What's Your Poison?

Go to "Death by Caffeine" to find out how much of your chosen caffeine you can have before it kills you!

What is a missionary?

Missionaries - we all know who they are. They're the people who live in exotic, far away lands, with people of different cultures. Bringing Christ to the Nations. Different languages, different cultures, different people, different countries. It takes a special kind of person to be a missionary. They're special. They're called. They're God's Important People. Lots of special training, lots of special work...right?

There's another kind of mission field, though. I go out into it every day. Showing Christ to the people around me. Following God's will and God's Word - even when it's not convenient or easy. Believing and trusting and HOLDING FIRMLY to Romans 8:28: "And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose." Praying and living each day believing that GOD'S will shall be done - not MY will. Living according to His will, His word, and His purpose.

That's my mission field. I'm a missionary to lots of people - including fellow Christians. Who knows what they need - maybe just by being there I can help them in their faith walk. Maybe just an email, or a smile, or a comment is all they need to help them right now. Maybe it's something greater. Maybe I'll never know the purpose to which God is putting me right now. But that's OK, because I know that He is putting me to a purpose. He does have a plan, and it all works together for the good of those who love Him.

No, I don't have to go to exotic, far-away lands to serve in a mission field. I'm in my mission field, day in and day out, doing the mission I was called to do. I just pray that I can do it well, and faithfully. It's hard sometimes to remember I'm in a mission field. It's hard to "show Christ to the nations" - or even my friends and family sometimes. But, I also hold tight to Philippians 4:13 - "I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me."

Which Dino are you?

I'm a VELOCIRAPTOR! w00t!

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Straight No Chaser - 12 Days

My coworker *rocks*.

I got in this morning to see a small bag of chocolates sitting on my desk. Asked my coworker about it and she said that since everyone in the "contractor's triangle" had their "stockings" filled (small stockings for each of them at their desk, I'm guessing), and I don't sit over there so I wouldn't get any, she dropped off a few chocolates for me.

Nice to come in to. :)
Thanks, Chris.

Thoughts for the day

Life is too short to wake up with regrets.
So love the people who treat you right.
Forget about the ones who don't.
Believe everything happens for a reason.
If you get a second chance, grab it with both hands.
If it changes your life, let it.
Nobody said life would be easy,
they just promised it would be worth it.

Links for your enjoyment

If you're looking for free, downloadable books for your PDA, here are a couple of links for you.

Memoware has free e-books in several formats, and a searchable database. If you create an account there (also free), it'll even save your search preferences!

For more free books, go to Baen Books' Free Library page. Eric Flint explains the reason behind the Free Library on that page. New, original material from current authors who Baen publishes. I don't know about you guys, but I'm going to try to buy Baen books whenever I can, just because of that policy.

And, for some fantastic Christian music, go to Lost & Found's website. They do great Christian music, and believe that music should be sung enthusiastically.

On Sheep, Wolves, and Sheepdogs

There's an excellent article here about our Law Enforcement in society. I encourage everyone to read it and really think about it. I'd reproduce it here, but it's not mine to post.

Are you a sheep, a sheepdog, or a wolf?

Woof.

The Rules of The West

Rules of Utah, Idaho and the Wild West are as follows:

1. Pull your pants up. You look like an idiot.

2. Turn your cap right, your head ain't crooked.

3. Let's get this straight: it's called a "gravel road." I drive a pickup truck because I want to. No matter how slow you drive, you're gonna get dust on your Lexus. Drive it or get out of the way.

4. They are cattle. That's why they smell to you. They smell like money to us. Get over it. Don't like it? I-80 goes east and west, I-15 goes north and south. Pick one.

5. So you have a $60,000 car. We're impressed. We have $250,000 combines that are driven only 3 weeks a year.

6. Every person in the Wild West waves. It's called being friendly. Try to understand the concept.

7. If that cell phone rings while a bunch of geese/pheasants/ducks/doves are comin' in during the hunts, we WILL shoot it outa your hand. You better hope you don't have it up to your ear at the time.

8. Yeah. We eat trout, salmon, deer and elk. You really want sushi and caviar you can get them at the bait store on the corner.

9. The "Opener" refers to the first day of deer season. It's a religious holiday held the closest Saturday to the first of November.

10. We open doors for women. That's applied to all women, regardless of age.

11. No, there's no "vegetarian special" on the menu. Order steak, or you can order the Chef's Salad and pick off the 2 pounds of ham & turkey.

12. When we fill out a table, there are three main dishes: meats, vegetables, and breads We use three spices: salt, pepper, and ketchup! Oh, yeah.... We don't care what you folks in Cincinnati call that stuff you eat... IT AIN'T REAL CHILI!!

13. You bring "Coke" into my house, it better be brown, wet and served over ice. You bring "Mary Jane" into my house, she better be cute, know how to shoot, drive a truck, and have long hair.

