A friend recently asked me to chime in on a Twitter conversation in which someone was asserting that Jesus’s disciples did not die over their belief in the Resurrection. Sometimes Twitter arguments can be completely useless, but this one seemed to include some genuine discussion and, as obscure as arguing over why someone died millennia ago may seem, in this case, it means quite a lot.
The mowing is finally done, at least for now, and the whole area carries the invigorating scent of newly mown grass. My amazing Swisher mower pulled through like a champ yet again. They make ‘em good in Missouri, except that when a friend overseas asked me about it, I checked and learned that it is no longer manufactured, which is a shame.
The Boys talk about Jason’s adventures this summer, the changing world we find ourselves in (and some encouragement from Ps. 89 related to it), their mutual love of all things Apple and the importance for Christians being people of the Truth.
As life moves to dotage (and of course anecdotage), and like many people having allowed my recovery from COVID-19 to proceed largely at its own pace, I only now am getting around to mowing.
The B21 doesn’t look like an ordinary keyboard. Crowdfunded in mid-2021, it appeared with its two brightly colored knobs ahead of present onslaught of turny-thing keyboards. Relegated to Indiegogo while Epomaker nearly simultaneously launched the more conventional AK84S on Kickstarter, the B21 felt almost forgotten. But it hasn’t been on my desk.
It hit me like a bolt of lightning last week, as I saw the OPEC logo flash on the television screen. It is, at best, a doodle and not a very good one at that. The thought had been simmering in my mind — “cogitatin’” as an old friend put it years ago — since I first saw the ridiculous NATO logo. This comprises a four-pointed star of the sort drawn by every third-grader, along side the letters “NATO” over the letters “OTAN,” or “NATO” backwards. It does not strike me as something sufficiently sophisticated to characterize as an idea.
Years ago, though in living memory, a phrase was coined. “Too big to fail” meant an institution is of such significance that the government must bail it out no matter what amount of incompetence, mismanagement, or pure corruption has put it at risk. In the intervening decade or two, the meaning of that phrase (along with the meaning of very nearly everything else) has softened. It’s now “too big to go against,” meaning anything whose shortcomings it would be inconvenient to mention.
Today’s rain would have altered plans, if today were thirty years ago. Thirty years ago, my family was sitting at a table on pea gravel under our deck eating a meal together, chalk on the concrete foundation proclaiming the venue “Augusta the Third’s” — a pop up eatery in today’s parlance — to celebrate my grandparents’ fiftieth anniversary. And they were ecstatic.
The Zippy Crew returns with musings on Aldi, Cheese, Monkeypox, preaching, Dale Earnhardt and more in an episode as packed as a summer potluck.
Paul Sorvino died on Monday at age 83. He was involved in an anecdote that I cherish a little. In some respects it might surprise you.