Molly and I "endured" the Desiring God Conference: Stand. It was a great weekend together. We laugh together a lot. But this weekend really gave us a chance to be playful and chase each other around a bit, more than the average weekend. I have an amazing, beautiful, fun and godly wife. She is a treasure to me. She's better than 1,000 yaks.
We didn't really pick to go to this conference because of the topic, but because we very much enjoyed the 2004 conference and wanted to try it again. We like Minneapolis and Piper and all. So we went and are really glad we did. All the speakers were great, but we particularly enjoyed John MacArthur's two messages. A great help to us and something we will review together over the next few days. (All audio/video is online for free.)
On Saturday Ohio State played at Minnesota and on Sunday Green Bay played in Minnesota, so the city was buzzing. It was kinda fun to be around for the bad Minnesota football (I shouldn't talk...Bears...ugh!). And we saw some hispanic celebrity at the Residence Inn lobby. No idea who he was. I asked two people who he was. One said he didn't know. The other explained it to me, and I couldn't understand him. Oh well. He did have a huge bouncer and a small posse, so he must be really important. It was an out-of-body experience. Well, actually it wasn't. But it was interesting.
Marc Heinrich (Purgatorio, on hiatus) pulled us aside and said "hi" early on in the conference. Erik Reymond (Irish Calvinist) introduced himself outside Brit's Pub while we were indulging in some scotch eggs (please click the picture for a larger, more delicious view!) and adult beverages on Saturday night. You should check out his blog if you haven't yet. Good guy. We were privileged to meet a handful of other folks who have kept up with the blog in some form or another. By the way, when I go to places like the Southern Baptist Convention I get recognized for my stellar blog and metrosexual hotness (that's what Joe Thorn says about me, anyway). But at the Desiring God Conference we were most often recognized for Molly's hotness...er...Chiari...ness. Most conversations went like this. "Hey, Molly, I'm _____. So great to meet you. We've been praying for you. How are you doing?" Molly replies, "I'm doing great!" I say, "Oh, hi. I'm Steve." ______ responds, "Who?" I've been demoted, but my superior is something else!