RecoveringBaptist

On this day

2011-09-11T09:13:00.000-04:00

I have this blog so I can write things that are too politically correct for me to have associated with my real name. So here it goes.

Ten years ago today a brilliant enemy of the United States completed its attack. And truth be told, today I wish I could find a way to avoid all of the attempts to remember what happened. It's not that I'm trying to hide from an ugly truth, nor is it that I don't recognize, honor, and appreciate those who gave their lives trying to save others.

Remembering the aftermath of 9/11 reminds me that the terrorists won.

The purpose of terrorism is to instill fear into an enemy in order to change their actions. Since that fateful day we have gladly traded our freedoms for the appearance of security and have happily sacrificed thousands more sons and daughters on foreign soil. We have toppled two governments that were marginally, if at all, associated with the real culprits and violated the sovereignty of other nations.

And for what? So that on this day, ten years later, people can sell T-shirts and make advertiser-supported TV shows to "remember" what happened. As if any of us could forget...

How big is your Gospel?

2011-08-09T07:15:00.001-04:00

I heard a local preacher who I generally like this morning on his regular advertisement-length mini-sermon. He was talking about the parable of the prodigal son. He said something like “this story talks about our present day relationship with God, but I think it is also a great image of what will come in the next life.”

What a shame. Yes, the Gospel is about our eternity in Heaven, but it is so much more than that. A lot of Christians get caught up in that future hope that they overlook the power of the Gospel in our lives as we live them today. This is a message that Christians need to be constantly reminded of, and it is a more powerful evangelistic message for a post-modern age.

Random technical thoughts

2011-07-25T07:18:00.000-04:00

RB's random technical thoughts from the Dominican"

It's tough to write coherently when there's a fly buzzing around your head
Non-American keyboards are tough enough, but they're even tougher when what appears on the screen doesn't match the button on the keyboard. Good thing I can touch type, because I would never have found the question mark on this thing...
A couple of weeks ago I bought a wacky little gizmo that has an Android tablet on one side and a Kindle-like e-reader on the other. The tablet is useless in the sun, but that e-reader rocks. I can get used to that.
International television is interesting. They have channels in the DR that we don't get in the States like Cubavizion Internacional.

Celebrating survival

2011-07-25T07:13:00.000-04:00

We've already heard the question several times. "Is this your anniversary? Are you celebrating something special?" The answers, although we don't always give them are, "No and Yes."

No, we're not near a nice, even anniversary date. But we don't care. We're celebrating the fact that we've come this far literally and figuratively. We're nearly 13 years into marriage, and we love each other now more than we ever have. Staying married isn't easy; growing to love each other more when you're had some hard times is even tougher, and yet we have. We're very, very blessed.

So no, it's not our anniversary, and it's not a second honeymoon, but we don't care.

Oh yeah, so why would people be asking these fairly personal questions? What's going on? We're in the beautiful country of the Dominican Republic eating, drinking, and doing pretty much whatever the hell we want to for a week. After being together this long we figure we deserve it.

Church Review - Church of the Apostles

2011-07-16T08:56:00.000-04:00

Church name: Church of the Apostles
Meeting place: 3585 Northside Parkway, Atlanta
Denomination: Anglican
Worship Style: Contemporary (piano led with several vocalist leads, backing vocals, band, and horns)
Dress: Varies, with suits for the older and more wealthy and jeans for younger parents
Demographics: Mostly white, almost completely upper middle class
Service times: 9:00 and 10:30

Dr. Michael Youssef is very well known and respected in evangelical circles. And the history of Apostles is impressive. It has grown from a small home church into a near-meagachurch with worldwide ministries.

While not quite as large as some churches in this city, the best way to describe this church is "big." The music is big with every instrument imaginable. Unfortunately the music is somewhat stuck in the late 1980's, complete with vocalists with hand-held mics and saxaphone. Everyone on stage wears a suit (or similar for the ladies). Of course, all of the music is played perfectly, and one of the vocalists had a studio-worthy voice. For those who enjoy the music the best place to sit is in the center in front of the balcony. Sitting under the balcony changes the acoustics for the worse.

