Google’s privacy changes

There’s been a lot of hype recently about how Google is going to start tracking the websites visited by their users. I thought I’d spare them the trouble and provide my own list (in order of my most visited):

1. Yahoo (for email and news)
2. Facebook
3. My blog at wordpress, and other blogs
4. NFL.com – I rooted for the Giants all season
5. Deutsch Perfekt and spiegel.de — for various articles and audio clips
6. Fox news

So, there you have it Google. If you choose to track me, these are the websites you will find.

And now for a report on the bugs

It is official: we are being overrun by cicadas here in Louisburg. It all began about a week ago. I stepped outside around 10:00 at night. In the stillness of the night I heard a distinct noise, the sound of something slithering in the leaves. I looked down and, sure enough, I could see the leaves near my feet rustling and moving. Expecting to see a snake, I crouched down, but was surprised to see BUGS! These bugs were crawling out from under the leaves, as if in slow motion. As I watched and listened, I realized this was happening all over our yard. “What is this?” I thought to myself. “In the three and a half years that we’ve lived here this has never happened.”

The next day I found hundreds of little holes throughout the yard, apparently where the bugs had been hidden in the ground. This process has continued during the week. There are now thousands of bug-shells laying in the yard. I did a little research and discovered that these are called the “13 year cicadas” — they are a unique variety that only comes out once every thirteen years. When it is their year, they come out with a vengeance! If you google these critters, you’ll discover that there are also “17 year cicadas”, which are found in the northern states. The 13 year variety emerges on a spring night, generally in early May when the soil temperature reaches 63 degrees. Now here is the crazy part: according to Wikepedia, when this happens as many as 1.5 million might emerge PER SQUARE ACRE!

When these millions of cicadas emerge, what happens? They are present from May to July for one purpose: mating. And they are known for their mating “songs.” And I do not even want to imagine what the hum of millions of these bugs sounds like every 13 years. This is much different from the yearly cicadas, this is a mass appearance of cicadas that will be very loud! And animals are known to thrive the year of the cicada appearance; for example, Turkeys and moles are known to become fatter from gorging themselves on the insects.

With all that in mind, I got home from work tonight to see the swarms around the house getting bigger. I ran inside, grabbed the camera, and got a video. I was in my sandals, thinking that these bugs were slow-moving. I was wrong! I must tell you, as I filmed these bugs, I felt a little like the crocodile hunter, or like Bear Grylls. Enjoy!

Temporary

God has a way of reminding us of how frail life can be. This week, I have been reminded of this like never before.

-I guess the tornadoes were my first reminder. We lived through storms on Saturday that took the lives of 22 people. That could have been me!
-The news of little Rebekah has been another reminder. Within less than a week’s time, the Chandlers have gone from having a happy, “normal” life, to one filled with chemo, hospitals, and sorrow. That could have been my daughter!
-I got to work yesterday to discover several customers had suddenly died during the past week. One I knew very well. One of these customers I saw on a weekly basis, and we often swapped bicycling tips and stories. He was young (in his 50′s), healthy, active, but died of a massive heart attack while changing a tire. That could have been me!

Life is fragile. We are not guaranteed another day. None of us knows what tomorrow holds. I’ll never forget a conversation I overheard a couple of months ago. I heard a teenager blabbing away about how good life was, about how great it was to be young and healthy with the best years ahead. Oh yes, life was good for this teenager. And how glad they were not to be old like their 40-year-old parents. No, this teenager never planned on getting old but on being a young, healthy teenager their whole life. I wanted to grab this youth by the collar and say, “wake up!”

“All people are like grass”

Bad attitude

Can I be brutally honest with you for a minute? I’ve been struggling with a sour attitude for the past two days. I won’t go into details except to say I’ve felt impatient, grumpy, and snappy. . . and convicted! As I prayed about it and tried to put the attitude off, I realized a few things. I had been completely thinking about myself the whole time, so of course I was feeling bad. selfishness is miserable! I also noticed that I had nothing to be grumpy about, in fact I have a whole lot to be thankful for. But rather than being thankful for the Lord’s goodness in my life, I simply chose to dwell on some small inconveniences. So, you could really say, I was choosing to be miserable. And as I thought about this, I remembered something that I read a couple of weeks ago that said, “Often those complain the most in life are those who really have it quite easy, who have the least to worry about, while those who face tremendous difficulty and sorrow are filled with the most radiant joy.” How true! I had nothing to be gripping about, yet I was.

Lord, help me take my eyes off myself and to live for your gospel and for others. Fill me with your Spirit’s joy.

Yo Yo Ma & Allison Krauss

Check out this YouTube video. Beautiful music and beautiful words!

Incidentally, Christmas caroling season is gearing up for HJ. Today the women in the group had a mandatory meeting where they got together and sewed bonnets. The group she carols with dresses in full costume and is hired to sing at different functions almost every weekend in November and December. Last year they were even hired a couple of times by Disney. Hopefully she will be able to get a few gigs in this year before Melody arrives.

You might live in the South if…

if you’re planning a big corn-cob toss this weekend. Yes, I did say corn-cob toss. Today a fellow at work told me about how he has been practicing all week for the big competition this weekend. I asked him what a corn-cob toss entails. It basically is where a bunch of guys get together, stand 20-30 feet away from a designated hole, and see who can successfully toss the corn-cob into the target. The closest one wins 300 dollars. It’s not too late to come to Louisburg and see if you’ve got what it takes to be the master corn-cob thrower.

Great weather if you’re a duck…

or an energetic black lab still bursting with puppy youthfullness who’s been home alone all day and can’t wait to get outside and play is there a stick anywhere nearby?

Real Sick

I couldn’t help but chuckle at work Saturday when I heard someone say,

My wife, she’s real sick. She’s been having all sorts of stomach trouble. The doctor has put her on a special medicine. She’s so sick, he told her she can’t even eat at Bojangles anymore.

You know you’ve got it bad when Bojangles is on your “forbidden foods” list. Talk about a bleak picture, what else is there when there’s no more Bojangles?

Kung Fu

Did you know that the term “Kung Fu” originally referred to expertise in any skill achieved through hard work and practice, not necessarily with martial arts (click here for definition). So, you could say someone has Kung Fu in cooking, or in calligraphy. Wikepedia states that “someone with ‘bad kung fu’ simply has not put enough time and effort into training.”

How cool. Now we can all say with entire honesty and straight faces that we’re “Kung Fu Masters.” Aren’t we all good at something that took effort and practice to perfect?

What is discipleship

Reading one of Arthur Sido‘s masterfully written essays has given me something to chew on this week. In his essay, Arthur points out some flawed tradition which says that mature Christianity is no more than shuffling in and out of church, dropping a tithe envelope, and faithfully listening to sermons year after year. Rather than being the mark of mature Christianity, Arthur argues that these things may not even belong to Christianity.

Two points about his essay sparked the most thought. First, after critiquing the faulty view of discipleship, Arthur slightly hints at what may actually be true, biblical discipleship: self-denial, sacrifice, and ministry by all believers. But this is as far as Arthur goes in this post towards a solution.

Secondly, Arthur raises the question of whether true discipleship is ever monotonous, or even boring.

What do you think?

How would you describe radical, biblical discipleship? What does that entail? What traits and habits characterize a mature disciple?

Is there ever a place in one’s walk with the Lord for seeming monotony and boredom?