Hurrah for Rowan Williams for saying no to a "victory" service for the Iraqi Invasion.

Rev. Butler recently posted an article and a picture of the new Microsoft I-Loo. That's right, it's a crapper with internet access. Your worst fears/best dreams confirmed.

Seeing as how I don't use any form of public restroom, I have good reason to believe that I'll be immune to its charms should it make an appearance over here in the States. All I have to say is these things better come equipped with packs of rubber gloves if they're going to be popping up at the local county fair. Better yet, after each use, huge blowers should case the room with disinfectant just like that room in Outbreak, where the scientists go to detox after working with diseases. Yeah, that'd be cool.

Here's the best part of the article though:

"...MSN is also in talks with toilet paper manufacturers to produce special web paper for those in need of URL inspiration."

Is there really any better "screaming down the highway at 80 mph" song right now than Sugar by System of a Down?

"Go up, you baldhead"

Peter Leithart on Elisha and the identity of the forty-two "lads" that were taken out by bears (II Kings 3):

"But who are the "lads"? The Hebrew word (na'ar) sometimes means "official" or "steward" and sometimes doesn't say anything about age. Mephibosheth's servant Ziba is a na'ar of Saul's house (2 Samuel 16:1), but he is clearly not a boy since he has fifteen sons of his own (2 Sam. 19:17). Boaz would have been a fool to put a "boy" in charge of his reapers, but his foreman is callled a na'ar in Ruth 2:5-6. The forty-two killed by bears are servants at the shrine at Bethel, the shrine devoted to golden calves. Elisha does not slaughter babies or infants or little children but instead calls down curses on the "officials" of the idolatrous shrine of Bethel. As the new Joshua [Leithart earlier shows parallels between the lives of Moses & Josh with the lives of Elijah and Elisha - RC], he is beginning his holy war against the shrines of the "Cannanites" who dominate the Northern Kingdom."

Well, it took a week and a half, but I finally got my car back. The final toll was $580, not light, but considerably better than the $700 that the shop owner originally quoted me on Saturday. He ended up not needing a few parts which took the price down a bit and he only charged me $30 per hour for labor, rather than the regular $34. I guess he took pity on me after he saw the cartoon-like expression on my face when I received the $700 estimate. That's fine, I don't mind being pitied if it will shave two bills off the price.

Ahhh...It's great to finally open the door withour rolling down the window to reach the outside handle, especially now that the rainy season is approaching.

False Messiah of the Day

Well, this one is original to say the least.

" Despite claiming she is a terminally ill cancer patient, a surprisingly animated and lively Chino argued that the most important issue at the moment was to save "Tama-chan," a stray bearded seal that now lives in a river in Saitama Prefecture.

"I will die in four or five days from now but that's nothing as important as Tama-chan. We've been feeding him every day since last summer," Chino told the Fuji reporter inside one of the cult's vans...

Sources said Panawave members believe that "rescuing" Tama-chan would spare mankind from certain destruction on May 15 -- the day when a massive earthquake triggered by the tilting of the Earth's axis will devastated [sic] the planet, according to cultist publications."

Yes, in case you were wondering, I am a loud sneezer.

I feel that it is my obligation to tell you, dear reader, that I have recently converted. Yes, as shocking as it may seem, I have given up the practice of using two pillows to lay my weary head down when I sleep. Too many nights of waking up at 3 AM with neck cramps has forced me to rethink my once staunch position of "dual pillow crainial reinforcment"

Through the civilization that comes from marriage and all of its glorious trappings (such as clean bedsheets every week), I have also become accustomed to pillowcases. Whereas once I felt that they were nusiances existing only to suck up warmth from the human head and eliminate any notion of the "cool side" of the pillow; I now feel that they are necessary in order to keep my pillow, ahem, drool-stain free. As a single man, such notions of cleanliness and "FRICKEN HECK, THERE ARE LITTLE BUGS CALLED GERMS CAMPING ON YOUR PILLOW, Y'KNOW???!!!!", seemed to be a colossal waste of good concern. I mean, why worry about that stuff when the Dodgers are 6 games out of first place?

Yet here now I stand, homosapien domesticus, fretting about whether or not to wash the sheets on warm or cold for fear that the colors will fade. Who'da thunk.

Woo-hoo! Mark Horne is back with a new blog. I'll still keep his old link up since it's full of all sorts of theological goodies, but this one looks to be promising. Less theology and more current events can be a good thing.

Also Barukatash is back up. Brian always had the good info on books and theology sites. Good to see him back.

Yet alas, another classic blogger has gone garver. Well, perhaps it would be more accurate in this case to say "gone Garner". Fare thee well Duane. Amberbach will be missed.

I just found this picture too sad for words.



Probably not how this young bride envisioned her wedding day, hmm?

Yet another reason to keep your kid away from McDonalds.

The Wrath of Grapes

Crikey!! As if we didn't have enough to worry about!

"Almost seven years ago, a 16-year-old bird hunter stepped onto a dusty-looking pile of grape pulp and sank into a deep pit of smoldering 500-degree mash...Fruit juice companies — Seneca Foods Corp., of Marion, N.Y., and Milne Fruit Products, of Prosser — had for years contracted with Whitney Farms to haul away and dispose of the mash — grape skins, pulp, seeds and vine — left over from their local processing plants.
The material was dumped in large pits and covered with soil. As it decomposed, spontaneous combustion would ignite the material. It smoldered at temperatures as high as 507 degrees."

Feeling Yourself Disintegrate

If I never have another day like yesterday, that would be alright by me. I had to write an paper for my communications class, rehearse my oral presentation and prepare and interview for another job all in the space of 12 hours. I had no time to dwell on the neverending pit of money that is my car (repair estimate is now about $700.00), which was probably a good thing all things considered.

The interview went smoothly. It was the first interview in a while where I felt at ease and didn't walk out kicking myself for either being a blabbermouth, or for tripping over my tongue. Of course it probably helped that I knew the guy who interviewed me and already had a good working relationship with him. He pulled out a yelow pad with about 15 questions written down on it; we got through about 4 questions before he said, "Well, what do you think? Is this the position for you?", to which I responded firmly in the affirmative. He then looked at the rest of the pad, then said, "Ah, you probably know all of this anyway", and we continued to chat about the lease industry. It was without a doubt the most laid back job interview I've ever had. Now we'll see if that was a good or a bad thing.

The oral presentation was unrehearsed and shoddy, it was also a hoot. Yes, I said "hoot". My team had a good idea to make our presentation in the form of a game show. We copped the "American Idol" concept. Instead of the contestants being judged on the strength of the performance, they would be judged on the grammatical accuracy of their songs. My teammate, Ralph, rapped a song by Eminem, which I (as Simon with a crappy English accent) then eviscerated to the delight of the class. Pretty fun stuff.

When I got home, I collapsed, exhausted from the day's events and all the stress that it brought. I ate my first meal of the day (ahem, night) at 10 pm and washed it down with a bottle of champagne (split between Karlene and I of course) left over from my new year's party. Coming off the adrenaline rush, I crashed and ended up oversleeping. Karly blamed it on the alcohol, which might have been a factor, but no, adrenaline crash sounds better than hung over. So we'll go with that! ;-)