Dr. Youssef is a dynamic speaker who comes from the older styled "preachy" preacher. What surprised me as someone who has visited before is how much he resembles some charismatic preachers. If it were ever possible to have an Anglican church that speaks in tongues, it would be Apostles.

Apostles offers nearly every program one could want, and there are numerous adult education (no one calls them Sunday Schools anymore) options. It is a very well run church.

Perhaps the strangest part of our visit to Apostles was how I reacted. I think this is more of a reflection on me than the church, but I bristled throughout almost the entire service. After 15 years as a Presbyterian, I am not comfortable with the Charismatic movement, and I have become accustomed to discussions of how The Gospel impacts our lives today instead of what it means for the saving of our souls. I know a lot of my friends love this church, and I am glad for them, but I have no intentions of going back anytime soon. Besides, I prefer to go to church barefooted, and that would look strange when wearing a three piece suit.

Church Review - Christian Church of Buckhead

2011-07-16T08:08:00.001-04:00

For those who don't know Georgia very well, there is a town in the state named Buckhead. It is a tiny town and not particularly fancy. This is NOT the Buckhead of which I speak in this post. This Buckhead is one of the wealthiest sections of Atlanta. And it's a strange place for this kind of church.

Church name: Christian Church of Buckhead
Meeting place: 3372 Peachtree Road, Atlanta in the old Christian Science Reading Room next to Maggianos near Lenox Mall
Denomination: Christian Church (which is a non-denominational denomination and not creatively named)
Worship Style: Modern pop (acoustic guitar led with keys, bass, and drums)
Dress: Casual (jeans)
Demographics: Mostly white, mostly young families or young professionals
Service times: 9:30 and 11:00

Review: We've visited this church a couple of time with friends. It's a fine church, and we could possibly worship there on a more regular basis. The worship is upbeat and modern with a good band. In our visits all of the songs were recently written with no hymns or songs with complex writing. There is no liturgy, but communion is observed (with grape juice in tiny cups) every week.

The building is rented, and the church has done a good job converting space designed for another religion to something that works for a Christian service. Flat screen TV's flank the stage for lyrics and other purposes. Artwork fills the wall behind the stage and is updated periodically based on the current sermon series. There are no kids in the service because they spend the entire time in Sunday School, which received high reviews from the younger critics in the RB household.

Derek is a cool guy and a fine preacher. His sermons are delivered in a very conversational style. His sermons are practical without a lot of "religious stuff." While he references a number of passages during his sermon, there isn't a lot of page turning. The sermons are applicable without being very challenging or threatening.

Christian Church of Buckhead is a good church, and we can see why our friends have made it their church home. However, our preference is for a church with a deeper root in historical Christianity. Christian Church of Buckhead seems to have left that with the historical trappings.

Reviewing Churches

2011-05-30T20:17:00.000-04:00

I love to dream about my next big idea. I've had a few that have come close to being worthwhile. I know this because other people implemented them long after I thought about it and did well. One day I'll actually pull the trigger on one of my ideas before someone else does and, hopefully, make some money in the process.

One of my ideas is to create a web tool for finding churches. Think about it. In any major metro area there are hundreds of churches, and there's no way to try them all. But if we could build a decent little tool that included objective information like denomination, number of services and starting times, and basic demographics, it would be very helpful. If we could then add on subjective information like "this church is more hipster and less pop" or "the preacher's sermons were dull," then we could have something very useful. But alas, I don't have the time to build such a thing. But should you, dear reader, ever find yourself looking for a church in Metro Atlanta, then you will have the benefit of RB's church reviews.

My next several posts will contain reviews. If you know these churches and want to counter them, then you are very welcome to in the comments. I'd love to know how your experience has differed from mine.

