growing up...

Its funny, you know how you never say you will turn into your parents or do stuff like they do it.. Well I am finding more and more I was so wrong.. For example... I find myself wanting to go to bed earlier and earlier becuase i have to wake up earlier and earlier. I am turning into an old man. Its midnight and i am so tired. Maybe i have a tiring job? I mean after all i sit at a desk all day and wait for a tour to come along.

Today was a good day. I got to make a mock up for a Dane Cook cd. We are trying to pitch him for Instant Live so we talked with the Comedy division (who today gave me the chapelle show season 2) and they wanted a sample of what we could do. Needless to say I am super proud of it, because our in house design guy Braden also know as "hot bowling shoes" is an amazing designer.

After that my english friend Andy took me to this really amazing place in beverly HIlls. I forget what it was called but we got some delicious Salmon and jasmine rice and then had some great apple pie to top it off. Man what a great place. Right on rodeo and wilshire. Nothing like a nice walk in beverly hills. Its funny because i just got the new Weezer album and they have that beverly hills song. I used to think as a child that someday songs will mean something to me, and that i could relate and know what they are talking about. Well today as i drove away I blasted Beverly Hills by Weezer with my windows down. I am such a dork! If you guys havn't heard the new Weezer album its really really good.

Yesterday was interesting because i felt like God was telling me i was being selfish. And then to top it off an old friend who I havn't talked to in more than a year or two randomly imed me at work and started to tell me this sob story and how she couldn't pay her bills and it sounded to me like she was asking for money. I of course being in my selfish mood wrote it off and just said .. hey call me later.. So when she called I was really not interested so I ignored the call, but something told me I should call her back. I did and for a lot of the conversation she told me about how she has had such a rough life in the past year or two with her new husband and that she has all these medical things wrong with her, her bills were piling up, and to make things worse her landlord was basically screwing her. I just listened and sat there. the whole time waiting for her to ask me for some money and send her a check. Well boy was I wrong, she never once brought it up.

And thats when it occured to me....Jon Mark, your being selfish, what does your friend really need here? I remember something my dad once taught me.. the power of Prayer. Growing up I had seen my dad pace through the halls on the phone councelling someone, and then at the end he would always pray with them over the phone. I always thought that was weird. When I would ask my father for advice in situations like this with friends, he would always ask me, "so you talked to her and listened, did you offer to pray for her right there on the phone?"

What a Jerk I am sometimes. Here I am just waiting for her to ask for a hand out and I couldn't even see that all she needed was some prayer. So I asked her to pray.. and we did.. and she started crying.. Then told me that she had needed that for a long time now.

It really is amazing how much prayer impacts people, even the ones who are filled with faith like my friend. So if the Lord ever gives you the urge to pray for someone, don't fight it.. ask them to pray and see what amazing things God can do through it.

Thats all for now... Got any cool prayer stories to share?


qoute of the night... came from Andy Scarth our englishman who is working over here with us... " I am not a foreigner.. I am an Alien of extraordinary ability!!!"

I love fourteen hour days!

So i just realized with the help of a good friend that Its been almost a month since i have posted on this.. Which brings me to my next question...WHERE DID THE LAST MONTH GO? Oh ya.. i work too much. Today I got done working about 10 minutes ago. so that would mean i worked 13 hours today again. I really have to stop doing that. But "you got to do what it takes" declares my boss, yes.. the one who calls me at midnight to chat.

Since its been a while i might as well put in a few highlights from the past month:

