The Kingdom Come

May is busy around my house. My daughter will walk the aisle to mark the end of her High School days. Her mother and I are so proud of her. She even graduated a semester earlier but had to wait until now to walk. In fact she will be done with her college education by January.

On the topic of education; public primary education is almost pointless after the sixth grade. Most of the remaining six years are spent rehashing the same thing learned in the prior six years. I think our cookie-cutter education system needs a reformation; starting with moving most of it to privatization. America has become too socialistic in thinking everyone is the same. We're all different to some degree and we'd be more powerful and productive as a united country if we stopped wasting time teaching our children things they will never use.

Time for another update of random thoughts. First, my daughter will be graduating High school within a few days -- mid-term. Her mother and I are so proud of her. She has always been an A-B student. She will be going on to college after about a month off.

There is a local submarine sandwich shop my workmates and I like to frequent. It is ran by Egyptians -- Coptic Christian Egyptians. I usually like to have short discussions with them about the situations in Egypt. When the so-called "Arab Spring" began in the Middle East we talked about the changes in Egypt. They were hopeful. But now it seems Egypt, like many of these Muslim countries will become more radically Islamic. However, we spoke how we believe that there is a large segment of the "revolutionaries" that wanted true liberty and will become upset when it obviously doesn't come under Islamic rule.

Ω-Α
Christian Atomism is the underdeveloped notion that "everything is the same", that is, at base level, at the atomic or subatomic level everything is the same. While this may sound more like a philosophy or some sort of Gnosticism or Hellenistic/Neo-Platonic influence, there is strong biblical warrant for this notion.

First, the biblical Creation account has God creating the universe out of "firmament". (Gen 1:1-9) Eventually God creates humans from the humus or dirt of the reorganized firmament called planet earth. As we know, as any organic thing; be it humans, animals, or plants degrade - they return to "dirt". Or as the Bible puts it: "Till you return to the ground, For out of it you were taken; For dust you are, And to dust you shall return." (Gen 3:19)
Is this not the epitome of Atomism?

After all the last bites, those left in tupperware tombs and tinfoil firkins. Passes passed and touchdowns danced. Aunt Sandy sighs and waves and hugged. Rug rolled up, door last shut. Another years gathering gone.

The couch calls the listless lingerer. Final sip of watered-down tea. Eyes heavy shades falling fast.

Comfy corner pillows piled high. Palms wrap the waning light. Sleep quickly comes. Dreaming of teaming doors and well wax floors.

Waiting in another line as signs mural. Another register opens by the girl in white. I'm next! I'm next! Cutters creatures and all. Brown hats and baseball bats, all things new.

Forty-five percent off. Scarves and knives for haves and have-nots. Get a receipt for things bought to return on Monday. Black Friday! Black Friday!

Alarm goes off. Wives and kiddies jiggle. Wake up! Wake! it is 12AM. Time to go. This place and that. Baseball bats and brown hats. Fifty percent off shoes.

Tryptophanic Dream. Extra piece of pie, whip cream. Rub your eyes. Time to go. Stretch and yawn to the approaching dawn. Black Friday! Black Friday!

Well, it's time for another installment of my random blogging. These are bits of stuff I've been thinking about or doing.
First up, let's get the geeky stuff out of the way.

Last year, I had to battle the problem of Canadian Thistle invading my gardens. I relentlessly sprayed every sign of this pest until it was virtually eradicated from my yard. But this year, a new menace has emerged; Wild Yarrow.

As with everything, I see a theological or philosophical connection.

So, I used to be a die-hard FireFox user, having long abandoned Internet Explorer. But FireFox eats up a lot of CPU and Physical Memory (RAM) usage -- yep, a bunch of geek-speak. This was drastically slowing down my computer. Most people say, "We'll just buy more RAM". I say, I shouldn't have to. I tried out Google Chrome, but it was even worse than FireFox in that it didn't like it when you had other browsers open. Well, I resumed using FireFox for a while but it was consuming 500,000 to 900,000K and would consistently rise to those levels after the initial 40,000K at launch. That is outrageous. I even removed most of the add-ons, but it is still a memory hog.

A SOLUTION?

Surely there had to be someone out there making a better browser. Enter; LUNASCAPE.

TKC has a pretty good collection of "feeds" from other websites (see here) but I'd like to give people the opportunity to contribute more. Send me a feed or more via the contact form and if it is a sound, historic Christian site or a site that is not contrary to sound, historic Christianity I'd be happy to add it to the feed collection.

Oddly enough, I never added a feed to my other ANTI-Hyperpreteristⁱ site until today -- (see here).

I've been a Christian for 27 years and of that time I've seen and been in many theological "fights". Some were merely minor disagreements but some were on par with the most brutal UFC match. There are many reactions to such fierce theological rumbles. Here is a short list of reactions.

1. Ignore the cause of a dispute and simply call for everyone to "agree to disagree" -- this solves nothing.
2. Pick a side and set out to destroy all opposing arguments -- this usually ends in burn out or isolation.
3. Attempt to reconcile the disagreements in a syncretic/relativistic manner -- this insults both positions and solves nothing.
4. Drop out of all discussion on the topic -- this solves nothing.