Something new

2011-05-15T08:46:00.000-04:00

Church shopping isn't everything it's cracked up to be, especially when the kids are asking if we've found our new "forever church." So I'm very excited about today's church - a "spirit filled" Lutheran church. I don't know much about the Lutherans, but that sounds like a contradiction. Then again, I never thought I'd find a charismatic Anglican church, but we visited a very large one of those a few weeks ago.

God does work in mysterious ways...

The Gospel at work

2011-05-11T07:00:00.000-04:00

I've sat under 3 different pastors in the past 12 years, and each of them focused on the centrality of the Gospel in our lives. But they weren't focusing on the Gospel in the way that my old SBC pastors did. There was never an alter call, and they rarely talked about Heaven or Hell. (That's not to say that they didn't, and Hell is a very real place that holds a lot of people.) Instead, they were talking about the fact that God, through Jesus, is making all things new and that he loves us because of Christ. There is nothing we can do or not do to make God love us less, and there is nothing we can do or not do to earn more of His favor.

If this isn't what you hear every Sunday, think about that for a moment. I heard this for 12 years, but it still didn't sink in. And now that I've been without a church home for a couple of months it has.

Over the past few years I have been a generally unhappy man. Some people have described me as full of rage. I've felt a need to be right. And I've given in to much more temptation than I would have liked.

But the last few weeks have been very different. Despite a very overwhelming work situation, sick kids, and a dead car, one of my few friends described me as a changed man. He had no idea I was under so much stress. And I have found temptation less inviting over the last few weeks. This is a huge change, and I'm not doing anything. No quiet times. Less worship and teaching. No more prayer than usual. How is this possible? How can God be working in my life?

The Gospel.

The answer is that God is working in my life. I'm not working. Christians don't have to work; that's the Holy Spirit's responsibility. And the more we recognize that and allow Him to work, the more like Christ we are.

Yes, I want to go back to church. And we're still church shopping. But I'm not going there looking for a solution. I'm going there to worship with other people who have realized the same thing. Jesus is the solution.

Lonely

2011-04-21T18:31:00.000-04:00

One of the things that a church can provide is community. When it does there is nothing better. When it does not then it can be lonely. But even then at least there is an appearance of community. Attending church with familiar faces gives a sense of comfort.

We lost real community at our last church. That's one of the reasons we left. It was painful to realize, but it was the honest truth. But now that we've been gone over a month the loneliness is sinking in.

Work has been very tough this week. I went for a walk this afternoon during work and really wanted to talk with someone and realized that there's no one to call, and there's no one to look forward to running in to on Sunday. The loneliness is really sinking in.

Leaving was the right thing to do, but I'm VERY ready to find a new home and a new group of friends.

Drunken theology

2011-04-14T01:07:00.000-04:00

Many years ago I broke up with a girl (or maybe she broke up with me) and found myself with a juice glass and a bottle of Jack Daniel's. I learned two things that night. 1) A juice glass is a poor choice for a shot glass. 2) A little alcohol and some good friends can lead to some interesting and worthwhile conversation.

So tonight I was hanging out with some old friends, trying out new beers, and talking. The conversation covered Nietzsche, Rob Bell, theology, hell, and Christianity in general. It was interesting to hear this crowd of evangelical, reformed, "theologically conservative" types recognizing that what we have known about theology could possibly be wrong or, at the very least, be as rooted in culture as it is in what Jesus actually said.

We never talked about my church search in particular, but it's weighing on me. On the one hand I think beliefs are very important. On the other, perhaps what's equally important is how loosely a church holds those beliefs and is willing to constantly compare them to the scriptures. And it's very interesting to see others recognize that a life consistently lived according to scriptures, even when espousing a theologically different perspective, should be respected and that someone who can logically support his opinion but cannot put it into practical living should not.

I don't know what happens when other people drink, but now you have a view into my world. Yes, I know it's not normal.