- I bought a moped in san diego for 10 bucks and fit it in the back of my camry.
- A buddy hooked me up with a surf board that I don't have time to use.
- my church had a sweet beach bonfire at huntington where I locked the keys in my car,, yes even the spare in my wallet.
-Instant Live got their first big tour with Hall and Oats. Yes thats the band that does the song Maneater. (whoooah.. here she comes... she's a man eater"
- Drove to phoenix and back with Hall and Oats
- GoD rocked my world and gave me a huge wake up call and at the same time broke me right when i needed breaking. Funny how hes good like that.
-realized that I am so blessed to have such amazing friends.
- My brothes band BTJ you can visit at Myspace.com/btj or btjrock.com did their first mini canadian tour.
- My Sister Maria, went to Africa to work at an orphanage. Now she is in D.C. working in the inner city with her school.
THrough that Maria just inspired me to not doubt the power of God, and that we are such spoiled people in America who stress out over things like what we want to do for the fourth of july. When in Africa people are so close to GOd because they have to be, they have to rely on him because they have nothing. Then i look around me and I am surrounded by stuff. How pitiful. That also happened to be the day When God broke me at work right in front of my boss.. For the first time in a long time I got well.. lets just say "really really EMO"
- I got to help brighten someones day today!


On a sad note, I will not be able to get back home for the fourth and meet my brothers girlfriend. My family usually go to maine to our house we have on sebago lake and watch fireworks.. I hate breaking traditions. But hey life changes so I got to roll with the punches i guess.


oh .. i just remembered I found the Magyver dvds at walmart when i went to phoenix. OH ya.. i totally forgot, I got to visit with my best friend from childhood, Joe prunera who lives in Phoenix when i was there last week. That was really cool because he has this really sweet beat up ford bronco. When i asked him for a ride he literally had to shovel crap and trash out of his passenger seat and floor. IT was hilarious. Even though it was great roaming around walmart like old times, it was sad too. When I asked him what his friends were doing that night, he said,,"oh he is out with so and so.." Then when i asked him why he said he.. as opposed to they, he said because he only really has one. It was hard to see a good friend so lonely. That once again made me realize how blessed I really am.

well there you have it.. my latest post.. totally ramdom with no order to it..
Tommorow we meet with comedy department at work.. hopefully they can make me laugh.

making up ...

Homeruns and roller coasters

Well today was probably the biggest roller coaster ride i have had in a while. Let just say there was nothing better than to hit a home run on the first at bat in softball especially after you have had a craptastic day! You ever have those days when you get totally broken by the Lord.. ya.. happened today. I love how the Lord sometime likes to get our attenton.

So I got "the talking to" from the boss today which was unexpected.. you know the kind where they say you don't do enough and this might not be a "long term situation for you" ya.. totally craptacular. But in it all I got a really large fire lit under my butt to work at a faster pace, be more proactive and to ask lots of questions. So i guess i need to get more organized, ask more questions and find out better descriptions of what the given task is that needs to be done or else i am goin to get blamed for not coming through in time. I know today will be one of those days where i will look back and say, "oh ya i learned a lot from that and laugh" but not really feeling that right now. So if your a praying person, pray for focus and direction and wisdom for me and the guys i work for. Part of it is I am not relying on God enough to meet my needs at work, i am trying to do it all myself. Why the crap don't I learn, I can't do it all myself!!! Sometimes i just get frustrated with myself.
anyway i am so tired.. leave love..

My friends are awesome!

So ya, I think i am officially the most blessed kid i know. I have the most awesome friends. I was thinking about this today because i think in the last week, i have only had one day where i havn't gotten to hang out with amazing people.. Like tonight.. Shannon called me tonight and was like.. uh so whats the plan.. i was like uh.. i dunno.. just come over... so then we called "the girls" as we call them and they came over by way of using the movie raizing arizona which we didn't even end up watching... then the kids from the neighbor hood came over and we just played with our ipods all night.. it was grandioso..

So ya on top of that.. my day at work was well.. just ok. so coming home to great friends was just what I needed. So thanks God, I know i don't tell you that enough, but ya thanks it shows how much you really do love me.

oh and even cooler,last night we went to wilsons house because our friend from vegas Josh Stine, was in town.. well towards the end of the night, we all piled into josh's parents mini van (all 9 of us) and went to bring Nori some dinner. OH man talk about good times.. Wish we could do it every night! Its too bad stine doesn't live here permanently.. it would be amazing!!

well thats all the news I got .. oh wait.. how could i forget.. I got the new coldplay !!! and the new lifehouse!!!

ok kids.. leave love and comments..