Caption Contest

The picture below was recently published in Westminster’s 2008-2009 course selection handbook for parents and students. As a result, I’ve been getting grief (”You look like you’re doing a magic trick,” “Vanna White has competition,” etc.) ever since, mostly from colleagues, family, and others who claim they care for and love me.
Because I’d hate for [...]

Playing Caffeine Cop

Hey all you Starbucks addicts fans out there, did it work? Comment and file your report.

Coming to St. Louis

Here are two interesting events coming to town this week and in March:
A Conversation on Denominational Renewal
Tuesday-Thursday, February 26-28, 2008
Memorial Presbyterian Church
“What are our hopes for the church? In one sense, this is a deeply intimate question because it evokes the possibility of both disappointment and delight. And in another sense it is a [...]

Overheard

…during a blitzkrieg cleaning this Saturday morning:
Maddie (age 9): “Daddy, if you lived at Hogwarts, you’d have to do your own laundry.”
Me: “That’s also known as college.”

The Ideology of Rationality

Susan Jacoby’s name has been floating around several sites I frequent and enjoy, so I thought I’d read up a little on why. Jacoby is a former education reporter for The Washington Post, now an author whose new book, The Age of American Unreason, comes out in a couple of weeks (she wrote Freethinkers: A [...]

Moonlighting with God

God, brilliant Lord,
yours is a household name.
Nursing infants gurgle choruses about you;
toddlers shout the songs
That drown out enemy talk,
and silence atheist babble.
I look up at your macro-skies, dark and enormous,
your handmade sky-jewelry,
Moon and stars mounted in their settings.
Then I look at my micro-self and wonder,
Why do you bother with us?
Why take a second look our [...]

Things That Made Me Smile Today

Rumor has it that I’m hard to please, but it really doesn’t take all that much to make me smile. To prove my point, here’s what did it today (and I’m not making these up):

My new office in the Pit of Despair (our unfinished basement) after a weekend of swapping workspaces with Megan’s crafts
Homemade whole [...]

Some Presidential Self-Help

Our first President, George Washington, copied the following list as a teenager (probably as a homework assignment) from a pamphlet called “Rules of Civility and Decent Behavior in Company and Conversation.” The list contained 110 such rules, was composed by French Jesuits in 1595, and was later rendered into English.
According to historian Richard Brookhiser, who [...]

Revelation on a Saturday

I finally trimmed my fingernails today.
I hate having long fingernails.
I could never be a woman.

A Thought on Puke Day

In honor of today being Puke Day (an old college moniker that has always seemed appropriate; for a more inspiring history, click here), I thought I’d share a little meditative exercise to bring some perspective to our modern-day understanding of love.
If you’ve ever been to a wedding, you’ve heard 1 Corinthians 13 read ad nauseum. [...]

We Aren’t the World

In case you were wondering, the 50th annual Grammy Awards are tonight on CBS. I’m not planning to watch, so let me know what you think if you do. Maybe I’m just getting old, but the idea of watching four hours of a drawn-out awards show for music that does nothing for me seems somewhat [...]

It’s for the Kids

In a class on the topic of children’s ministry this weekend at Covenant. Regardless of how what I learn gets used in the church, having four kids in the age range, I’m interested (I figure it’s time to go back and learn what I thought I already knew about children and any ministry to them [...]

Shooting Sadness

Well, St. Louis (namely Kirkwood) made the national news again for all the wrong reasons.
Sigh.

Oh, the Inanimacy

I spent my birthday teaching as a Christmas tree per Westminster’s Spirit Week festivities going on all this week (today was “inanimate object” day).
And that’s all I have to say about that.

Ron Paul for President

In light of Super Tuesday this week (on my 37th birthday, no less), I feel compelled to own whatever influence I may have in the blogosphere and endorse the candidate I believe would be the best choice for America. After months of discussion and thought, the candidate I will be voting for (both this Tuesday [...]

Free Punxsutawney Phil

From The Folklore of American Holidays:
“Groundhog Day or Groundhog’s Day is a holiday celebrated in Pennsylvania, New York, Canada, and other locations on February 2. In weather lore, if a groundhog, also known as a woodchuck, marmot or ground squirrel, emerges from its burrow on this day and fails to see its shadow because the [...]