A potential vice president with the ideology of Dick Cheney and fewer qualifications than Dan Quayle should send arctic shivers up our spines.
-- John Podesta, President, Center for American Progress
HT: Washington Post
"Barack Obama selected one of the most qualified people available for the job of vice-president; John McCain picked one of the least qualified. Who really puts country ahead of politics?"
-- a reader response to Talking Points Memo
Asking a working writer what he thinks about critics is like asking a lamppost how it feels about dogs.
- Christopher Hampton
Add this site to your favorites and RSS feeds: From Thomas' blog at Everyday Liturgy
O God, as rain melts back into the earth and sky,
leaving not a trace on a hot summer day,
so let my cares and worries be.
O God, as the bear who does not want or consume all winter,
but sits content, dreaming, waiting
for the first hints of Resurrection,
so I plead you calm my soul in contentment.
For I have life abundantly, through Father, Son and Spirit.
Amen
Teddy Roosevelt - 42 John Kennedy - 43
Bill Clinton - 46 Barack Obama - 47
I did something I've never done before. Since 2004, time in the MRI has been a regular thing. The technicians have done their thing and then sent the result over to the neurologists for evaluation. At my appointment for imaging this past Friday, I asked if they would burn a copy of the image disk for me to have. They obliged me with no question.
I've suspected for the past couple of weeks that the disease is currently active so I was anxious to have a look at the pictures myself. This is what I've found with my untrained eye. Below, you see a white splotch that looks like it doesn't belong.
In the image below, you can see a thicker crescent shape toward the bottom left side. This is a view of the white shadow above seen from the top.
There are other images that I will have questions about at my appointment but I thought I'd take time to share just these two.
From today's New York Times, Frank Rich writes:
What we have learned this summer is this: McCain’s trigger-happy temperament and reactionary policies offer worse than no change. He is an unstable bridge back not just to Bush policies but to an increasingly distant 20th-century America that is still fighting Red China in Vietnam and the Soviet Union in the cold war. As the country tries to navigate the fast-moving changes of the 21st century, McCain would put America on hold.
UPDATE: The song I posted was "Healer" by Mike Guglielmucci. It was taken down from YouTube by Hillsong for copyright infringement. Sorry.
My sister's brain tumor. My mother's Meniere's Disease. A new friend's shattered leg. My MS. All life altering assaults on the body that can threaten life altering assaults on the mind and the spirit of all in our circle of love and living.
Mike Guglielmucci, a youth pastor and musician in Australia, recorded this song with Hillsong. The first video is Mike sharing the story behind the song and the second video is a service in which he lead a large gathering in singing it.
I hope that you find it as refreshing, encouraging and comforting as I have found it to be.
Mankind have a great aversion to intellectual labor; but even supposing knowledge to be easily attainable, more people would be content to be ignorant than would take even a little trouble to acquire it.
- Samuel Johnson
I decided to try to locate a sound file or video clip that came closest to showing others what MS feels like in my legs and forearms these days. A quick search of Youtube using the terms "shortwave" and "static" provided the perfect example. I caution you not to try to endure the full three plus minutes. Just get a taste and then thank God you can turn it off.
It's so hard to know with much certainty if feeling like 'Flopsy, Dropsy, and Cottontail' all rolled into one is a passing thing or part of the inevitable ratcheting up of the disease process. Gratefully, other than just having to experience bizarre messages from my legs and forearms, I'm functioning fine and have no indication that that's going to change.
Sent via BlackBerry from SunCom Wireless
Pastor Tim interviews Bob Kauflin (2/9) from Mars Hill Church on Vimeo.
HT: Bob Kauflin @ WorshipMatters
It's been a while since I've checked the count but I know I'm not far from having participated in leading 400 funerals since coming to my present position of ministry. These folks died of all sorts of things...cancer, heart attacks, strokes, blood clots, vehicle accidents, suicide, old age, etc.
Whether they were young or old or somewhere in between, whether they died suddenly or slowly, whether they died alone or with others standing by, whether they were well loved or barely tolerated, they all had funeral services with at least a few in attendance.
Not so for those in this article from The State newspaper.
I've often joked with my wife that when I die, she should have my body put in a lawn size "Hefty" bag and toss me in a ditch somewhere. I really don't care at all about what happens to my earthly remains. If they 'claim' my body, ok. Whatever is finally decided about what is to become of my shell, it is a great comfort to know there will be people who care...not for that shell, but for the memory of a life well lived.
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