This afternoon, I got the chance to spend some time with Bryan Conrad and his staff at the UF Biomechanics Lab. They are the people who use motion capture technology to analyze everything from golf swings to dance moves to quarterback throwing motion and reaction time. Today, he gave me a tour of the lab, showed me the kind of full 3D work they do with the athletes at UF, and ran me through the reaction time test. While I don’t think I can share any of the information on the specific patient named “T. Tebow,” I can tell you that thanks to this lab, his motion has improved over the past few years.
For my test, they had me stand in the ready position and played a noise. When the noise sounded, I had to get rid of the ball as soon as possible. They measured from the time of the sound to the first movements of my hands (which had the awesome motion-control dots on them) and then from the first movement to the time I released the ball. Those are the reaction times and the release times. My average reaction time was 0.46 seconds, and my average release time as 0.395 seconds, adding up to an average total time of 0.86 seconds. Again, while I don’t think I can give Tebow’s specific numbers, they are in that under-a-second range, so it was cool to know that I at least have some quickness (though you will notice I have almost no cocking back of the ball since I was focused on getting it out quickly). Plus, the velocity of my throws was only in the low 30 mph range, well below a NCAA QB. That’s all I will say for now, but for the full write-up on the experience, check out my brother’s blog (http://year2.wordpress.com) very soon. My brother was the guy that initiated the contact with the lab that allowed me to have this awesome experience, so thank you to him, and be sure to check out his stuff. Also, of course, a big thank you to Bryan and his staff. Below is some sweet hi-speed video from the test. Again, look for the full post soon at http://year2.wordpress.com.
Getting my throw analyzed by the people that work with Tebow!
May 8, 200925 Things I Learned at the Monastery
March 13, 200925 Things I Learned at the Monastery
1. I talk a lot. Even when I am silent, I am always talking in my head.
2. I have forgotten how to walk slowly.
3. Roosters crow all day long, not just at dawn.
4. They place a strong emphasis on the Trinity here- more than I am used to. Every reading ends with “Praise the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit… The God who is, who was and is to come.” Also, at the beginning of the first service (4am) and the end of the last service (7:30pm), they ring the bell three sets of three times and then nine continuous times. I took this to be another way of symbolizing the three distinct persons of the Trinity and then the unified oneness of God.
5. Church at 4 a.m. can actually be a good thing- not that I am advocating it at UF.
6. Pine forests are the coolest places to walk, read, nap, and pray.
7. I miss baseball season. I have seen so many orioles, blue jays, and cardinals, and baseball is the first thing that came to mind. Too bad I will only watch the first two weeks and then get bored with it until the playoffs…
8. It is way easier for Shawn and Katie to be quiet, read, and reflect than any of you would ever have imagined 
I was never worried about David or Doug…
9. Their translation of the Psalms, which are used at every worship service, has given us the opportunity to chant such unique and, quite frankly, funny things such as “aha!”, “bosom friend,” and “rock-badger.”
10. The Minor Prophets (Hosea – Malachi) will depress you unless you read each book in one sitting. The promise for restoration, forgiveness, and reconciliation with God usually comes at the end, and it’s worth reading that section immediately after the “gloom and doom.”
11. Work (especially homework) is so much easier if you give yourself a chance to fully wake up and get in touch with God. As Dr. Tuttle says, “If you were to pray for 23 hours a day, that 24th hour would be something to behold!”
12. I seriously need to get Sabbath back into my routine- playing video games all morning on Fridays no longer cuts it!
13. Ducks take naps. I know- I watched one. It lasted about 20 minutes.
14. On the other hand, Canadian geese do not sleep- ever. They honk all night long. Also, FYI, their poop is green… and very slippery.
15. Flickering Pixels by Shane Hipps will blow your mind and open your eyes to how different media (meaning the actual medium through which content is delivered- text, TV, radio, internet, oral tradition, etc.) can control you and how you receive the content through each medium. I highly recommend this book!
16. Social justice, Mother Theresa, Shane Claiborne, and Mother Theresa’s quote, “Be the change you want to see,” are currently the “in” thing in the Christian circles I follow. I hope it’s more than a fad.
17. I want an awesome robe with a sweet hood and ginormous sleeves. Plus those soft shoes that let you walk in complete silence- the monks float by like ghosts!
