Urban Gardens

Until recently, I had a narrow perception of Jonah as pitiful and angry and bitter. Thatâ??s how the Bible describes him. Lately, however, my perception of Jonah is broadening. First, I heard a sermon series by RC Sproul on the subject of Jonah then, my church did a series on Jonah. Itâ??s a whale of a tale weighing the grace of God against the self-righteousness of man and Iâ??m discovering stuff I didnâ??t know. LOVE how Godâ??s Word does that!

Have you ever had a â??belly of the fishâ?? kind of experience where you were covered my the mirk and mire of oneâ??s circumstances, yet it was your salvation? We donâ??t often see the salvation until later, kind of like Jesus and the tomb ….. (duh – if you cross reference much of anything thatâ??s an easy match). But because we donâ??t live in the â??ever afterâ?? but in the â??here and nowâ?? in the midst of our stinky, acidic, rotting circumstances we forget to be thankful. Sometimes it is good to remember that despite everything, God calls us to Himself. We canâ??t get away from His purposes. We canâ??t run away from His agenda. We canâ??t escape His love.

We continue to stay busy. Besides our regular Laugh Out Loud improv shows, we’re also traveling to do holiday shows and enjoying attending some as well. We’re also both starting to go on more commercial auditions. Corey’s actually booked a couple! If you live anywhere that has a Firestone store, you might see him pop up in a commercial as “Donut guy.” If you live in Chicago, you’ll be lucky enough to see him this Spring in a commercial for a local costume store as the store manager. I’m getting closer and closer to booking, but haven’t quite yet. It just takes perseverance. In fact the statistics show that you only book one in every 27 auditions, so I figure it’s just a matter of time.

Last summer we wrote a short film. It started out as a sketch for a show we were helping to write, and when it didn’t quite fit into that show, we decided to extend it and film our first short movie. Thankfully we had wonderful friends willing to help us make it. Though it took a while to finally finish, we’re proud to present “The Pinata.” Please check it out and if you like it, pass it along!

Emotions in musical form? You’re fucking kidding, right? I’d like you to play ennui in G minor, if you please. How can centuries worth of music all be about emotions? No classical arrangement was ever about fucking, or beer, or fucking beer? If you want to hear a bunch of songs about emotions, listen to Pinkerton. What a gross generalization for something you claim to have such a nuanced appreciation for. Second, hundreds of unique melodies? Shostakovich probably wrote hundreds of unique melodies himself, so aren’t you underselling this part? Then again, so has Matthew Good. So that really doesn’t distinguish anything from anything. And finally, as you enjoy your empty glass full of fart, ‘written by true musical geniuses’? Have you ever considered the possibility that there is shitty classical music written by shitty composers, just as there are shitty pop songs today? Maybe, a hundred plus years on, the shit just got filtered out? And furthermore, there’s an awful lot of mediocre classical music floating around written by supposed geniuses.

Hey kids, the third and final installment of our Marriage Counseling videos is up (be sure to watch it all the way through). We have just two more performances of The Union – A Very Civil War at Donny’s Skybox, tonight is one of them. The show is at 10:30pm and we’d love to see you there!

It’s funny how things work out sometimes. I was dreading teaching today–talking about water for a 2-hr class with preschoolers? It sounded miserable. A class about sharks or tidepools or coral reefs is fun. But a whole class about water? Oh brother, I didn’t know how I would pull it off. On top of that, I was supposed to discuss the water cycle (can preschoolers even say the words precipitation, evaporation and condensation?), and the density of fresh water versus salt water. DENSITY?!

Yeah, so I really wasn’t looking forward to teaching. And you know what? It turned out fine. Even better than fine. The 4 and 5 year olds were well behaved, adorable, and really smart. They got everything. Kids will surprise you. And they can crack you up too. I forgot how fun teaching can be.

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