I’m on the road today, so here’s a handful of quick hitters.

I’m sure you’ll find something in here of interest to you. If not, you’re probably holding the phone wrong.

7 Random Things That are Random

1. Donald Miller’s charity, The Mentoring Project, is in the running to receive some grant money from Chase. It takes 60 seconds to place your vote on Facebook. Would you mind helping out? The Mentoring Project is trying to change our country by providing fatherless boys with strong male role models in their life. It’s an amazing cause and an easy way for you to help. Click here to vote.

2. It’s been light years since I’ve mentioned it, but I am still booking speaking gigs. If your church/mens/youth group is looking for a funny guy who can get semi-serious too, shoot me an email. My talks are approximately 24.8 minutes long and revolve around biblical truths that I apply to our lives as non-robots living in 2010. I do not wear a cape when I speak.

3. Speaking of semi-serious, I’ve got a bunch of faith-related thoughts percolating these days, so look for a little more of those in the near future. (if that’s okay).

4. I made a video for Tyler Stanton’s blog. If you don’t read Tyler’s blog, here it is.

5. LeBron James is going to play for the Miami Heat next year. I’ve never been so anxious to hear someone make a decision that was going to have so little effect on my life. Also, LeBron James’ beard was awesome. If you squinted it looked like a beard of bees. Now THAT would have been a great way to give an announcement.

6. A question for you writers and book lovers out there. If I were to sit down and interview some authors, what would you be most interested hearing about? Their writing process? Their experiences in the publishing industry? More about their personal lives? Let me know…

7. Finally, I walked into my living room last night to this:

If you’re keeping score at home, that’s 1 love seat, 1 couch, and 10 pillows.

Earlier in the day Erica did some shopping with her friend Ashley (who is a reader of this fine blog, I might add – Hey Ashley!), and they came up with this pillow idea. Now, keeping in mind that you can’t totally see how the colors work in the room, and you can’t really appreciate the fabric and textures of the pillows, what do you think? Does it look good or ridiculous? (just be nice about it either way or I’ll flick your nose)

So there you go, give me answers to #6 and #7 and have a great weekend!

I’ve done quite a bit of guest posting during the month of April. The link to today’s guest post on Shawn Smucker’s blog is coming in a minute. Shawn’s a writer, a co-author of two books, and a good friend.

Earlier this week Shawn and I took a trip up to Messiah College to hear Don Miller speak. Don seemed to be in a bit of a rambling mood, but as usual he gave his audience a bunch of good thoughts to chew on and more than a few great one-liners to keep us laughing. And he was kind enough to leave Shawn and I free tickets, so that was nice of him.*

*only he forgot to actually put the tickets in will call, which led to this exchange

Will Call Girl: Sorry, there are no tickets here for Bryan Allain. Who left them again?

Me: Don actually left them.

Will Call Girl: *blank expression*

Me: Yeah, Don…Donald…Miller.

Will Call Girl: *blank expression*

Me: The person speaking.

Will Call Girl: Ohhhhhhhhh. Um…I’ll just print you up two tickets.

In a not-so-related story…last month Tripp and Tyler flew out to Portland to film a video with Don for Catalyst, and as usual they knocked it out of the park. They asked me for script ideas early on in the process and a few of my lines actually made it into the final video.

(Actually, of the 100 things that are awesome in this video I was responsible for only 2 of them. Tripp and Tyler did the rest. I’ll tell you which 2 lines in the comments.)

The Sunny D / Tang thing kills me every time. Just slays me.

Anyhoo, Shawn and I had a great time. And today I’ve got a guest post on his blog, 10 Reasons I Love TV.

You should check out Shawn’s blog because he’s a great writer and because he’s crazy enough to have given up TV for all of 2010. (and next week be on the lookout for a Shawn Smucker guest post here.)