By the way, I married the girl. I'd be a poor, drunk bastard if I hadn't.

Turning the tables

2011-04-05T23:22:00.000-04:00

I'm writing a lot about the Baptists these days, but now it's time to talk about the home team. A recent post by an old friend made me think. He became a believer in college and in true PCA style started thinking. He learned all the right theology and, when that wasn't enough, became an expert in apologetics. For those who don't know, apologetics is the big Christian word for convincing someone to become a Christian.

My friend was in a debate tonight in front of an audience. His post is as follows:

a) If the Bible is inerrant then you can trust in the resurrection of Jesus
b) The Bible is not inerrant (Look at all these errors…)
...Therefore
c) you cannot trust in the resurrection of Jesus

But this is an invalid argument.

Who can name the error in their line of reasoning???

My response should be "who cares?" But then I would get in an online argument about arguing.

This may not be true about my old friend, but it was of me when I studied a little apologetics years ago: I focused so much on the fallacies of the other person's thinking and the rightness of mine that I forget the other person was there.

It's an old saying, but no one has ever been argued into heaven. And in today's post modern age Christians should not expect people to follow consistent, "logical" thought processes. A post modern age creates a different set of rules of logic. I'm not saying that apologetics is no longer a valid field of study, but we are nearing an age where we reclassify it as classical apologetics, useful only for historical purposes.

The Obvious

2011-04-05T20:20:00.000-04:00

Let's go ahead and get this one out of the way: Baptists dunk. It's kind of a key thing they do.

For a long time after leaving the Baptist church I wasn't sure what I thought of infant baptism. It seemed pretty clear to me that scripture advocates for taking adults to a river and putting them under water after a confession of faith. And there are good proof-texts for that. (For those who don't speak Christianese, proof-text is finding a few verses to support a particular belief. The criticism of proof texts is that they are often disconnected from a consistent theology.) However, now that I have 15 years of history as a Presbyterian I can find good solid theological arguments for infant baptism, too. So what to do?

There are some theological points that are not very clear in scripture. Since I'm not a theologian, one approach that I take is to consider what the theological viewpoint looks like in real life. If its application naturally leads to a more Christ-like life, then I try to choose that one. Take for example rewards in heaven. Some traditions argue each earns treasures in heaven based on their deeds on Earth while others hold that every is treated equally as a result of Jesus' sacrifice. I am motivated by treasures, so I act as if my work here leads to treasures there. Others are made more grateful because their deeds (or lack of them) have no impact on their afterlife experience and live a life of gratitude as a result. This is a practical viewpoint on theology.

A practical perspective on theology matters for me at this stage of parenting. The result of infant baptism is that my children, should they eventually confirm that they are God's children, is that they never know a day when they are under God's wrath. They will never live in fear that for some indeterminate time between when they became conscious and when they accepted Christ that they might die and land in hell. (I fully believe in hell, but maybe that's a post for another day.) This theology seems to be a practical demonstration of God's grace. Is there a place for understanding God's wrath? Absolutely. And that can be very clearly taught without scaring little kids. Many Baptists believe that the age of accountability is around 4 which leads them to start pushing kids to accept Christ at that age. A decision to follow Christ should not be made lightly, and it should be made by someone who truly understands what they're deciding. A theology of infant baptism properly delays a making a decision to follow or reject Christ to an age where they can truly make that kind of decision without instilling the fear that they're "not covered" in the interim.

How Baptist is too Baptist???

2011-04-03T23:33:00.000-04:00

It was really strange a few weeks ago to fill out a form and leave the "home church" line blank. We thought we might be able to just skip church for a few weeks, but that's too foreign. God works in many ways, but HE especially moves through HIS church. So today we found ourselves trying out a new church.

As a recovering Baptist, trying out new churches brings to mind a lot of questions, such as:

What do they believe?
What's the worship style?
How do they care for the kids?
How Baptist are they?

