“When they cremate me I want to have a hat on.”
Oct 11
poignard
n., PONE-yerd or PWN-yerd for you gamers out there. As you could probably tell from the way the pronunciation doesn’t match the spelling, the word is indeed French. The Anglicized spelling is ‘poniard,’ and in French or English it refers to a small, tapering dagger.
“She speaks poniards, and every word stabs.” –Benedick, from Much Ado About Nothing
Oct 09
Quotable: D.A. Carson
“There’s no rulebook in Haddon Robinson’s ‘Homiletics’ that says, ‘Thou shalt preach the entire flipping book or thou shalt be damned.'”
Oct 07
Free Wallpaper: Concrete Parallax for iPhone 5
If you have iOS 7 installed on your iPhone 5, I have created a parallax wallpaper just for you:
Oct 04
Always check the physical layer
One of the most valuable lessons I have learned in IT I learned from one of our network guys at the time. I had misdiagnosed an issue as a “network problem,” a term which is a catch-all used by noobs and vendors to say that they don’t know what the problem is.
Chris, the network guy, helped me troubleshoot it, and the issue turned out to be not a “network problem,” but a “something wasn’t plugged in” problem.
After helping me, he gave me a lesson:
“Always check the physical layer.”
For you non IT people, there is a seven layer model used to specify how networks work. The physical layer, or Layer 1, is the stuff you can actually touch–cables and jacks and things.
However, the mantra “always check the physical layer” doesn’t just work on networking–it’s just as useful for troubleshooting pretty much anything electrical. You could also say, “Is it plugged in? No, I mean it–is it really plugged in?”
Once in a while I still fail to check the physical layer, but not often.
Oct 02
VBS 2013 Development Diary: #12: Stepping Up
Every year we do Bible school I supervise most aspects of the skit: writing, direction, set building, prop construction, casting, and rehearsal (I have a lot of input on the music and costumes, but not usually enough expertise to give useful input). I usually have some people who take care of some of these once I get the ball rolling: Heather often takes over rehearsals, Allison always takes care of music and soundboard, Greg makes all of the weapons, Bruce tempers my wordy Shakespearean wit with punchy Three Stooges gags.
This year more than any other I was blessed with several people who stepped up to take charge of large chunks of stuff that I normally would have spread myself too thin trying to keep together–and they did so brilliantly, frequently with little or no input from me. Teresa supervised almost the entire construction of the papier-mache rocks; Joe oversaw construction of the bamboo cage, door, and boobytrap; Jacob and Frank made the thrown-dagger special effect; Allison and Jesse built the armor; Allison composed the theme music and wrote parts for the musicians; Elsa, Lex, Amelia, Jacob, Ethan, and Trenton choreographed fight scenes; Allison and Tabitha came in during the day and built large portions of the stage; Sherry, Audrey, and Allison sewed costumes.
I’ve likely missed a couple of people, but the point is that a lot of people took greater leadership roles which freed me up to act and direct rehearsals. Overall, I would say that because of this extra effort on so many people’s parts, this was probably the best experience I have had doing VBS–which is really saying something.
Sep 28
Quotable: Otto von Bismark
“They treat me like a fox, a cunning fellow (Schlaukopf) of the first rank. But the truth is that with a gentleman I am always a gentleman and a half, and when I have to do with a pirate, I try to be a pirate and a half.”
Sep 25
I’m a big kid! $#%+!
I recently attended the freshman showcase for my daughter’s theater department at college. Most all of the incoming freshmen and transfer students performed a monologue, a song, or dance number. There were several good performances, and a few amazing ones.
Sadly there were a few that appeared to be the performer’s attempt to prove that they were grown-up and not at all a kid fresh out of high school. Clearly the only way to do this is to say $#%+!, frequently and loudly. In case you did not have a chance to perform, an alternative method to prove true grown-upitude was to write it on the poster you prepared to introduce yourself to attendees. As expected, punctuating an otherwise semi-interesting monologue with $#%+ made it amazingly interesting. Similarly, inserting $#%+! onto a shoddily prepared poster completely distracts from poor preparation and craftsmanship.
Instead of coming across as more grown-up, it comes across rather like this:
Sep 23
Bridges of Madison County: The Musical
The 1993 hit book The Bridges of Madison County is being made into a musical. For those of you who like music and stories about guys who sleep with other guys’ wives, this is your thing.
My initial draft of this post contained a faux track list of song titles I made up to go with the musical. The problem I found with satirizing adultery is that 1) things can quickly degenerate into raunchy innuendo and 2) instead of pointedly condemning the betrayal of one or more spouses, the humor may actually remove some of seriousness that I was getting at.
I don’t understand how a story about unfaithfulness qualifies as a romance. I doubt that those on the other side of relationships where their spouse cheated on them would see the romance in it.
