Rocky Top

I greatly apologize on my tardiness on the blog but I’ve been kind of busy with a whole bunch of stuff. I have several things that I want to write about so I need to get on the stick...

So here ya go…

Friday, late in the afternoon the boss man said “Yes or no, do you want tickets to the Tennessee game tomorrow?”

Me: “Give me a sec”…”How many?”

Boss: “Four”

A couple of phone calls and arm twisting later, it was on. Knoxville or bust to watch a team that I really don’t root for but who cares, I’ve never been to a college football game much less a SEC game.

So Amanda, Nay Nay, The Doche and I headed up at about 7am on Sat. morning. The drive to Knoxville was pretty chill and we got there about 20 minutes before game time. Of course, Amanda had to patronize a local bookstore and get all oranged out. Like I just said, I’ve never been to a college football game so going to one of the biggest stadiums in the country was incredible. The amount of orange that I saw that day will be forever be engrained into my brain. It was crazy. I can’t imagine what would have happened if I went to such a big school.

The game was awesome and we had great seats. Tennessee ended up putting a spank down on Arkansas so people were pretty pumped. After the game, we headed back South. On the way back, we watched about 10 episodes of It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia on my new toy…Covered in the next post…

Team Spirit

Ridiculous amounts of orange

More team spirit

Post game at a local watering hole

And Yet Another Reason why I enjoy my Church...

This was the opening song yesterday at Buckhead Church...Freakin' insane...And then Jeff Henderson gave one of the best messages I have ever heard and want to apply to my life...Listen to it here...It's called out of the Shadows...

B-Day Bash

Last Saturday I turned 28 years of old. I guess that's pretty cool right? Kind of on that downhill slide to the big 3-0. A bunch has happened these past 12 months and I would say almost all of them are pretty darn good. I was thinking about writing about all the things that took place and ponder on them but I figured that nobody would really care...

The day itself was pretty good though. During the day, the small group gang volunteered at an extremely well run women's shelter. It was a really fulfilling and great experience. Then, as you read in the previous post, I got to watch one of the little ones in my UpStreet group get baptized...It could have ended there and it would have been perfect...But...Since there were several of us that had B-Days around the same time we all went out to celebrate together. We first headed to an awesome restaurant called Tap. Great food with an extraordinary selection of imported beers. Afterwards we hit up Cosmo/Lave for some dancin' action...Great times, great friends...

Here's a few pics from the evening...

The Amandas looking hot...

The Brown Man in all his glory

The Boys...

My lover of my soul...

Not really a great Fantasy...

This is my first official year playing fantasy football and I have to be honest, I'm not very good. I thought I had a good team but Stephen Jackson went down, Anquan Boldin, Matt Leinart, Vince Young and now Marvin Harrison...Boo bears...

I thought that Daunte C. was going to be a horse for me but apparently I don't check out what's happening and both him and Harrison didn't play this past Sunday...Look at this weak performance...Zeros are no bueno in Fantasy Football.

Still in a 4 way tie for fifth...Got a chance for the playoffs...

Why I do what I do...

As many of you know, I teach Sunday school (UpStreet) at Buckhead Church. I've been doing this for almost two years and I absolutely love it. Of all the things during the week that I do, this is by far my favorite thing that I honestly look forward to. I get the opportunity to hang out with 15 third graders that I think are about the coolest kids ever.

Well on Saturday night, Buckhead Church had Family Celebration which is an event where they baptize the kids (k-8th) that have accepted Christ as their Savior and want to publicly profess it. Well, one of the little girls in my group, Maggie Leigh got baptized. The cool part about it is they film a short one minute clip of the kids of why they are here getting baptized. Their testimony basically. Maggie Leigh was absolutely adorable and did such an incredible job.

Also, to make the night even better, one of the girls in Amanda's 7th grade group got baptized as well. She did such an amazing job as well and had a great testimony of why Christ is her Savior.

All in all, 19 kids got baptized. Watching their videos made me realize how complicated I make things some times. Some of their videos just hit me right in the gut and were like "Duh Jonathon, why do you make this harder than it is?"

It was by far the best B-Day present I've ever gotten...

How bad I want an I Phone

I don't know why, but I really want an I Phone. Don't know if I'd ever fully utilize all that it has to offer but it doesn't matter, I want one. I looked at them at the Apple Store and I was messin' around with the I Pod Touch at Best Buy and I was convinced that I need to go all in and get the I Phone. The thing is just rad...

So as I was reading something on espn.com, up popped the banner ad for a free IPhone. Anybody that has ever been on the internet has at least seen one of those Free I Pod banners. I've never ever have been tempted to look at one of these but for some totally un-intelligent reason, I clicked on it and filled out the survey along with my email address thinking for some reason at the end an I Phone would magically appear along with a hologram of Steve Jobs telling me out to use it...I tell you right now, I didn't get the I Phone. What I did get and I'm so happy about is lots more email. It seems I'm a popular guy now and everybody is offering to give me a great interest rate, enlarge certain limbs on my body, sell me prescription drugs...You get the point...

Everyone has idiot moments and I had mine...Mr. Jobs, if you're out there please see my passion for your product and just hook me up dude...

Jack Daniels World BBQ Championship

This past Saturday Amanda and I headed up to Lynchburg, TN to an event that I've wanted to go to for the last four years....The Jack Daniels World BBQ Championship. This may have been one of the coolest things I have ever been to. Basically, it's all things BBQ and you have to have game to get into this thing. You either have to win a state championship or be invited. 60 teams in total...4 Categories - BBQ Sauce, Ribs, Pulled Pork and Brisket...

The food was absolutely insane. So good. Makes me want to buy a cooker and start cooking for a living. Probably not going to happen but you have to have dreams. There were several international teams there sporting their colors and bringing some good grub....

Besides for the food, the highlight of the trip was the tour of the Jack Daniels distillery. First of all, it was free and that in itself is freakin' cool. Second, we had a tour guide named Ron that was awesome. He gave a great tour of the facility that lasted for about an hour. Learned about the process from start to finish. Some interesting facts that you may have not known:
1) Built specifically on this site because of the Iron Free cave water they use
2) 77 Barrel houses around Lynchburg holding one million gallons of Jack
3) Jack builds their own barrels and torches the inside...That's where the brown color comes from
4) You can buy a single barrel of Jack for 8-10 Grand...Apparently it's a big deal...George Staight did
5) Drip raw distilled booze through charcoal - 10 ft. worth
6) Only place in county to be able to sell booze

I highly recommend this tour as well as the event. It was just cool. Lots of food and lots of cool people.

I've attached a slide show below and have all the pics right here