That last one's a kicker. I've already had a lot of people tell me that such and such a church isn't like other SBC churches. It's much more contemporary, etc. Or maybe a church will skirt the issue by saying that they're non-denominational and shouldn't be confused with the Baptists. Nice try!

Over the next few posts I'm going to break down some of the different aspects of what it means to be Baptist and what concerns me about that.

The interesting thing will be to see what God does. When I left the SBC and found myself at a PCA church I went with the attitude that I would yield to the authorities that God placed over me and learn their theology. So regardless of what I now hold as God-given facts, I may find myself in a church that believes somewhat differently from what I do now. But it will be somewhat awkward to continue to post on this blog if HE takes me back to a SBC church.

Changing churches

2011-04-03T23:19:00.000-04:00

Well, here we go. It looks like I may now be adding "Presbyterian" to the list of things from which I must recover.

Unlike the Baptists, I really don't have anything against the Presbyterians. And that's saying something since I've been Presbyterian for 15 years.

We've been in 2 PCA churches over that time and generally loved them. But as much as it hurts, we've come to realize that our church isn't providing us with the shepherding and community that we need. And so now the church hunt is on. And since all the other PCA churches are on the other side of town, we're probably switching denominations in addition to churches.

This will be an interesting journey to say the least...

I'm back!

2011-04-03T23:10:00.001-04:00

Like the post below says, I stopped blogging on blogspot and started blogging on my own domain in 2006. That blog lasted for a few years and then died for several reasons. The real shame is that almost all of those posts are completely lost, and I don't have a way to import the ones I do have.

But now I have some things to share, and I decided to stop hosting this site myself. We'll see how this goes. I hope to write something interesting and that you enjoy it.

I've moved!

2006-08-17T15:14:00.000-04:00

Not only do I have a new house, but I have a new address. Please feel free to check it out at recoveringbaptist.com.

And I know everyone at atlbloggers.net is waiting with baited breath to know if I'll still be around. The answer is yes; I'm working on getting all the feeds updated. I'm also hoping to figure out how to set things up so that only the interesting posts end up there, but that would imply that I have something interesting to say in the first place, wouldn't it?

Thank you

2006-08-10T10:21:00.000-04:00

As I've chronicled here, the past few weeks have been pretty grueling for my family. What I've been remiss in relaying here is the support of our family and friends, and I need to correct that now.

We closed on the new house last Monday afternoon and began painting the new one on Tuesday evening. Our goal was to paint 7 rooms, 2 halls, and the trim in another room before the floors were installed on Saturday. That's a lot of painting in a little time, but not only did we get it done, we even managed to paint a ceiling, too! (OK, technically we finished the second coat in one room on Monday, but we took the weekend completely off and the floors weren't installed in that room yet.) Considering that during all of this we were also dealing with the difficulties which come with the contract falling through on the house we're selling, I'm very happy with what all we accomplished.

I've been a little surprised at how many of our friends are keeping up with what's going on through this blog (don't ask me why that's a surprise, I know that's what a blog is for), so this seems to be one of the many right places to say thanks.

First, to the hired hands. I lucked out and managed to hire the three best teenagers in Atlanta. Thanks to Corey and Dave for several long days of painting and to Becca for giving up her one free night. You're good painters, but the Anne Murray music's got to go!

Then to all of our friends who helped out. Veleda brought us an incredible lunch and then loaned Mike out for a long evening to paint. Doug watched the girls at home while Vanessa got high on paint fumes at our place. Keith also gave up a night to help out, which means Liz was at home with the boys. Finally, there's Jimmy who's stayed with us so many times over the years that he may as well be family. Jimmy painted more than I did (hey, someone's got to earn some money in this family) despite his cold. Nothing goes with paint fumes better than Robitussin!

Doug, Vanessa, and the girls made sure we took Saturday night off by inviting us to the pool. Little did they know we were going to bring the lightening show of the year to their house and kill the electricity. We all had a great time anyway, even if we didn't get to see Doug light up like a Christmas tree while cooking burgers.

