Out of the Wilderness

Learn Slow But Steadfast

I have no fear of drowning, it’s the breathing that’s taking all this work.
“Work” by Jars of Clay

I was laying in a bed around midnight but before I drifted off to sleep, I said a few little prayers. Those are often times my most honest conversations with the Lord. In fact, there are days I get down on my knees to pray before going to sleep and after the “Amen,” I climb in bed and that’s when the real praying begins. I confess to Him my desires, hoping that Psalm 145:19 is a promise I can count on. I’ve leaned on it in the past and God did not fail me, so I put a lot of hope in that being the case each time I cast my cares on Him. This particular midnight prayer came after attending the Chicago world premiere of “The Dilemma” starring Vince Vaughn, Kevin James, Jennifer Connelly, Winona Ryder and Channing Tatum.

The Dilemma World Premiere — Ticket to World Premiere of The Dilemma

There’s a scene in the movie where Vince Vaughn’s character has a honest conversation with God. He says something like this: I know I’m supposed to give you things, but I just can’t give you this.” I was surprised by the emotional scene in a movie that was marketed as a comedy. I could’ve been Vince Vaughn sitting on the bus bench in that scene. He was in the middle of a dilemma (is that surprising?) without a good solution to fix it. When he was at his lowest, he turned to God for help. I loved that. Returning to the hotel afterwards, I watched a little television, then went down for the night. As I prayed, I thought about the things that I’ve given over to the Lord, and the things I haven’t. What I’m holding with an open hand, and what I won’t let go of. I was compelled to raise an open hand as I laid there, to loosen the grip on what I think I have control over. But to open my hand, to let go, is to no longer have control. It’s living out of control.

I didn’t raise my hand that night. I’ve chosen to hold onto the snake that keeps biting me for another day. Maybe the venom won’t kill me. When will I trust Him enough to open a raised hand so he can put bread in it?

How long till suffering makes me steadfast?

The Bachelor Brad Womack: The Tattoo and It’s Meaning.

The Bachelor episode recaps: Episode 1, Episode 2, Episode 3, Episode 4, Episode 5, Episode 6, Episode 7, Episode 8, Episode 9, The Women Tell All, Episode 11 (The Final Rose).

10 Signs Your Date Was A Contestant on the Bachelor.

Brad Womack has a back tattoo of a cross. Above the tattoo is the Latin word ‘Prosapia’ which means family. Here are some images.

Prosapia tattoo — Brad in the pool with Michelle after descending an LA high rise.

Brad Womack tattoo — A closer shot of Brads tattoo, Brad kissing Shawntel.

brad womack tattoo2 — Brad Womack jogging and his cross tattoo

brad womack tattoo3 — In the pool with girls, and Michelle

brad womack tattoo5 — Brad with Michelle

The Bachelor Brad Womack, Episode 1: He Meets the Girls.

Season 15 kicked off with a remorseful Brad Womack who lead us down Lonesome Road, which is a left off Sad Boulevard and a right on Solitaire Street (if you hit Rejection Lane you’ve gone too far). Brad’s life was at a dead end. In 2007, he finished season 11 of the Bachelor and had no marriage proposal to show for it. That’s because, with the two girls left on that season, he gave neither a rose. They took the off ramp down to Dejection Depot while Brad signed up for three years of therapy. Here is where we see a montage of Brad sitting in the rain. Then walking in the sun.

Therapy. Analyzation. Trust issues. Blame father. Standing by lake with no shirt.

Green v-neck shirt.

Not to be outdone, purple v-neck shirt.

Fast forward to 2011 and Brad’s back in business, claiming to be a changed man. Global warming? War? Rising gas prices? No, no. Tell me who killed Michael Jackson then tell me Brad’s a changed man. We’ll courier that news to Bin Laden and bing bang, problem solved. In my best George W. Bush voice: America, you’re a beacon of freedom and change and giving people second chances at… freedom and change… and being on The Bachelor. End quote.

Par for the course next when Chris Harrison brings Brad to the front of the mansion where each girl steps out of a limousine to introduce themselves. This season there are 30 potential Womackettes (instead of the standard 25) so that’ll make for more drama and a few extra episodes of awesomeness.