PS… as if the free tickets weren’t enough. Later on in the night we ordered food from the Messiah Student Union Cafe (after running into Janet O!), but they didn’t take credit cards and the ATM wouldn’t give either of us money. So we just ate and ran. Hey, Shawn’s a Messiah Alum, so I figure he overpaid $10 for SOMETHING there in his 4 years at the school.

Author: Donald Miller

Book Name: A Million Miles in a Thousand Years: What I Learned While Editing My Life

I’m Glad it Wasn’t Called: Let Story Guide You: Why some lives make sense and others don’t, which was the original title for the book when Don first conceived it. (I even have the original cover art for the book, which I’ll show you at the end of the post.) I’m also glad it wasn’t called Auteur: Why some lives make sense and others don’t, which was another title they were throwing around back in the Fall of 2007.

Book Synopsis in Twitteresque 140 characters or less: While writing a movie based on his stories, Don discovers that the same elements that make up a good story, also make a good life.

Where I Bought It: Got it at a bookstore in King of Prussia, PA. (though I should note that I didn’t end up purchasing the one I bit. So somewhere there’s a copy of this book with my dental records all over it.)

Paid for With: Visa. I’ve always been a Visa guy and not a Mastercard guy. No idea why.

How Long it Took Me to Read: Not long. I read the first 40 pages in an airplane in Microsoft Word since someone had sent me a pre-release illegal copy (shh, don’t tell anyone). After I bought the book a few weeks later I read the whole thing in about a week.

Who I WOULD NOT recommend this book to: Someone on their death bed. It’s pretty inconsiderate to ask someone who’s about to die to read a book about writing a better story with their life. It’s downright rude, actually.

Who I WOULD recommend this book to: Just about everyone. Whether you’re chasing your dreams, trying to figure out what your dreams are, or enjoying the dreams you’ve caught, there’s something in here for you.

What I used for a bookmark: A candy corn. Totally screwed up the book’s binding.

What were some interesting true stories from the book: Don’s story about finding and meeting his father was huge. As you get to the end of it, you’re like, “oh crap, my eyes are about to get watery, aren’t they?” and then it’s too late. It was also fascinating to read about Don’s failed relationship that he and his fiancee broke off. Not just because it’s Don, but because rarely do successful Christian authors write about their failed relationships.

What were some interesting true stories NOT from the book: I got to hang out with Don and Susan Isaacs on their tour bus the other day, which was a lot of fun. They’re just as kind in person as they are engaging on stage, but I’m sure you figured that. Unfortunately Don was not able to put the transcript of our riveting 20-minute conversation into the book because it happened a month after the book was released. Maybe the second printing?

What was the 1 thing I’ll take from the book: I’m gonna cheat and give you 3 things. #1 is that when a character doesn’t have a good ambition, he is not in a good story. If all I want to be is a successful writer, who cares? If I’m striving to be a good father and husband who loves those around him, now we’re getting somewhere. #2 is that this really isn’t about us. God is not a supporting character in my story. This is God’s story, and I play a part in it. Changes your perspective on things. #3 is that the climax of the Christian’s story is not when they accept Christ as savior. Because after that point there is still much conflict and heartache. No, the big scene in Act 3 when it all comes together is at the wedding feast of the Lamb in heaven. Conflict here on earth isn’t against God’s will for us. He actually uses it to shape and change us on this side of eternity.

What I learned from this book that I will apply to my next book: A good title is a good title no matter where it comes from. If you’re wondering where “A Million Miles in a Thousand Years” comes from, it’s from a line in the book that you might have not even noticed, had it not been the inspiration for the book’s name. A memorable title is HUGE (and I think I finally have one for the book I’m working on…maybe.)

Expectations Going In: It’s Don Miller, so the expectations were very high.

Cannarf Rating: Despite my high expectations, the book still was an unexpected surprise. I had heard Don speak about Story before, so I wondered if some of the material would feel old and stale. On the contrary, the stories he injected into the book really helped the material make sense in a fresh way. I truly feel that anyone who reads through this book will be better off for it. Good chance I’ll wind up calling this my favorite book of his.   The Rating: +2 cannarfs. (what’s a cannarf?)