18. I am way more self-centered than I thought.
19. I miss Kara. (Note: list not in order of importance…)
20. During the Lenten season, when we look forward to the resurrection, the Psalms that are chanted in worship deal mainly with God’s unfailing love, forgiveness, and mercy. It has made me aware of the ways in which I don’t live like I believe it.
21. You can use Purell to get tree sap off of your Mac.
22. Fasting from soda is super easy if it’s nowhere in sight. The only time I have even thought about it was during our meals on the way to and from the monastery.
23. I have thanked God more this week than all of 2009 so far, and thanked God for a wider variety of things. It is not that I have not had things to be thankful for, but I have felt an overwhelming sense of gratitude this week.
24. In case you were wondering, here is what I read this week besides for school: Flickering Pixels by Shane Hipps, and from the Bible I chose two main sections (the sections with the shortest books), which are the Minor Prophets (12 books from Hosea-Malachi) and the General Epistles (7 books from James-Jude). I chose these sections of the Bible so I could read each book in one sitting and try to see the big picture in each.
25. I am a lot like the little tree in the picture below that I took in the pine forest- vibrantly green and growing but still a ways to go when compared to everyone around me.
Random thoughts…
March 7, 2009For some reason, my brain is going a mile a minute tonight, and I thought maybe the best way to calm it down would be to empty it into a blog post… Perhaps it has something to do with the Starbucks dark chocolate frappucino I had 2 hours ago, but that leads me into number one.
1. How is your lent going? I have to admit that I have not been keeping up with our Gator Wesley lenten devotional. I laid the whole thing out, so I have skimmed most of them, but I really do intend to read them all. I will certainly catch up next week at the monastery. Besides that, and the way in which this relates to the introduction (in case you were not seeing the connection), I gave up soda for lent. I read a column about how giving up soda and candy and stuff is lame and that I should really have given up TV or technology or other things that actually take time, but its working well for me. I certainly had/have a soda dependency, and I am just beginning to see the strength of it. I didn’t have any caffeine headaches, which was nice. I also am noticing that caffeine is having more of an effect after not having it for a week and a half (and there’s the connection to the intro…)- which I had pretty much forgotten what it was like for it to actually do anything. Yet, I still really want a soda with meals and in the middle of the afternoon. It is scary how much flavored sugar water has captured my being. But that’s where I am connecting to God. I am seeing my dependencies on other things and am reminded that Christ is the ultimate source of freedom.
2. Its no longer if but how… Paul and Amber have described Kara and I as Mac evangelists. I cannot comment for Kara, but I for one am here to declare that apparently my calling is to something much bigger- apparently it is tech in general. I am probably too late to be considered a really cool early adopter, but I am finally well steeped in the web 2.0 world. In short, web 2.0 is the general universe of websites that are heavily dependent upon user content and contributions. For example, I personally have: a website, a WordPress blog (which interfaces with Facebook and Virb), a Twitter account (with 3 separate ways of posting to Twitter without going to their website), a Facebook page (which interfaces with Twitter), a Posterous blog (which interfaces with WordPress and Twitter), a LinkedIn profile, an online store (for my music and swag), an Evernote account, a MySpace page, and a Virb page. Now, I have streamlined how I interact with all of them- for example the Twitter, Facebook, WordPress blog, and Posterous all work pretty much in conjunction by posting the same content while I do virtually nothing with MySpace or Virb anymore. You will notice the glaring absence of photo sharing sites but that’s because I don’t have a digital camera or a phone camera that takes pictures worth sharing. For the campus ministry I work for, I pretty much run all of the same sites plus a 12 Seconds account and a YouTube channel. This week alone, I have convinced 2 friends to join Twitter because its pretty boring following only 3 or 4 real friends and then a bunch of celebrities who just post about what video game they are playing- although kudos to Rainn Wilson (of the Office) and Cameron Strang (editor of Relevant) for having Twitter feeds worth following. The gist is- for me, it is no longer a question of if I will use new technologies and web resources, but how can I use them most effectively to communicate and build community. Some would argue that isn’t possible over the internet, but I would ask you to look up “Obama, Barack” in the non-existent dictionary of successful online communication dictionary. I will not comment for or against his presidency, but his campaign and their use of technology was a free lesson for any organization.
