Nice heat

All the Nashville inhabitants continuely complains about the nice warm Summer breeze
they've got. It has been the hottest and driest Summer since...Yeah since before they started recording the weather. 106 degrees Fahrenheit the other day (41 Celcius). I actually like it...a lot. Aaah. But the bad thing is that I have to bring a jacket whenever I'm going to a restaurant, Starbucks, at most peoples homes or at the Cinema. Air Condition...What's that all about?But yesterday we actually got some heavy rain. Hmm... Okay, you know at some point you just have to talk about the weather...so there we go. Thanks for reading my blog...

Oh NO!

Pastor Bob has secret powers that I didn't ever know of!!


The other day he turned me into an anphibian...grr...why you little..!
IN THE MALL!!

Resurrecting The Champ

Sunday afternoon at the cinemas P.Bob and I went to see Mr. Bean's Holiday and Resurrecting The Champ. The last one, pictured below, was REALLY good!

Samuel L. Jackson is the homeless man who once was a professional boxer. He's doing such a great job on his character, and I can see a whole lot of similarities to the homeless people I've worked with in Denmark!

A great movie based on a true story. Recommendable!

Church

Last Sunday I went to a big Church (Bethel World Outreach Center in Brentwood) and the atmosphere was just like a huge embrace to me. Today I went for the 2nd time together with Jamie, Tricia and Bryndan.

In several ways it reminds me of Aarhus Valgmenighed at home, so I really felt at home. Especially last Sunday. In the morning, when I woke up, I listened to a couple of worship songs on the Mac and "Lead Me To The Cross" was on my heart when we left for Church.

It was great teaching and fellowship + GREAT worship! ...And the theme for the Church service was the song "Lead Me To The Cross". What a blessed day!

Shrek cake

Hey take a look at this dude!

Kari (Jamie's sister) made this cool Shrek cake, the head and everything. Bryndan turned 2 years old and the theme for the birthday was definite Skrek! (Shrek ears for everyone, Shrek present paper, napkins, balloons, to Shrek cakes and stuff.

On the picture below Bryndan is having his own cake, ready to be destroyed..!


Jayden above (Kari's son) eating green cake. Pretty good taste, he told me :P

iLife

Right now I'm sitting at one of the free WiFi Panera cafés in Nashville, working together with Jason and P.Bob.

...Jason is the most hard working man of the three of us! He just helped installing the brand new iLife programs to our Mac's. Those programs are awesome. The new Garageband, iPhone, iWeb and so one, pwhew..! :) Jason is our web master and problem solver whenever we're lost. Thank you, man!!

Dinner at Logans

Today we didn't have Chinese..! We went to hang out with Todd at Logans.


Good food and so on, but the best thing about the restaurant was the all you can eat peanuts ...and the whole idea was to throw the shells on the floor! Yeah! And so we did :O)

Good mornings

Every morning I wake up to this great sight!


Usually I grab the 7-string as the first thing in the morning. Aaahhh..!

I've simply got the best bed room in the house => the studio.

Thanks Jamie and Tricia! How did you know? :)

Nashville Zoo

So the other day I was invited to go to the Nashville Zoo together with Tricia, Bryndon, Jamie's mother and his sister and her two kids. The zoo was a cool place, but somehow I only got pictures of the kids :0)


Jamie's niece and Bryndon hand in hand. They don't see each other very often:
Jamie's nephew. Great and so funny kids all of them!
A coool day at the zoo. Good to hang out with my little friends.

A typical day

I was just sitting here and thinking about the day today, and actually it has been a quiet typical and great day! Everyday is full of blessings.

- I woke up by Pastor Bobs phone call (so I missed my run for today..again:).
- Grabbed a guitar in front of me (sleeping in the best room of the house => the studio!) and played for ten minutes.
- Went down the stairs to a full packed living room of great people and 3 funny 1 to 4 year old kids. Friendly faces saying good morning and less than 2 year old Bryndon shouting "Hey duude!". It's another great day!
- Saying good morning, have a good day and disappearing out in the 40'celcius breeze (that just embraces me), where Pastor Bob is waiting for me in his 15'celcius air conditioned car.
- I take on my hoodie and reminds PB to take his seat belt on.
- Driving to one of the Chinese restaurants in town.
- Meeting and sharing a meal with some cool people there, friends of PB, and suddenly I know 3 people more!
- After the dinner we had to catch a movie at the cinema, and after that..:
- Going to work. Sitting at one of the many coffee shops with free WiFi in Nashville, drinking liters of Doctor Pepper.
- Getting home from work at around 20 o'clock and then hanging out with Jamie and Tricia, and Jamie's sister and mother. They are the coolest folks!

Ain't life grand!?

Silent car crash

The other day something thought-provoking happened. We (P.Bob and I) were driving into Nashville and just when we held for red a a bunch of cars crashed just behind us..!

I didn't hear a thing because of the music and air condition but when we looked back the cars just behind us were smashed. If we would have arrived just 15 seconds earlier we would have been involved..!

I hope and pray that nobody got hurt. Thank God for protecting us! He always does in one way or another!!

