Seven Good Things - Almost Spring Break Edition

Every month, I like to tell you about seven things I think are cool. Maybe you’ll think they’re cool too.

I forgot to do this in January and remembered at the end of February. Frankly, I spent most of the past few months in a fog. Some of that was an ice storm. Some of that was a self-employed cycle of self-loathing I had to work through until I found some better systems for my life.

Anywhoo…

Now it’s March and here are seven things I think are cool that you might also like.

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1. Stumble

Parks and Recreation might be my favorite television show of all time. I miss it dearly. Not just because I miss the idea of a functioning government (he stares wistfully out the window…) but I also miss quick, character-driven comedies that are super clever and well-written. We had a little golden age there for a minute. 30 Rock. The Office. Arrested Development. It’s been a dry spell ever since.

This new show, about a cheerleading team in rural Texas, has made me belly laugh multiple times. Their rival school is named “Sammy Davis Sr. Junior College.” That joke happens in the first ten seconds. I knew immediately I was in.

The lead actress is my age, and I’ve somehow never seen her in anything before. She’s incredible. I love when that happens. When someone fully formed just appears out of nowhere and crushes it.

If you miss sharp ensemble comedies, this one’s worth your time.

2. Hemphill Guitars

I’ve been playing a new guitar for the past few months, and it’s been blowing my mind.

Hemphill Guitars is an affordable boutique builder here in Nashville. Joe Hemphill is the guy behind it. He’s a worship pastor and close friend of a producer/engineer I work with a lot, Jared Fox. Jared mixed my Hold the Light album as well as the All Sons & Daughters records and a bunch of Bethel albums and about a million other things.

Jared always has a few of Joe’s guitars at his studio. I always bring my own guitars to sessions there, but usually end up playing whatever Hemphill he has on hand for most of the day.

A few months ago Jared texted and asked if I’d want to try one for a while. Maybe take it on the road, use it in some videos, help get the word out. I was not going to say no to that.

I brought it on the road for some of the Behold the Lamb shows and got to play it at the Ryman. Joe and I got to meet up for lunch and hang a bit and he is the kindest, most sweet and genuine guy. We’d known eachother in passing for a while, but it has been a lot of fun to start to become actual friends. And he really is a master guitar builder. On these guitars he does everything. He winds the pickups himself and carves every piece of the instrument — from the neck to the pickguard. It’s his own body shape, too.

It’s a stunner. He makes killer acoustics as well. Check him out.

3. The Faithful Spy: Dietrich Bonhoeffer and the Plot to Kill Hitler by John Hendrix

I first read this book a couple of years ago. I borrowed it from someone and, embarrassingly, don’t remember who.

It’s a graphic novel about the life of Dietrich Bonhoeffer, the German theologian who was executed in a Nazi prison camp after being captured during a failed plot to assassinate Hitler.

The story itself is fascinating. Bonhoeffer was one of the great theologians of the 20th century, and his work is all the more powerful because he was writing so richly about discipleship and the freedom of the Gospel under the deep shadows of the Holocaust. But the book is also remarkable. Hendrix’s artwork is inspired and immersive. It pulls you into the history, the characters, and even the theology in a way that feels alive.

Written almost ten years ago, it reveals with unsettling clarity that the prowling wolf of Christian nationalism that arose in Bonhoeffer’s time is still alive and stalking today.

Remarkable.

Check it out.

4. The Wendy’s Frosty Key Tag

I won’t lie—Wendy’s is probably my favorite fast-food restaurant.

At the beginning of every year, they sell a little keychain tag that raises money for the Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption. It costs about $3 and gets you a free small Frosty with any purchase all year long.

Every year I tell myself I shouldn’t do this.

Every year I do it.

It’s for a good cause. That’s what I tell myself.

5. Skyjo

My nephew Graham gave us this card game for Christmas. He bought it with his own money, which makes it even more fun.

We’d never heard of it, and were totally surprised when we fell in love with it. Now we kind of can’t stop playing.

I guess it’s a German game. Maybe the name makes more sense in German?

With two kids off at college, there aren’t a lot of us left at the house these days. But when we have a few minutes for a game, it’s almost always Skyjo.

We take it to restaurants and play while waiting for our meal. We play when we should be going to bed. Basically, any time we have a few minutes to kill, we play Skyjo.

It’s simple to learn, with a ton of different strategies to keep trying. You can play a round with two or three people in probably ten minutes. I think you can have up to six play at once.

It’s super fun, inexpensive, and I hope we play it again tonight.

6. forScore

This one’s a bit nerdy.

I play a lot of different music with a lot of different artists. I’ve figured out that the best way for me to learn songs is to listen a couple times then make a number chart by hand. The act of writing it out is one of the most important parts of cementing a song into my brain.

Over the years then, I’ve amassed a giant stack of charts. It was getting obnoxious.

Finally, a few years ago, I bought a cheap refurbished iPad and started using it for charts and lyrics at shows. I’d seen other players doing it and assumed there must be a convenient app for organizing everything.

But everything I saw seemed incredibly laborious. You’d have to enter every chord and number manually, like a spreadsheet. No thanks.

So for the last couple of years, I’ve just taken photos of my charts and organized them into photo albums for each artist. It worked… mostly. But if I wasn’t on Wi-Fi, the images would sometimes offload and turn fuzzy. I couldn’t read them. It became just as frustrating as a stack of papers

Then a few weeks ago, while prepping for the Anchor Hymns recording, I noticed a couple of the guys using something cleaner and smarter. It’s called forScore. I think it was about $25.

It’s basically a glorified, elegant version of my cobbled-together photo system. You upload PDFs. You build setlists. You can reorder things instantly. It just works.

If you play at church, in a symphony, as a sideman, or in your own solo shows, particularly if your music organization has gotten unruly, I can finally recommend something that actually helps.

It sure has for me

7. This weird AI video of fake Warren Buffett

Ok, you know how your aunt posts pictures on Facebook of wooden barrels of puppies being rescued from floods by a very ripped Donald Trump in a tanktop? Our hero!

I know the video I’m sharing here is not real. Warren Buffett is the most accomplished investor in American history, and famous for his practical advice. Somebody clearly had ChatGPT synthesize a bunch of stuff he wrote and said and put it in his voice and has been posting videos of them that have been dripping into my Youtube feed. One or two have started auto-playing after a John Oliver clip or a JHS drop and before I’ve had time to recognize the fakery I’ve been struck by the advice.

This video here is an AI baby whose bathwater most definitely deserves to be thrown out. But a lot of the advice in this is solid. It weirdly puts in precise and succinct language things that have taken me a couple decades to learn the hard way, many of which I’m just now starting to intentionally implement in my life.

So, yes, this is AI slop. Maybe one of the few times that’s not a bad thing. As one of my old bosses used to say: “Chew the meat and spit out the bones.”

One major caveat: Material wealth does not define us, nor give us ultimate freedom. However, we are called to steward what we’ve been given, be it our skills, our money, even our relationships. There is a huge difference between pursuing riches and pursuing wisdom. Sometimes, though, they might require some of the same choices.

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Finally, today’s episode of The Pivot is fantastic! I got to talk with Fr. James Martin, one of the leading voices of the Jesuits here in America (and the official chaplain of the Colbert Nation.) What a lovely man, and a really sweet conversation.

Okay well, that’s it for March. I’ll tell you something else I’m gonna love in March. It’s daylight savings time. Who’s ready for some sunlight?

As Kirsten Dunst once said, “Bring it on!”