3. It is late. This is the 4th night in a row that I have been up until 1am. Now, for most of my college students, that is no big deal. Hansol never sleeps, Shawn and Kris play video games until the wee hours every night, and Laurie told me she wasn’t going to sleep tonight and would wait until she gets in the van for the 13 hour car ride to Washington D.C. with our Gator Wesley mission team. However, I had been in a pretty good groove of going to bed between 11pm and midnight all through January and February. I think I have been seeing the trip to the monastery next week on the horizon and thus I could catch up on sleep then. However, even though I have still been able to get up and go to work in the morning, it has led to some slow afternoons and made studying for the online Church History exam that I have Sunday at 9pm virtually impossible. It also factored into my decision to drink the Starbucks while driving for two and a half hours in the dark to get to Bartow. Thus, in some weird way, my not sleeping has led to me not sleeping tonight…
Well, I really should head to bed. We have breakfast at 8:30am in the morning and then a full day. I am also preaching Sunday morning in Bartow, so I want to be fresh and ready for that in a day and a half. Thanks for letting me spill my brain. If you are still reading this, even if you skimmed some- gold star to you. Goodnight.
Peace
Dan
What I am learning from Tiger Woods
February 25, 2009Tomorrow (Wednesday), Tiger Woods makes his return. It has been big news all over the sports shows and sites I check out. Everyone is super excited about the return of quite possibly the best known athlete in the world. Surely, this is exciting for sports fans, especially golf fans, but I feel like Tiger is teaching me a few lessons with the timing of his return this week. Namely: priorities, patience, and the value of excellence.
First, Tiger just had a kid a little while back. To have waited on returning until after his wife had the baby to make sure he was around during the important last few weeks and months of the pregnancy shows that Tiger has his priorities in order. Now, all of the moms out there may argue that choosing to return shortly after the birth and leaving his wife home with a newborn still presents a challenge, and they would be right. But, he still showed that he was willing to wait for the good of his family.
Second, Tiger was willing to wait as long as it took to get back to strength and get his priorities in order. It cannot be easy for someone who is ultra-competitive to be patient. Yet, the patience Tiger has in the actual game of golf was mirrored or even surpassed by his patience of the course of the last year. If he was truly able to stick to his rehab regime and not overwork too early, as would be easy if you are itching to get back at it, then he is a great model of taking what seems like the longer, harder road to reap the better benefit in the end.
Thirdly, Tiger will probably show the value of excellence this week. As I have already mentioned, Tiger has waited to get back to strength and full health, but I guarantee that today’s practice round was not his first round since the surgery. It is also not the tenth round. It is probably much higher than that. The media storm around his first public practice round seemed to baffle his swing coach. They kept asking if he was back to his full ability. The coach essentially responded, Now, this is a paraphrase and not a direct quote (which is why I used the “carrots” ), but let’s read between the lines and behind his coaches wry smile. What he was really communicating was, The coach understands why people might think he would be worse. Tiger had surgery that would keep him off the course for a long time, and you get rusty when you don’t do something, even if you were good at it. Yet, Tiger did not just wait to get healthy but to get good too. If the spotlight is on, there is a value in excellence.
So, what can I take away? In the realm of priorities, if a man who thrives off of competition and whose world seems to completely revolve around the game of golf can put off his return until its good for his family, then I should be able to make self and family care a priority too. In the realm of patience, I really have none, so Tiger serves as a great example. In the realm of excellence, I feel that it is comparable in my ministry and the life of the church. Simply put- don’t do something publicly until you are good at it. The brighter the spotlight will be, the more excellent the offering should be before you give it to the public. For example, if you are planning a new activity or worship service or even a new song- don’t roll it out until you are ready (unless shaping and refining it are part of the program).
Those are just a few of my thoughts inspired by Tiger’s return. What do you think?
Peace
Dan
Obama Inaugural Address Quote WP
January 20, 2009
Obama Inauguration Quote WP 1440x900
Here’s a quick wallpaper that I put together with the closing quote from Obama’s inaugural address. It also has the full text of the address in the background. At this point, I only have a 1440×900 version, but check back later for other sizes.
Peace,
Dan
