the north side

hello all. i'm become aware that my blog has been dismally boring of late. (and i bet you thought i was going to attempt to fix that now. you were wrong.) i'm not sure why, but my creativity level is bordering on non-existant. my apologies.
i've been hanging out on the north side of the city this week. yesterday i had my supervision meeting at the vault coffee and tea bar, which i like. newfriendphil was working there, so i hung around for a bit after my boss left and did sudoku puzzles with him. he lives on the north side, and last night andrew and i went there to hang out with him. we listened to the red house painters and anathallo and ate burnt popcorn and stayed up too late. and then i went to the pyn today (that's pittsburgh youth network for you out-of-townies) at pnc park. this dude was speaking about his passion for the emergent church, and it was pretty interesting. his vision for the emergent church around here has a lot to do with the city... for a few decades now, people have been trying to make pittsburgh as famous for God as it was for steel. the christians are trying to think of ways to unite the city around faith instead of football, for example. but he said something interesting that i'd never thought of before: when we talk about our churches, we split up on denominational lines. but in the new testament, the defining characteristic of each church was geographical. everything is written about the church of corinth, or of thessolonica, or of laodecia (luke-warm as it may be). so this morning, as we looked over the city out the windows of the pirates stadium, we were thinking and praying about what the church of pittsburgh would be like. it was pretty amazing to join hands and pray with people from all over the city that God would do something big here. it's a good time to be in pittsburgh.
afterwards andrew and i went out for coffee at beleza, a new place that opened on the north side last weekend. it's owned by newfriendphil and some of his friends from hope. it's pretty great. plus the girl who was working there today is pretty great, and i think we might be friends.
so i'm enjoying my exploits on the north shore. there are art museums and coffee shops and stadiums and red brick rowhouses. PLUS, it's much closer to my house. good times.
well, i'm off to watch my middle schoolers in hopewell junior high's performance of the classic musical, annie. i hope your evenings are equally enjoyable.
pax.