(This column was published in the ‘Faith’ section yesterday which I’m now a regular contributor for.)

Andrew Fouché

For The Times-Standard

As the year 2006 comes to a close I find myself running from holiday party to Christmas shopping, to more holiday parties, with little to no down time. Besides the busyness of the season, one of the reasons I don’t have much extra time could have something to do with the recent birth of my son which has definitely turned my world upside down – in a good way. This time last year my wife and I had only ourselves to think about and although things were still busy, our interests were the center of importance. Now life, sleep, activities, and even Christmas itself revolves around this helpless little baby. To put it mildly my focus has shifted. It has shifted from me to my son. To a life focused on self to a life…well, less-focused on self (I still have a long way to go before I’m entirely selfless).

As a Christian one phrase I’ve heard said often during this time of the year is “Jesus is the reason for the season.” Christmas is a celebration of his birth, a birth that would ultimately come to be known as the ultimate selfless act, as Jesus later willingly gives his life. The challenge we face in our consumer driven society today is to actually keep the real meaning of Christmas at the center of our celebration. This is always difficult for me as I get so focused on buying stuff and giving others ideas of what to buy for me that I lose sight of the real spirit of the season. Whether you celebrate this season in the same way as I do we can all agree that the idea of being selfless transcends religion and culture.

It’s no coincidence that the two areas that are the biggest focus this time of year- gifts and relationships- are also the same ones that can cause people to dread the Christmas season the most. While gift-giving remains and will always be a huge part of the season there are many people in our community that barely have enough money to buy food, let alone presents, for their kids. For them Christmas is a time where the overwhelming commercialism serves as a constant reminder of their shortcomings. Many amazing people and organizations in our community reach out during this time of the year to make Christmas special and help meet the needs of those in our community, selflessly giving and taking the time to serve those who have fallen on hard times. Because of their effort we also have an opportunity to partner with them. Whether it’s donating a gift or just dropping spare change in a bucket your selfless act of giving has the potential to bring light and hope to someone’s life this year.

The second area that can be a struggle this time of year is our relationships. For many of us this is a time of reuniting with family and friends and enjoying the blessing of the relationships that we have. Unfortunately this time of year also brings to the surface the pain of relationships that have been lost. Whether because of death, estrangement, or other circumstances, intense loneliness and even mourning is often a byproduct of the Christmas season. As a community our ability to fill this void in people’s lives is far more individual than the first area I mentioned. It may take inviting someone to a family gathering that isn’t family, sharing a meal, or just listening to and acknowledging the hurt. I often find the hardest part of my life to be selfless with is my time. But giving time can be a gift far more valuable than a wrapped present.

Let’s all take the time this season to let the universal message of love speak through the commercialism and self centeredness of our society. Imagine what this next year could like if we did?

Before music downloading, (way back) and cheap places to buy music like Borders, one of the first record stores got it’s start out of the back of a pharmacy. Tower Records started in Sacramento close to where my dad grew up, actually right down the street. He worked there during it’s early days and has told me stories of famous musicians that would come through the store.

Tower Records is now going out of business and shutting down all of it’s stores in the next week or so. I’m willing to bet that the future of music sales moves out of buildings altogether within the next decade…time will tell.

A young David Fouche behind the counter

Did you know that Time Magazine’s Person of the Year is YOU!
The lame thing is that even though YOU are the Person of the Year you still have to pay $5 to read about it. Anyways I just thought I’d let you know in case you haven’t heard. You have 10 more days to enjoy it.

I posted about this website back when Humboldt Happenings could be found on a really bad blog host and my friend Brian reminded me of it recently. I still find it amusing.

Check out how gizoogle translates my blog into ghetto speak. Click here.
*Warning - translation could contain inappropriate language.

I’m sure that I’m not alone in the busyness of this time of year…and that’s my excuse for not blogging much, that and the fact I’m still adjusting to fatherhood, which by the way is amazing!

I have an early Christmas present for you, my friends that read my blog. It’s actually compliments of my Dad who recently cut a Christmas EP and has given me permission to distribute it via the world wide web.
To download the songs below you’ll need to right click and ’save as’
Thanks to Mike for hosing the audio.
Enjoy!

We Wish You A Merry Christmas
Mary’s Boy Child
In The Bleak Midwinter
Christmas Dinner
I Wonder As I Wander
Christmas Is Coming
God Bless This House (A David Fouche original)

It’s hard to believe that there’s only two weeks until Christmas. Dude!
I will now post my favorite Christmas music video. Enjoy.

It’s official!
Enough time has passed that you can now say things like “back in the 90’s” or “that’s so 90’s”. Some people jumped the gun big time and started making 90’s references as early as a couple of years ago. Now that we are on the backside of the uh… 00’s (no one ever came up with a good name for this decade) it’s officially ok to refer to the 90’s nostalgically.

If you want to start making 90’s references but don’t know where to start the following may help you. Note: it’s important to realize that some things from the 80’s bled into the early 90’s like mullets, pegged pants, neon clothes, and KISS.

Hyper Color Clothes – They would change color with heat and let people know when you’re nervous because your armpits would be a different color.

Flannel Shirts – a popular clothing style in the mid-nineties amongst the dudes.

Grunge Music – Fueled by Nirvana and birthed in Seattle.

TGIF and Saturday Morning Cartoons – need I say more.

Pogs - the milk cap game that I still don’t really understand.

So go ahead. Relive the 90’s, make fun of fanny packs and parachute pants. At this point in the 00’s I don’t see much that we’ll be making fun of in the next decade.

I try to check my site stats daily for this here blog of mine. Sometimes it’s very interesting what people are searching for when they arrive on my blog.
For instance:
My blog (at one point) came up as the 11th result when searching on the artist “Matisyahu” on Google Ireland.
It was the first result when searching for ‘humboldt crabs video, on Ask.com
And of course if you’re a friend of mine and I’ve mentioned you in any way and you go to Google your name, then my site will probably come up.

Now obviously these search results come up because I’ve written about a topic, person, or thing that’s being searched for. This morning on checking my site stats I noticed a very unusual search result that led to my site and frankly has me excited and puzzled.

On Yahoo someone searched for “Fouché grandmaster flash” and foosh.blogsome.com was 1 of 3 results.

If you’re educated in the history of Hip Hop then you would know that Grandmaster Flash is one of the founding fathers. But why the odd pairing on a search? The searcher even included the accent mark above the ‘e’. This will most likely remain a mystery but if the searcher happens to be reading this, then please drop me a line.

Not that I have time to kill, or am I implying that you do either. But on the rare occasion that you may, you can try out this game compliments of Paragon Media via Albinoblacksheep. Note the sound effects reminiscent of the school yard ball.