14. College and High School Football is as important here as the Lakers and the Knicks, and a dang site more fun to watch.

15. Yeah, we have golf courses. But don't hit the water hazards -- it spooks the fish.

16. Colleges? We have them all over. We have State Universities, Universities, and Vo-techs. They come outta there with an education plus a love for God and country, and they still wave at everybody when they come home for the holidays.

17. We have more folks in the Army, Navy, Air Force, and Marines than all of you put together, so don't mess with us. If you do, you'll get whipped by the best.

18. Turn down that blasted car stereo! That thumpity-thump crap ain't music, anyway. We don't want to hear it anymore than we want to see your boxers! Refer back to #1!

Winter Weather Car Tip

Want to save yourself some time in the morning? Try this trick that a friend of mine from Michigan passed along.

Get a large garbage bag, at least a 30-gallon one. I like to cut it open along the 2 side seams and fold it out along the bottom seam (leave the bottom seam intact). Now, go start your car's windshield wipers, and turn off the car when they're in the "full up" position, so they stay that way.
Now, lift the wipers out of the way (away from the windshield), take your garbage-bag-plastic-sheet and spread it out across your windshield. Once it's flat and spread out as far as you can make it, put the wipers back where they belong to hold it down.
If you have any bag hanging over the sides of the windshield, open your front doors, and tuck the bag in. Shut the door to hold the bag.

Now you won't have to scrape that 3/4" of ice off your windshield tomorrow! It's great for keeping off snow, frost and (of current interest throughout the Midwest) freezing rain and sleet.

Small plastic grocery bags and a twist-tie or two may do a fair job at keeping the ice off the side mirrors, as well. I've tried drawstring garbage bags on that, so far, with a 50% success rate (one stayed on, one blew off). I'm trying the grocery-bag-twist-tie thing next.

Stay safe, dry and warm!

Happy Saint Nicholas' Day!

Yes, today is St. Nicholas Day. You thought it was a bit later in the month, didn't you? Nope, that day is reserved for the Lord's Birthday.

St. Nicholas was a Bishop of Myra during the 3rd century A.D. It will come as no surprise to find out he had a reputation for secret gift-giving. He is the patron saint of sailors, pawnbrokers, merchants, archers, children, and students.

The most famous legend told about him is this one.

A poor man had three daughters but could not afford a proper dowry for them. This meant that they would remain unmarried and probably, in absence of any other possible employment would have to become prostitutes. Hearing of the poor man's plight, Nicholas decided to help him but being too modest (or too shy) to help the man in public, (or knowing the man too proud to accept charity), he went to his house under the cover of night and threw three purses filled with gold coins through the window opening onto the man's floor. One version has him throwing one purse for three consecutive nights. Another has him throw the purses over a period of three years, each time the night before one of the daughters comes "of age". Invariably the third time the father lies in waiting, trying to discover their benefactor. In one version the father confronts the saint, only to have Saint Nicholas say it is not him he should thank, but God alone. In another version, Nicholas learns of the poor man's plan and drops the third bag down the chimney instead; a variant holds that the daughter had washed her stockings that evening and hung them over the embers to dry, and that the bag of gold fell into the stocking. For his help to the poor, Nicholas is the patron saint of pawnbrokers; the three gold balls traditionally hung outside a pawnshop symbolize the three sacks of gold. People then began to suspect that he was behind a large number of other anonymous gifts to the poor, using the inheritance from his wealthy parents. After he died, people in the region continued to give to the poor anonymously, and such gifts were still often attributed to St. Nicholas.

I'm a triolet!

What poetry form are you?

If they told you I'm mad, then they lied. I'm odd, but it isn't compulsive. I'm the triolet, bursting with pride; If they told you I'm mad, then they lied. No, it isn't obsessive. Now hide All the spoons or I might get convulsive. If they told you I'm mad then they lied. I'm odd, but it isn't compulsive. What Poetry Form Are You?

Movie Review: Enchanted

This one's a fun little ride. It shows what happens when the naive little Disneyfied world collides with modern-day New York City. It takes a lot of the Disney conventions and gently pokes fun at them, encouraging us to laugh.
Since it is pretty much a Disney-ish movie, you know how it's going to end. Everyone gets their Happily Ever After. Sorry if that spoiled it for you, but geez, Kev & I both saw the ending coming from a mile away. You probably will too. It doesn't matter, as the "how will it END?" really isn't there. The movie knows you know how it's going to end, and therefore doesn't waste any plot-points on hiding it. Good move, in my opinion - that screen time is better served giving us another joke (like Prince Charming stabbing a bus - and getting completely told off by the bus driver).
Susan Sarandon camps it up as The Evil Stepmother - and she does a great job. The only jarring note was her platform "KISS"-style boots. I thought they looked awfully clunky, but then again I'm sure that pretty much everyone else is going to love them, so it's not like those ruined it or anything. Her...um...assets are displayed to great advantage, I must say.