Work

We're slowly starting to work now we've catched up on a big part of the movies. A lot of our work will be at Star Bucks Café's around Nashville (with free internet) working on our Mac's and doing meetings (and drinking coffee off course).

Above you see Jered and I meeting for at talk at a Star Bucks. He's a great guy.

Worlds biggest Hotel

Yesterday I spent a couple of hours together with Bob and a cool lady named Tamra + I went on my own expedition at this Opryland Hotel in Nashville: The worlds biggest, and maan it's crazy..! I've never seen a hotel like this before!

Above is one of the smaller indoor domes with waterfalls, giant trees, bridges and so on.

In this indoor dome above there's giant water fountains that danced to classical music. At one time the fountain went 30-40 meters up in the air. People went for tourist guided boat trips on the river inside the hotel and there were lots of restaurants and shops all over the hotel. Crazy Americans :) ...and very cool!

Tim Beemans birthday

Bob's brother just turned 50 which resulted in a family/friends hang out party at Bob's parents house. It was great meeting and talking with a lot of cool people there!

At the picture above you see the neck of Jamie, Jason from the metal band LoPhat, me and Tim's daughter. He has got some very cute kids!

Here's Bob's mother. She's a very cool lady => like her a lot!

I brought Danish dark rye bread (rugbrød) and salty liquorice (saltlakrids) to the party. It's always good entertainment to watch Americans eat salty liquorice... =0)

Hard work...at the movies

We decided to take it easy and catch up on some of the movies. Pastor Bob is sitting in the directors board for the huge Nashville Film Festival, so the cinema is kind of his 2nd home (along with Star Bucks).


That means that I've during the last 5 days had to watch

- The Simsons
- Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (Imax 3D)
- Bourne Ultimatum
- Underdog
- Transformers
- Spiderman 3
- Shrek the 3rd

Lots of good movies and man, The Simpsons was really funny! I've still got Homers Spider Pig Song in my head :) Hard work in the States...

Jamies house

I had a great 1st day in Nashville, and I was really impressed how clear in head I was in spite of the traveling. I met a bunch of cool people and got well installed at Jamie's house. Her a picture of Jamie and Brandon, who'll turn 2 soon.

Here's Jamie and his wife Tricia, taken a few years ago. Jamie is great musician, has got a great studio in their house and writes/plays in the bands Wedding Party and I-Dragon-I.

This little family is just so loving and hospitable and I couldn't think of a better place to live than at their house! They are a huge blessing to me!

40 hour trip

Well I had a nice and calm morning the 1st of August. Pastor Bob and I went by different airplanes to save money but the plan was to arrive in Nashville around the same time...


Sometimes things just don't turn out the way you thought the would. For quiet some years now I've tried to overcome "bad luck" by looking at it as a challenge of my patience and it kinda works well :O)

I didn't knew that United Airlines was known for loosing peoples luggage, but now I know, tsk tsk. My ESP, Kirk Hammett Signature, guitar hasn't arrived yet, and in Washington Airport I had to stand in line for so long that I (and a bunch of other travelers) couldn't make it in time for our next planes. I had to stay at the airport for about 18 hours and overnight in a corner. I bit of a lazy night but that was okay. Met some interesting people.

Welcome to the US of A :)

In spite of everything it just felt so right to be in America (Washington Airport) and God has blessed me with a deep please about being here!

Saying goodbye..

Saying goodbye is a strange thing. Fortunately I'm going to see this little fellow here (+ many other friends and family) again 2 1/2 month from now, while I'll be in Denmark for a couple of weeks in October.

I'll fly from Copenhagen Wednesday morning and arrive in Nashville in the afternoon, American time. Looking forward to meet new people!

The Last Song

During the last bonus song at The Last Stand something that I'll never forget happened...


We introduced the song "And All They Hoped For Finally Turned Out To Be True", which is about this guy who's been living a life clinging to his hope, that he by grace will receive a new and eternal life together with Christ, the Father and Holy Spirit in Heaven. And all he hoped for...

Our concert was very intense and the audience were moshing SO hard => they were the best. When we started playing this song I saw both Lars (bas player) and Morten (guitarist) kneeling on the stage floor, and tears were streaming out! I looked around and there were raised hands and closed eyes everywhere, and I had goose bums all over. I started praying and thanking for the people in the room, and I've never seen the Holy Spirit moving that intense before, it was amazing!

...When we ended the song every 250 people in the room were totally quiet. I turned of my amplifier and when I turned around there was long queues of people walking up on the small stage to give hugs. Many of them had tears in their eyes.

Amazing grace, how can it be, that you my God would die for me..!

The Last Stand

The Last Barricades Concert:My Last Barricades Headbang:
My Last Barricades Growl:
The LAST Barricades Ukulele:
The Last Barricades Crowd Surf:
A huge applause to Jonas H. Brunsnæs who was the main organizer for The Last Stand (and the crowd surfer on the picture above) => THANK YOU!

It was an honor to do our last gig together with so many Friends! Their was 8 cool bands playing. Especially a big thank you to our Friends in Magtesløs, Amplified, Servants Of The Immortal, In All Her Ruin and Face The Mantra!