Although these are the typical reactions, I wonder if they are the only options? I'm sure people could offer more reactions and I'd welcome the civil suggestions. (Please don't offer mere variations on the 4 listed)

Yes, that is a strange combination for a topic but you'll see it ties together. On Friday October 8th, 2010 I had the Lasik (laser) eye surgery procedure done to correct my vision. I've only worn glasses for about 10 years but my eyes had reached a point where they weren't getting any worse and I decided now was the time to do this procedure and gain independence from glasses.

This question has been hounding me more and more in my life as I experience and see real injustices against myself, my friends and others. Is what's right merely subjective? It reminds me of the movie, The Crucible where character John Proctor (and his entire town) experienced the question of what is "legal" versus what is right. Granted, the original screenplay was addressing the so-called "McCarthyism" of the 1940s-50s, and ironically enough what Joseph McCarthy feared would happen to America in the 1940s-50s is actually subtly and insidiously happening today with all the political and societal socialism that is creeping into America. However, back to the movie.

Well, I was away from July 27, 2010 to August 8, 2010 on a vacation to Hawaii for my 20th wedding anniversary. Although it was a vacation, I'm constantly looking for how life relates to theology and theology relates to life. So, while sharing a little about the vacation, I'd also like to share some interesting theological perspectives about Hawai'i.

In light of Google's recent announcement that it is paying extra toward benefits for homosexual employees to have "partner" health benefits (source), I took an interest in a new search engine - Yippy.com.

Although, it is going to be difficult to top Google's reach, Yippy looks very interesting. One thing Google has tried to do, that Yippy seems to be following is to make the actual search page ad-minimal. When people go to a search engine, they don't want to have to navigate through a bunch of clutter. Yippy maintains the nice, clean page. Yippy does offer something different than other search engines; a menu bar. But the menu bar is simply icons, which makes you curious (at least it did me) as to what each menu does. I especially liked the Yippy radio, Blues channel. Cool stuff.

I signed up for an account to be able to check out some of the other features. Take a look, Yippy.com

My family has been thinking about hosting a foreign exchange high-school student. Tonight we attended the "return ceremonies" for the previous year students as they return home. Host families provided a food dish so there was plenty of good eats.

We were able to speak with a few of the students; one from Columbia, Thailand, and Germany.

Okay, time again for a little catching up with blogging. Blogging is typically just a person's rambling about their everyday life. So here I go.

I've been working over at my dad's house. His backyard is small and completely shaded. This causes the grass not to grow very well so I am putting in a cobble-stone "plaza" with surrounding shade-flower beds. He has a little bit of sun areas; one is where he has a little pond.

Ning has been a popular, FREE website platform that allows for building a social site. Many people have used Ning to build their own little personal network of "friends" (or "followers", depending how you look at it). But now there is a problem. Ning is discontinuing the FREE version (ref).

So, what will happen to all these Ning sites where the administrators have built up a following?

Victoria Beckham trams in the a.m. with Celine Dion's mustard cars.
Stars fly by Bugatti Type 57SC, Betty White's space ship hip replacement.

Up from the basement, King Ptolemy IV drafted by the Oakland Raiders, fading into the past at last.

Prince Harry in a box wearing Jerry's socks since E. coli came.

Kelly Clarkson's has no son named Casey Affleck, Beckham or Zack!

Rebel dog digging Greece Greek, sneak peak at the week ahead.

El Sid is dead! So he said, flooding flew through and through, dow dow and down.

Wall Street, Main Street met the meet we wii on bees knees. Die!

Spell spill oil in the gulf, flags aloft in Mexico show no immigration toleration in the nation.

Nashville, Capitol Hill will feel for parliament's meal milling around.

Iron man can fans flame, in a name Bible Tagalog too.

What's it all mean?

I have sometimes been ridiculed for linking to Wikipedia or using it for reference. Wikipedia, for those who may not know is an online, open-source encyclopedia. Open-source in this case means that anyone can edit the entries. And it is because it is open-source, that people sometimes ridicule me for using it, since the implication is that the information is supposedly not professionally established and may be unreliable.

However, to me Wikipedia's strong point is exactly because its entries can be challenged, by anyone. Think of the "professional" media for example. They often put out information which we have little ability to challenge, let alone verify. The same can be said of school text books. Look at any public school text book on say history or science and you'll see hypothetical concepts that are presented to children as if they are fact.

Something I wrote -- Is it poetry? Could it be song lyrics?

I'll run thru fire, climb o'er mountains, swim thru seas for thee.
Desperation, Dedication, Adulation

I'll ring round earth, fly the sky, zoom to the moon for you.
Contemplation, Adoration, Asphyxiation

I'll be born anew, suffer sacrifice, die and die for thy.
Incantation, Celebration, Termination

I'll run thru fire, climb o'er mountains, swim thru seas for thee.
Desperation, Dedication, Adulation