And Timothy Spall. God love him, that guy's found his niche and he's gonna play it for all he's worth. For those of you that remember him as "Wormtail" from the Harry Potter movies...well, let's just say you won't be surprised at his character.

Prince Charming is appealingly brainless, and James Marsden makes it work. I have no idea how - in most hands that kind of naive, brainless approach by a "real person" would've been incredibly annoying, but he makes it, appropriately enough, charming. And if he's doing his own singing...WELL. Great voice on whoever it was that did the songs.
Same with Amy Adams, a/k/a "Giselle", a/k/a "Prince Charming's intended". She was the perfect choice for this role, as she plays the naive, almost brainless "Disney Princess-to-be". I do like the scene where she discovers "angry". It's VERY well done. And again, if she did her own singing...brava.

Anyway, it's a fun spoof of the traditional "Disney" style movies, without breaking the "happily-ever-after" requirement.
Excellent.

Movie Review: Mister Magoriam's Wonder Emporium

This is an extremely bizarre movie. For those of you that haven't seen it, Dustin Hoffman plays Mr. Magoriam, a magical man who owns a magical toy store. When he decides that 243 years is long enough to live, he leaves the toy store to his assistant, "Mahoney". The magical toy store is evidently sentient as well, and expresses its displeasure at losing Magoriam by, essentially, throwing a fit. The magic stops working, everything turns black, and Mahoney decides to sell the store.

Subplots: Mahoney is a child prodigy-turned-frustrated composer. She keeps trying to make "the perfect composition" but never can quite do so. Turns out she needs to believe in herself.
There's a small boy who helps out in the store, and whose only friend is Mahoney. He's not only a magical kid, he's a total freak - building life-size statues of Abraham Lincoln out of Lincoln Logs, for example, and doing so in a matter of minutes. He collects hats. His mother expresses concern about his lack of friends. He says he doesn't know how. Mom says "introduce yourself." So he does, to...
The accountant, Henry. Magoriam has hired Henry to dig through over 100 years of receipts, notes, and random business papwerwork to find out how much of a legacy Magoriam is leaving to Mahoney. The only amusing points of the movie really came when dealing with the accountant. Magoriam decides that an accountant must be a "counting mutant", so everyone calls him "mutant". And he accepts it. I don't get it.
Anyway, the kid introduces himself to Henry, the "mutant", then gets Henry to walk him home. He invites Henry up to see his hat collection, nad he and Henry start playing "pretend" with all the hats. Mom, of course, shows up in the middle of their game and looks extremely disapproving about all this.
The movie ends, of course, with Mahoney deciding she does have the magic after all, and the store is restored to normal.

I found it highly annoying. Let's take the kid. Mom's barely there, but fine, she's a single mom, cut her some slack. But her interactions with her kid are horrible. Her suggestions on how to make friends are "find someone you don't know, and introduce yourself." That's it. The kid's already told her that all the other kids his age consider him a freak, so who does she think he's going to make friends with? And once he comes home with a friend, she kicks the friend out. Great, mom. Let's just make it perfectly clear that you're unhappy your kid isn't normal, hey? And he should just KNOW how to become normal and make you happy. Whatever.

Mahoney is another irritant. Much is made about her inability to finish a composition, evidently because she doesn't believe in herself. She has many awards littering her apartment, showing she won many piano playing competitions, prizes, scholarships...and yet, at the toy store, she encounters someone who says he was in her Physics class in college. Um...what? If you're good enough to win prizes, awards, and scholarships for your musical talent, you don't go to a generic local college and take PHYSICS class - you go to Interlochen or Juilliard or Tanglewood to learn how to be a better musician! You surround yourself with music, learn how to write music, play music with your musical peers - you don't go to PHYSICS classes!
By the way, with all the noise made about her needing to believe in herself and then she'll be able to finish her composition, the composition gets rather left out of the denoument of the story. Just so you know - don't go waiting around to hear what happens to her composition. She doesn't finish it.

And evidently all it took for her to believe in herself was for Henry-the-mutant to believe in her. Tell me you didn't see that coming.

Magoriam's death, by the way, was pretty weird. He just decides one day that, even though he's perfectly healthy and happy, he's done living. Bye.

I'm seeing a lot of problems with that concept. I imagine a conversation after that movie: "Daddy...why did mommy decide to leave us?" "She didn't, she was very sick and there was nothing we could do." "But Mr. Magoriam died because he wanted to. Why did mommy want to leave us?"

Yeah, thanks.
So, the messages for your kids in this movie are:
People die because they want to.
Make new friends, but only of people your own age, even if you're a freak and nobody your own age will talk to you, because otherwise mommy and daddy will be disappointed in you.
Believe in yourself and you can do anything - except what you really really wanted to do in the first place.

Okeydokey then.

Dustin Hoffman, and the credits, were really the only enjoyable parts of this movie. Well, other than Justin Bateman getting called "mutant". A lot.