It was such a great event! 250 people showed up and it was the very best last concert you could ever imagine, and I promise you: the is NO BETTER audience than these friends!! THANK YOU!

... Photographer: My friend Stefan http://ghashul.dk

Pastor Bob on visit

I've been looking so much forward to hang out with Pastor Bob again! Yesterday he arrived to Denmark from the Rock On The Rock festival in Italy and it really was good to see him again and confirm that we're both alive and well :O)

He will stay here with me and my family in Fjellerup for a week, so it's cool not having to rush before him and I will fly to the States (Nashville, TN) on the 1st of August..!

Family vacation in Norway

I just returned from Norway the day before yesterday. I had a WONDERFUL week long vacation together with my Family (Mom, Dad, Sister Signe, Brother Thomas, his wife Amy and their son Jonas). We stayed at a very nice cabin up in the mountains by Beitostølen. It looks like the one on this picture (though it had a bit more more luxuries :) and was placed above tree level).

We went day trekking and it only took us a couple of hours to reach the top of Mugnetind, which was a beautiful and cool place to sit and admire Gods work of nature powers!

2nd last concert

The night from the 14th to the 15th we did a gig at KFUM&K's UngUge. It was a good evening and we had a great crowd!! We played at an out door stage in front of the whole sleeping tent area where 1500 people were staying, so I guess a lot of folks heard us that evening, hehe :0)

Farewell party

Well A LOT has happened since I did blogging last time!
I had a GREAT drop in farewell party at my former home in Århus, where my very good friend Morten
now lives with his wife Maria, who's also a good friend of mine. THANKS for a cool evening to everyone who showed up!!

My "SEND OUT"

Today I was being send out as missionary from my beloved Church, Aarhus Valgmenighed ( www.valgmenighed.dk ) .

I've been an intense member of this Church for the last 3 years and it has been 3 great years in the Church where I've been challenged a lot + being given opportunities to make my visions become reality! This Church had a money collect for the Green Light District metal festival and it was a huge blessing!



One week ago I was being ordained Deacon by my Deacon/Social Worker education "Diakonhøjskolen". It has been 4 years of just the right education for me and I feel very blessed for that! The ordain ceremony at the big old Sct. Pauls Church in Aarhus was great and breathtaking, and with the todays Missionary ceremony I feel so very ready to work full time with ministry!
Glory to God!

And here's a picture (from last Sunday) of me together with the rest of the Deacon-gang + Henrik Stubkjær and Lars Østerkjærhus. Today I was the only one who got send out from Århus Valgmenighed.

1/4 century

Dude..! Yesterday was the day when I spend the last day of the first quarter century of my life. Hmmm... Still feeling young though:


...Though my skin is starting getting loose (and I've lost hair on one side of my head):


In Denmark we've got this wicked tradition, that when you turn 25 and you're not married you'll get powdered cinnamon. And when I say powdered cinnamon I mean freaking powdered cinnamon all over the place and everywhere :O)
I got totally run down by friends both at midnight AND at midday and I've still got a big plastic bag full of cinnamon clothes. My skin color was actually very similar to the pictures above.

Grandma's 80s birthday :)

Well yeah my Granny is turning 80 today (the 18th). Her name is Nora Christensen and she's a real nice and funny ol'lady with a lot of energy :O)


I haven't got any picture of her but I've got the Danish flag which is traditional used for every birthday and celebration. Nora gathered family and friends for her birthday at a fine hotel. It was a nice and calm day together with cousins and folks. In some wierd kind of way Grandma always expects me to play a little music for her at these parties... So I decided to make her happy and play/sing a song called "Kære lille mormor" (Dear little Grandma). The music genre is IN DEED VERY fare away from the music I like and I've never thought that I'd play this song ever in my life! ...But my cool sister, Signe, was hip and she helped singing along and playing 2nd guitar so I wasn't alone :) . And my teenage cousins were all singing, shouting and bawling along so it turned out to be lot of fun! And the old people seemed to like it as well, hehe :0)

Todays 50km run

Wow dude... My legs are pretty much less mobile now compared to how they were doing this morning :O)I've done 7 Marathons since I was 16 years old and now I wanted to give myself a bit of a bigger challenge. I like doing long distance running just to challenge myself and my staying power.

Today was a hard one. I haven't trained very much and the last two days I've been on a too long pilgrimage walk together with my class. A good but exhausting walk :) My goal for today was to run the 50km (31,1miles) without any kind of breaks or walking + to do it in less than 5hours, and it actually went kind of well! I reached my goal in the time 4hours and 22minutes, and now I'm going to suffer the next week because of such a dumb challenge hehe :) ...but sure it was worth it.

Rock For Nødhjælp

This is the name of a cool one-day festival at my school.


Yesterday was the big day of this debut festival, and everything went very smooth! It was mainly arranged by the students of the school and the main organizers did a very cool job!! I helped as well and Barricades did one of the late evening concerts, and a great concert it was! A bunch of Barricades-friends traveled long distances to come hang out with us. Thank you guys!!

And Karin from the band Munich did guest vocals on 3 songs at this concert! It was BEAUTIFUL! She's the one who does the female vocals on our album Blood Combines.