We also need to say thanks to Reid and Kim for caring enough to invite us over for a nice, stress-free lunch after church. We needed that even more than we thought, and meant a lot to us.

I would also say thanks to my parents and in-laws, but they don't spend enough time on the internets to know what blogs are, which is the way it should be.

Friends like all of you make weeks like last week bearable. And we're looking forward to years of welcoming you to our new house.

Don't Panic in Large Friendly Letters

2006-08-09T09:21:00.000-04:00

My grandfather manually set the insurance rates in Augusta many years ago, and my father and uncle are still in the insurance business, so I'm probably more interested in risk than most people. So I can't believe that I'm nearly two years late in finding this five page article from an OSU professor concerning the risk of terrorism. (Thanks to boingboing for the link, btw.)

Just the other night I saw an intro for a new program asking the question of whether we're more safe now than we were just after 9/11. I'm sick and tired of stories like that which play to our fears. The fact you're more likely to be struck by lightening or killed by a deer than to be directly impacted by terrorism should give us some comfort, but it doesn't seem to. Of course, fears are irrational, and few people really know how to assess risk. It's a very common fallicy to overestimate the probability of those things which we consider to be terrible and to underestimate the probability of those things which we do not consider as bad. For example, if I were to advertise that I have a rifle in a place where my kids could possibly get to it, I would be called a terrible parent. However, no one blinks twice when I take my children to the local pool, regardless of the fact that the chances of a child dying from drowning are much, much greater than of him dying from a bullet.

As many analysts have pointed out, the point of terrorism is not to kill people but to inspire fear in them. The more we change our way of life as a result of their despictable acts, the more they have won. I've known this for a while, but it's good to have someone more qualified than me actually do the math to prove it.

Poor loser

2006-08-08T23:48:00.000-04:00

Cynthia McKinney was soundly defeated today. Some other Congressman must now step up and serve as the laughingstock of the House, at least for the next two years.

I am very excited that Hank Johnson has won. We don't agree on political policy, but I'm glad that he seems to be, as one friend put it, "a genuinely nice and classy man."

Cynthia knows how to run a campaign, and she knows how to work the media. It was clear early in the night that she would lose, but unlike all the other losers tonight, she was not about to give her concession speech on live TV. She waited to arrive at her headquarters until 11:35, right as all of the late-night news shows were signing off. Channel 2 claimed they would try to carry it live, but as of 11:52 pm they haven't broken in to show her speech. I guess she just can't handle speaking the truth that she's lost her power.

Update - Since it seems like my other blogging friends have called it a night from Hank Johnson's campaign HQ, I figure I'll take notes
Update 12:14 am - just when I was about to turn off the TV she graces us with her presence. She has some sort of "special presentation." She's got some sort of musical presentation, but the sound guys can't get it to work. You can tell she's lost, she's completely speechless during the 4 minute plus downtime. I'm just sure we'll all be headed to youtube to check out her video.

Update 12:20 am - Cynthia's "special presentation" sounds like some sort of pathetic white singer-song writer chick. Not the kind of thing you'd expect at a McKinney gathering. According to the crack news group at WSB TV it's "Dear Mr. President" by Pink. Apparently she's going to play the whole song, and I don't think she's actually conceded yet. Kudos to Channel 2 for keeping the entire staff around to carry this wonderful moment live. WXIA did break in, too, but I think they were a little later than WSB.

Update 12:26 am - Cynthia claims that the media wanted us to focus on her hair. And now she's talking about someone "in the press in this room tonight" who caused someone on her staff to need stitches. Interesting that's the second thing a cop-beater talks about on the night she loses.

Update 12:28 am - I'm really bewildered. If she was going to make a speech like this, I don't know why she didn't do it during prime-time. She's attacking Bush while quoting Bobby Kennedy and MLK. Now she's praising every left-wing activist after "standing" with all the Iraqi dead and the homeless American and green-card soldiers. Of course, now she's taking advantage of this opportunity to denegrate the memory of so many dead soldiers and joining the likes of Cindy Sheehan.