Each girl has their own ideas of making good first impressions, some standouts include the girl who got him to propose, the vampire teeth girl, the hand mysteriously appearing out of the limousine window girl, and the slap heard round the world. Between promo packages and commericals, it was tough to squeeze in any real documention of relationships being formed (hey, they only had two hours to do this) so without much storyline, Brad narrowed it down to 20 girls (listed below). I’ll be honest, I had a couple guy friends over to my house to watch the premiere. We’re totally secure men so we never had a problem watching the show together, though they weren’t happy about my idea to light a fire, but I thought it would be warm.

Amongst the topics we talked about during the episode: why all the girls are white, the average bachelorette age this season is 27 years old (Brad is 38), Emily and who of us three should get to marry her when Brad lets her go, are fangs hot, Ashley S. grabbing Brad’s butt, Alli talking to Brad about her butt when he was probably thinking about something else of hers (more specifically her two something else’s that she made very obvious), Raichel’s wrist waxing, and how we can set up a bracket challenge for this season. I’ll work on setting up a bracket tomorrow, but that’s ok, at my job I have Microsoft Word and they encourage us to be creative. So I’ll design a sweet bracket, save it as a pdf and email to the guys. Copies available upon request.

Ashley S. gets the first impression rose. The next 19 went to Michelle, Kimberly, Madison Vampire, Emily, Raichel Wax, Keltie, Ashley H., Meghan, Lisa M., Lindsay, Alli, Sarah P. (your name rhymes with therapy), Marissa, Britt, Stacey, Shawntel, Jackie, Melissa, Chantal O.

No rose: Britnee, Cristy, J, Jill, Lacey, Lauren, Lisa P., Rebecca, Renee, and Sarah L.

My predictions for the final 3 are: Emily, Chantal O., Michelle. My two favorites after the first episode are Emily and Shawntel.

Click here for a recap of episode 2.

The Bachelor: An Introduction to Brad Womack

Welcome back to another season of The Bachelor. This is the first time Out of the Wilderness will be covering this version of the show. You may recall some wild and hilarious (that’s called shameless self-promotion) posts about Ali Fedotowski on last season’s Bachelorette. She ended up choosing Roberto over Chris L. (recap here), though most searches directing viewers to this site were about Chris and his tattoo. Chris Lambton was slated to be the next Bachelor but he declined, so lo and behold, we have Brad Womack.

This is Brad’s second time on the show, with the first being the season he surprised everyone by not choosing Jenni Croft or DeAnna Pappas. That was back in 2007. Now, in 2011, Brad lives in Austin, Texas and is sure he’s a changed man. His twin brother and their younger brother both are married and have families, so Brad is ~~desperate~~ excited to start a family of his own.

Out of the Wilderness will cover each episode as Brad narrows thirty ~~desperate~~ excited women down to one. Log on to the web either late Monday nights or early Tuesdays for a fresh, creative, clever and hilarious take on each new episode. Then check this site for my take.

Good luck to Brad and his ~~once-~~twice-in-a-lifetime search for love!

Thanks,

The Best of 2010

Last year welcomed a new blog into the world. Since the birth of ‘Out of the Wilderness’ in April, the site has attracted 26,604 views. The postings on this site cover everything from dolphins to Nashville to mustaches, Boney M, music, the power of words, ghosts, personality types, the BP oil spill, online dating, and much more. With all the variety of topics, though, the highest viewed posts are about the 2010 season of “The Bachelorette.” I posted a weekly review after each episode from the very first episode (meet the Bachelors) to the last when Ali picked Roberto Martinez over Chris Lambton. Curiosity about Chris drew in the most clicks among Bachelorette posts. However, the post with the most views overall will surprise you. It’s about a band called Boney M, international stars from the 1970s. Sadly, the male lead from the band died recently so searches for Bobby Farrell and Boney M have surged quite a bit since then. Without further explanation, here are stats from ‘Out of the Wilderness’ this year, in order of most viewed: