Me on the net

Those of you who know me well already know this, but for the benefit of those who do not, I will inform you of my current ability to use the force, ahem, I mean the net.
At the moment I do not own a computer. This makes a few things easy/cheap, but also makes others difficult.
The advantages: Well, I didnt have to fork out the large wads of cash required for a computer in the first place which is good. If I had a computer I would probably get the net at home and would have to get a fixed land line instead of using my mobile as my home phone. On top of this I would have to pay internet access from some service provider.
The disadvantages: Unfortunately this leaves the only access to the net is on my work computer. Therefore reading/replying to emails or looking up stuff/blogging is limited to me being in the office. That's not too bad but of course I need to do my work and not spend too much time on non work related things.
The other disadvantage is that since I dont have unlimited time to write posts or comments, it is hard to say exactly what I mean in the time allotted. So, if I write something that doesnt sound right, feel free to send me an email to discuss.
Other than that, the ability to type and print youth group talks and prayers etc. for church is another small disadvantage.
Probably the dullest post ever, but what are you going to do?

News on the job front.

Well, it's Friday and I certainly still work in the same place.
I went to Parramatta for the interview on Monday night. It wasnt really what I was expecting. I went in and we had the usual chats between myself and the 3 directors. They were all quite cool and one guy seemed to be a Christian. There were pretty much 4 reasons why I didnt take the job (they pretty much offered it to me on the spot).
Chronologically:
Reason #1. They were interested in someone who would sign up for the next 10 or so years and probably end up being a director. I really only wanted the job for 12 months and I think it would be pretty slack to give them the wrong idea.
Reason #2. Their opinion of 'excellent salary' and mine differed slightly. I am not moving to Sydney and battling Parramatta traffic on a daily basis (dont get me wrong I love driving, but sometimes I think the middle of Parra is worse than the middle of the city) for the same money as I will get after my pay review in a years time.
Reason #3. The advertised company car would remain at the office for the first 6 months and after that I would be allowed to take it home. Also, the Commadore/Falcon I had in my head turned out to be a corolla. Not that I dont like Corolla's, well, compared to the falcon I own now, they are pretty ordinary.
Reason #4. The following day at work the boss talked to me about how we just werent getting any people applying for the other engineer's position at our office. We also just lost a draftsman and so if I left we would be down 2 engineers and a draftsman and the company would be pretty stuffed. The boss also talked to me about changes to the way the office works with kind of jobs we do and also that I should expect good things out of the upcoming pay review.

So, here I stay for the moment. However, if I get offered a job in southern sydney with a company car that I can use straight away and a decent salary I would seriously consider it. It would mean I could pay off the current car (so no more repayments each fortnight) and I would be able to live at Dad's house (so no rent). I thought of the option of just moving to Dad's house anyway, but I think that the $105 a week rent I pay will be spent in petrol getting to work instead.

Post

I suppose it has been a while since my last 'what have I been up to' post. That is partly the fault of one certain online game known as Bejewelled 2.
This aside I have been up to a few things. I had a solid day of role playing with the dudes on Monday which was really good. Origin was last night and afterwards hanging out at Lisa's house for an end of exams dessert and drinks night she organised was good as well. Good relaxed atmosphere and got to say 'hi' to Sim as he was walking out the door.
Sunday night was really good with after supper supper at Litani's.
I have also applied for a few jobs advertised on seek. Partly to find out what is out there, and partly to be able to use in my salary review which is coming up. I think if I get the positions advertised I will take them to my current boss and say "this is what I have been offered, can you come close to matching it?" I figure that I have 12 months to get myself into a good financial situation (pay off loan etc) and then I can start MTS halfway through next year. I just need to make sure I use the next 12 months to the best of my ability.
I have an interview on Monday night for a job in Parramatta (company car provided) and I got a call yesterday about one in Albury but I dont know if I am willing to move.
Oh, that's the other thing, my Dad has offered for me to stay at his house for the next 12 months virtually rent free. It is in Sutherland though, so I would then have to revert back into sir travels-alot for that period of time. Not that it's a problem. In good traffic its only 30mins from Wollongong. Need to decide if that is a smart move or not.