Update 12:34 am - now it's getting interesting. "Electronic voting machines are a threat to our democracy." This is followed by a statement that they won't tolerate any more stolen elections. And she "wants her party back" too. I'm surprised she didn't spend more time on this.

Update 12:36 am - not really a concession, but she wishes "the new representative of the Fourth District well." And that's the end. Even Monica Kaufman points out that this wasn't a concession speech and didn't mention Hank Johnson by name. Leave it to Monica to say that Cynthia "took a whoopin" from Mr. Johnson.

As they ended the live coverage they returned to a rebroadcast of the nightbeat right as John Evans, Cynthia McKinney's campaign manager, was being interviewed. He was essentially saying that they got their asses whipped in areas where they "typically controlled." And, of course, Hank Johnson got all the white votes in Rockdale and Gwinnett counties. Here's a tip to Mr. Evans, if she had ever paid any attention to us white people in the northern part of DeKalb County, she probably wouldn't be looking for a job right now. One last note, it's interesting that right as Hank Johnson was claiming victory the McKinney team was claiming that Cynthia was in the campaign HQ building. Just one more lie from their team, since WAGA caught her arriving at that building at 11:35 pm.

Goodbye Cynthia, and good riddance. Mr. Johnson showed more class tonight than you've ever had.

Please vote today

2006-08-08T09:20:00.000-04:00

I've tried to minimize my political comments on this blog. There are enough politically oriented blogs already. But today I'm asking my neighbors in Georgia's fourth district to please take the time to vote in today's run off election.

For 12 out of the last 14 years our district has not been represented in Washington. Cynthia McKinney has been nothing but an embarassment, and we have an opportunity to replace her with a much more honorable man in Hank Johnson. If you did not vote in the Republican primary, then please vote in the Democratic run-off today.

I've had it

2006-08-03T16:50:00.000-04:00

I feel like I'm setting myself up to become some sort of terrible viral advertising for do-it-yourself real estate services, but I'm completely had it. As I best understand it, we're completely screwed in this whole transaction. Since the buyer's broker is holding the earnest money, it's up to her who gets it. Of course, both the buyer (or former buyer, as it rests now) says he should get it back, but we've got a claim on it, too. The buyer is the broker's client, and the broker wants him to do business with her again, she doesn't give a rat's ass about us.

So it will probably turn out that our only option, if we want to pursue it, will be to take this guy to DeKalb Superior Court. According to my lawyer friend, that's the most backed-up court in the state, and we'd probably still be working on this a year from now. In other words, we'd all waste a lot more money than is at stake here.

As I've said before, I don't understand the value of an agent. I've dealt with three or four of them now, and I have yet to feel like I got my money's worth. We found both of our houses without an agent, but in both cases the agent got her full 3% commission. And we can't unload this one after two agents, both of whom talked about what a wonderful house it was and claimed it should sell in no time.

Do I sound frustrated yet? I need a beer, but all I get tonight are paint fumes.

I hate it when I'm right

2006-08-02T12:04:00.000-04:00

As we were painting in the new house last night, my wife pointed out that I nailed the personality of the guy who put a contract on the house we're selling. From the very start I said that I didn't trust him and that there was a good chance he'd flake out and break the contract. I really didn't want to go under contract with him from the start, but I figured we really didn't have much choice.

The inspection process, including getting an engineer out to the house, only confirmed my suspicions. I didn't mind getting an engineer on site, but that was the first time I met the buyer, and I didn't like him. My wife says I'm pessimistic about people. Maybe that's true; maybe once I determine I don't trust or like someone it become a self-fulfilling prophecy. Either way, when I don't trust someone, my hunches often turn out to be right.