Have any of you read A Million Miles in a Thousand Years? If so, what’s your cannarf rating?

Bonus Time…here’s an early draft of the cover art for the book when it was titled, Let Story Guide You, designed by Barak Hardley:

and here’s a potential cover that Barak Hardley designed for Million Miles that Don’s blog readers thought was a little too dark. (it references a passage in the book where Don talks about how people would mourn the loss of good stories, and not non-fiction, if a Book Mobile fell off a bridge.)

Here’s a few things that caught my attention on the world wide spider web this week:

[+] Stuff Christian’s Like’s Jon Acuff blew me away this week with his post on “Refusing the Gift of the Desert Road“. Really appreciated the perspective this gave me with regards to my own journey as a writer.

[+] Speaking of perspective, I enjoyed Donald Miller’s post on leaders needing to be able to admit when they’re wrong. His blog post came in light of Robert McNamara’s death. I didn’t know much about the man, but I’ve heard that The Fog of War is worth a watch.

[+] Speaking of Robert McNamara, over at the Burnside Blog Karen Spears Zacharias wrote an inspired rebuttal to Don’s blog post that examined the other side of the coin.

[+] Speaking of things that are metal, if you’re a golfer and you’ve heard about the changes coming to the grooves in your irons, this post has all the details you could ever want.

[+] Speaking of things you might want, would you like to instantly know how far a Home Run was hit in next week’s home run derby so you can challenge your friends to a “yell out the distance of the home run as it leaves the bat” contest? Well, thanks to some newfangled doppler technology, now you will.

[+]Finally, speaking of challenging, Ben Arment continues to keep me from getting comfortable. This post on how fear can paralyze us was a nice kick in the ribs. Thanks Ben!

here’s a few things I found interesting this week online…

+ If I had a nickel for every time I had to tell someone that Donald Miller is not a part of the emergent church, I’d probably have $1.30. And I would spend it on a hash brown from McDonald’s because those things are so tasty in the morning with a coffee. Point is, I won’t have to tell people anymore. Now I’ll just point them to this post, where Don is forced to defend himself from an error-filled article in The Weekly Standard.

+ by the way, Don’s new book, A Million Miles in a Thousand Years, will be out this fall. You can read the first 3 chapters here.

+ This post by Brad Ruggles on “Sex, Lies, and Photoshop” last month was a good one. Remember folks, the chick on the cover of the magazine is not only made up by professional makeup artists, she’s also been photoshopped like crazy. Here’s one of the images from Brad’s post. These are not 2 copies of the exact image, but obviously they are shots from the same photo shoot. Finding the many ways they photoshopped Faith is like playing Where’s Waldo. Look at how much skinnier her left arm is, how they’ve smoothed out her face, and what they did to her skin right where it meets the top of her dress behind her left arm.

+ Tyler Stanton and I are racing to see who can get to 5,000 Twitter Followers first. Right now I have a slight lead on him 352-320 (yeah, we’ve got a looooong way to go). If you’re not on Twitter yet, stop pretending you’re too cool for it and at least give it a try. And once you’ve got an account, come follow me, and I’ll follow you back.

+ Here’s a link to a study that shows occasionally picking your nose actually makes you a better husband. (Hey, we all can dream, right?)

+ My good friend Geof has been struggling with depression for a few years now, and I’m always fascinated with the candor in which he blogs about it. I think it’s a brave thing to do, and whether you struggle with depression or not, I encourage you to read his posts on depression to gain a little more insight into it.

+ Finally, I haven’t done any videos for the site in a long time, but I plan on doing some in the future. In the meantime, here’s one from a few months ago that might be new to some of you. My miserable attempt at being sneaky

Not Quite Jason Bourne from Bryan Allain on Vimeo.