Godliness with Contentment is Great Gain

In one sense I have been hesitant to write a post on the topic of singleness, but a conversation I had with a friend on Saturday night helped clarify (and succinctly word) some thoughts I had on the topic, particularly with it's relevance to contentment.
Also, with Matt posting similar type posts, I thought I would add my 2 cents.
So, here we go...
It is quite easy to adopt the thoughts in one's head: "I will be happy when I meet someone". Society (and especially the media) promote this and as you start looking around, what you see seems to back up these thoughts. The TV says (I'm paraphrasing) 'sick of your unhappy life?, then go to the gym and get thin, once you are thin then the opposite sex will find you attractive and you will be happy'.
This is a big pile of poo! There are heaps of things in life that get people upset. Whether it is uni, or work, or just coz you are getting a bit sick, you cant escape life without being upset part of the way through. The trouble is that when we look at our lives we can think 'I just need someone and then I will be happy' we are fooling ourselves. Ask (or just plain observe) the married people you know. Are they happy/content people because they are married? Or because of the kind of people they are?
I think you will find it is almost always the latter. It is easy to look around and think that the single people are the uncontent ones. I dont think it just some kind of odd coincidence that the guys that seem to have most of the girls attentions seem to be the content ones.
When looking for a potential partner, I think one thing that is often thought of is: Is this person content in themself? Are they going to be my equal partner in life or am I going to have to babysit them the whole way? Am I going to be comfortable knowing that this person is content in themselves or am I going to be treading on eggshells for the rest of my life?
Now this being said, of course there is a definite place for carrying each others burdens and looking after each other. I was more commenting on what seems to make people attractive.
When talking with my friend (he is married), he said that the understanding he has come to, is that marriage is not for contentment, but for holiness.
I think the way he has put it is helpful. He didnt enter his marriage thinking that it would make him happy, he entered it thinking it would make him more holy. The presence of his wife in his life had a significant effect on his holiness. He found that his now wife encouraged him greatly towards holiness. He was holier with her in his life.
How do you go with seeking to be content in the situation you are in?. If you are like me, it is damn tough. Blocking out the message conditioned by years of living in the world is hard. Some helpful things I have found to do are:
- Try not to watch too much TV or read magazines which reinforce the incorrect thinking.
- Be proactive in organising your life to be full of things (especially hanging out with friends). This means there is less time to sit there and think your life is dull.
- Read your bible and see the great things God has done for you. Know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him. He saved you from an eternity away from Him, in the light of this, everything pales into insignificance.
- Spend time researching what life in other countries in the world is like. Especially third world countries. Next time you put the heater on, eat food till you are full, or have a hot shower, thank God that you can have these things.
- Try to aviod certain situations that are unhelpful. (especially if you are in a certain frame of mind). In one day, I went to a friends wedding and then had dinner with 2 ex-housemates and their wives. They spent most of the time talking about their married life and spouse and I had a less-than-great time. Instead, try to go to things that have mixed groups or non-clingy marrieds.
As you look around and dwell on the things you have, as opposed to the things you do not, your focus shifts from unhappiness to thanks and life is far more enjoyable. As you enjoy life, other things which you had wanted are far more likely to fall into place.
Dont get me wrong, this is all ultra hard and takes time. But as I have gone through this process (well most of it) I have been grateful to God that he has blessed me abundantly with great friends, a good job, a good car, a good place to live, never being hungry (genuinely hungry I mean), ministries, I could go on but you get the idea.
The other thing to ask is: How are you going in bringing out the best in people? Are you making them more holy by your presence or less?
If you dont have any concerns about being single then thank the Lord for that!
Comments?

What I do at work.