It turns out I was right about this guy. He's decided to break the contract. We should be receiving a termination letter today. The reason? Ultimately it came down to the way we proposed to "solve" a "problem" with two (yes, 2) outlets in the kitchen. Of course, once we offered to make his requested upgrade to take care of that issue he decided that he still wanted out.

I think I like the Aussie system much better. Your house sits on the market for four weeks. If no one buys it during that time, then it goes up for auction. After dealing with this mess for eight months, that's sounding awfully tempting right about now.

The New House

2006-08-01T08:31:00.000-04:00

OK, so to my friends on atlbloggers.net, sorry that I've reposted this like a dozen times. In case you care and want to see the house in its full glory, blue carpet and all, and don't see it here, please go to my blog.

We went to the lawyer's office yesterday around 2:00 to close on our new house. It's amazing just how many forms there are to sign. It was also somewhat sad to sit across from the sellers. Rather than being a happy occasion, they asked to get paid in two separate checks - they're getting divorced. That's sad enough, but the couple is way too old for that - the husband is 73. It's a sad fact that in real estate you get your best deal when the seller is in a bad situation.

Since Kick keeps asking for pictures of the new house, I'll post a few here. I'm fighting some stupid technical issues with Flickr, otherwise I'd have a stream up and ready.

Everytime we drive up we have the same thought - it looks like a grown up house, and we don't feel that grown up yet! And it's still hard for me to believe that I now own a bedroom with five, count then 5 bedrooms! It also has a living room, den, dining room, and an extra room we'll use for the home theater. It's just frickin huge!!!

In case there's any question, here's why we want to paint and install some hard wod floors. House about a picture of our son's new room?
There's nothing quite like dark green carpet and lime green walls, is there? And then there's the living room with its real estate walls and blue carpet.
We start painting tonight at 6:00pm. We've got 60 hours to get 6 rooms (plus trim in two others and some halls) painted before the floor guy arrives on Friday. The wife's headed to Costco today to pick up enough Coke and Oreos to feed our small army. When it's all said and done, I'm looking forward to sitting on the 1200 sqeare foot deck and enjoying a beer.

The Shaft

2006-07-29T21:58:00.000-04:00

There are some times when my experience at GA Tech come in very helpful. The Institute prides itself on preparing its alumni for the real world, and those five-plus years did help me understand how to prepare for and deal with the shaft. And I haven't faced a bigger shaft in a while than the one I'm facing right now - selling my house.

The realtors who I love so much like to talk about their ethics, and they paint such a pretty picture when it comes to how the negotiations are going to go. In the end, though, sometimes you're just going to get screwed, and you may as well get used to the idea.

Besides real estate agents, if there's one group of people I don't understand, it's those who dislike do-it-your-selfers. Until about a year ago I didn't realize that there were people who actually disliked people like me just because I'm industrious, competent, skilled, and actually enjoy working on my own house. I first ran into some of these people on another house we thought about buying. During the inspection the sellers made it clear that they would never DIY. The tone of voice the wife used was so full of disdain that I was taken aback. It never occurred to me that someone like THAT would end up with a contract on OUR house. Unfortunately, our buyer not only doesn't trust DIY people, but neither does his inspector, and the report was clear about that. My theory is that the inspector is bitter because he used to be a contractor, but his work dried up when Home Depot started convincing people that "You can do it, we can help" is true. So now we're facing a series of silly little repairs, but the buyer absolutely insists that receipts be shown for the repairs.

How silly could this be you might ask. Well, we've got three outlets which need covers, and he insists that a licensed electrician install the outlet covers and provide a warranty for the work. Of course there are some more important items on the list, but this illustrates his mindset pretty well.

We don't trust this guy. To be honest, I suspect we'll make all $2,000 worth of repairs only to have him walk away and find a way to keep his earnest money. But our only choice for now is to give him everything he wants and hope something falls our way. I feel like I'm walking into a calculus final, but I'm just a bit more drunk...