Apart from sleeping, the one thing that takes up most of my time is work.
What do you do? I hear you ask.
Well, I am an Engineer. Technically my job title is Structural Design Engineer but that sounds a bit over the top. Engineers are at heart problem solvers. The problems that I solve at work basically revolve around buildings and making sure they stand up under a set of assumed loads.
Much of my day is spent in front of the computer (hence being able to blog things whilst not actually owning a computer) designing things, and the rest usually involves going out on site inspecting the buildings being built to make sure they are building it right.
For a typical building, we will get the Architectural drawings and from that I will make a finite element model of the building in my computer. It's pretty fun and generally doesnt require too much brain power. Each building is made up of slabs, beams, columns and walls. I also put in the loads for the 'dead weight' elements inside the building such as tiles and stud walls.
Once the model is made, the computer solves it. Each element is assigned properties and the computer turns the model into a matrix of simultaneous equations to solve. One particularly large model was a 100Million x 100Million matrix. The computer solved it in about 1.5 hours.
Once the model is solved, I can find out any loads on any part of the building and design the elements from that to resist those loads (safety factor in there of course :) ).
Once the sizes of the members are decided, sketches are given to a draftsperson who turns the sketches into drawings that the builder can build off.
Inspections are pretty fun. You get to go out to some pretty cool sites such as the penthouse level of a beachfront block of units. It also changes up the day and getting out of the office is also good. Oh, did I mention that I get to drive the boss's brand new commadore as well. :)
That's most of it really. Not particularly exciting for the non-technical but I like it. It is challenging and no two days are the same. There are some interesting projects worked on as well, such as the new golf club house and the big block of units on the corner of Station and Crown St's.

Then till now

What has been happening lately? Short answer - not much, long answer - Also not much.
I will, however, attempt to fill in the details so as to not be too dull. Maybe I will comment on a few areas of life as well.
Last weekend I was sick. I dont get sick very often but I still hate it. What I mean is that I dont get so sick I have to take days off work or cant make it to things very often. In fact over my working life (including working while at uni) I can probably count on both hands the amount of days off I have had for being sick (not counting nose fixing operation).
So, being sick I couldnt go to sport or the gym coz my head hurt whenever I moved it around too quickly. After waking up at about 1:00Pm, I stayed in bed and finished reading "The DaVinci Code" and may I say what a pile of crap. Dont get me wrong, as a story teller and book writer, Dan Brown is really good. I quite enjoyed the book from that point of view but the historical and theological 'facts' that he explains with an air of unshakable certainty were pretty ordinary (actually just plain wrong). If I hear about the sacred feminine one more time I think I will throw up (either that or try and castrate Dan Brown). I think I will write a more in depth review on my thoughts as a later post.
After that I layed on the couch under my doona with the heater on and watched movies for the rest of the day (till 4:30). I had borrowed "King Arthur" and "The usual suspects" off Matt (ChinDoGu) which were quite good. "King Arthur" was a standard Jerry Bruckheimer movie with action and standard 'good guys win' action. No real twists and fairly formulaic. I still like movies like that and find them fairly entertaining. On the other hand "The usual suspects" was very clever and thought out. Not your standard movie. Had a great ending.
At 5:00 met the boys in town and we watched the rugby union final. Quite entertaining, though the Waratahs lost. Tim and I went to Macca's and got soft serve cones and went to 'The girl's house' and watched Star Wars episode 4. I thought it was good watching it thinking back to 3. I want to watch 6 again and see the emperor die. His death is so much more meaningful now we know the full story.
Role played on Monday night. I think the Bard wasted about 45 minutes of game time singing songs for people and being rediculously too careful in finding our contact who, was pointed out to me when I got jack of it and just asked the bartender. He said "that guy over there". Ohh well. It was pretty fun and I am really getting into it. Looking forward to next session. It's also comforting to know that Sally's character is there to look after me. Shame a L2 Wizard has been more effective in combat than a Shifter Barbarian... ;).
As for general things, bible study is going well. We studied Revelation Chapter 7 this week and we are going through the book at a blistering pace (not). It has promoted lots of good discussion and I think generally it has been helpful for those involved. This weeks discussion included the 144000 and who they were. We had a few options. Some said they could be old testament 'Christians', others thought they could be Christians alive when Jesus returns. I think generally the overall consensus was that they were the whole people of God who were sealed. The 144000 turn up later on in the book as well and we kind of agreed to keep chewing through before we solidified our thoughts.