Gas Prices... Just as I Suspected

I was thinking that gas prices have been getting low enough that they should be making some records when you adjust for inflation.  I found this graph that I thought was interesting enough to share for two reasons.  First of all, gas is now cheaper than it was 50 years ago when you adjust for inflation.  Secondly, the graph shows how much the dollar has inflated.  The dollar is basically worth half as much as it was 25 years ago.

Figure courtesy of Wall Street Journal.  Check out  http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122722595127246035.html

for the whole article.

The Tolerance we find in America

I came across an article today about an 8th grader who ran an experiment this election season.  She noticed that her school was predominantly in support of Obama, and so she wore a shirt that supported McCain for a day and recorded the tolerant and understanding responses that she received.  

I don't mean to imply that the situation would have been different had she worn an Obama shirt in a predominantly McCain-supporting school.  I hope that this experiment is an anomoly and the majority of people are more accepting... but I kinda doubt it.

The Ill-Fated Road trip

A few of you have heard the story about my attempt to make it to Phil and Heather's wedding a couple weeks ago. Here is the extended version of the story:

On Friday night after gcf (graduate Christian fellowship) large group my roommate and I gave another gcf member a ride home and found out that she was going to Chicago the next day for a family get together. She was planning on getting up to take the train at 6am, but the timing worked out that I could give her a ride, drop her off a couple miles from the highway, and continue on to Phil's wedding in Milwaukee. That made me happy, since while I like road tripping I get bored, and having company helps a lot. So. The next morning we headed out, and I dropped her off right on time. Right after I left, the low coolant light came on in my car. I got out and looked under the hood to see something wet scattered over part of my car.

Now, I'm not a mechanic. However, I do posses shrewd observation skills and a solid command of basic logic.  So after carefully evaluating the evidence before me, I determined that something was wrong with my car. I got directions to the nearest service station and headed there immediately, arriving just in time to pop the hood and watch the remainder of the engine coolant make its bold escape from the confines of my engine via a hose that was as cracked as a drug-dealing cop.

The service station I had happened upon said that they'd have to order the needed part from Saab and wouldn't be able to fix it until Monday. As a good American, I wanted it fixed within the next hour, so I called my insurance company to get my ride towed to a Saab service station. Sweet! tow truck within the hour. Get it fixed. Still make it to the reception and get to catch up with everyone...

An hour and twenty minutes later I called back. "Oh, apparently the tow truck was in an accident and they didn't tell us... please hold... we can get a different truck there in an hour to an hour and a half. Can you wait that long?" "NO! I'm going to drive off, catch me if you can!"  As if I had a choice.  Finally, four hours after I pulled into the station, a tow truck arrived and got me to Saabtech precisely fifteen minutes after they closed for the day, perfect timing. So I ended up calling Betsi (the friend I gave a ride to) and spending the evening with her and her extended family.

Now, as these plans were being made, I was picturing myself being introduced to all of Betsi's relatives as "her 'friend' from college who gave her a ride" (assuming they forget about the "and had car trouble" part at the end).  Meeting her Aunt and Uncle and immediate family was fine, and I went out to dinner with them.  However, after dinner we went to Betsi's great Uncle and Aunt's house where several other family members were lying in wait to jump me, tie me up, interrogate me about my intentions with their great niece/niece/cousin, and quite possibly look strangely at me.  But I knew their plan had a fatal flaw.  When my sister got married a few years ago I had a few awkward moments when I couldn't quite remember who certain people were that I was, in fact, related to.  Therefore, as I entered the door, before anyone could say anything (or get the rope out to tie me up), I greeted them all, "Hi everybody!  Man, it's been a while.  How have you all been?!"  

My shock and awe campaign was a complete success.  In the ensuing moments chaos ruled in their minds.  I could see from the looks on their faces that they were frantically scrambling to figure out who I possibly could be, who knew all of them without them recognizing me.  With the enemy camp thrown into disarray, I was able to explain why I was there, and they were so relieved to learn that they weren't supposed to know me that my explaination was met with no objections, no strange looks, and most importantly, no ropes or bright lights.

In the end it turned out to be kind of fun, because I do like people and Betsi has a very nice family.  I guess I also got a practice run at meeting a girlfriend's family (whenever that happens :).   I was fortunate enough to be able to stay the night at Betsi's Aunt and Uncle's sweet downtown flat, and took the train back to Champaign in the morning, leaving my car for my parents to pick up the next weekend on their way to visit me.

All in all the whole experience  reminded me that I'm not as in control of my life as I'd like to think I am. It could have been a lot worse, I had a place to stay and someone to ride the train back with, but bottom line was that the day went much differently than I had planned.

James 4:13-17

"Now listen, you who say, 'Today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city, spend a year there, carry on business and make money.'  Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow.  What is your life?  You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes.  Instead, you ought to say, 'If it is the Lord's will, we will live and do this or that.'  As it is, you boast and brag.  All such boasting is evil."

I'm going to retranslate that into the "Peter just had an interesting weekend" version.

"Now listen, you who say, 'Today or tomorrow we will go to Chicago and then Milwaukee, go to a wedding, and return home.'  Why, you do not even know whether or not your car's coolant hose will crack before you get there.  In addition, the tow truck may be delayed such that you cannot get your car fixed until Monday, forcing you to depend on a friend's relatives for a bed and to take the train home early the next morning.  What is your life?  You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes.  Instead, you ought to say, 'If it is the Lord's will, we will live and go on a road trip to celebrate an old friend's wedding.'  As it is, you boast and brag.  All such boasting is evil."

Apparently I'm not quite as in control of my life as I like to think.

Practical Justice...

is the name of a book that I started reading a couple weeks ago.  It is written by a Christian who spends a lot of time ministering to the opressed and the poor.  Most recently I read the section of the book on "giving a man a fish" where he talks about direct handouts:  what it looks like to directly help someone, what it can cost, and what not to do.  In addition to that, I started reading Isaiah in my quiet times, which is a lot of God criticizing the rich for making money by oppressing those who are in need.  God promises to return and give both the righteous and the wicked what they deserve.

Anyway, I think I read the chapter in Practical Justice on Wednesday morning.  That day it was raining so I rode the bus to campus and was thinking about walking home that evening because I felt like it.  As I was walking down green street a man named Charles greeted me on the street.  I could tell immediately from his manner that he wanted something from me (or was selling something), and sure enough, he told me he was homeless and asked if I would help him out.  Due to some other circumstances that God brought about, I was relatively free for the evening and so I agreed to buy him dinner, where he told me that he was a Christian, has been all his life, and his favorite passage is the ten commandments.  Also during dinner he asked me for a few different things that boiled down to more money, which I did agree to take him to Goodwill and buy him a coat, while refusing to give him $40 in cash.  

So I drove Charles and a buddy of his, Marcus, to Goodwill and bought him a warm coat and a pair of pants.  Marcus had walked over to buy some food at a fast food place, so we drove over to pick him up there, and parked to wait.  As we sat in the parking lot, I looked over my left shoulder to see the restaurant, and then to my right and saw a liquour store, and then started to wonder which door Marcus would come out of.  Sure enough, he came out of the latter establishment.  Charles assured me that he was talking to somebody there, cuz he knows lots of people, but Marcus hadn't seen us right away, and I saw the bottle in his hand and the look in his eye when he spotted us.  His story was that Long John Silver's didn't have change for a $50, so he had to go over there to get change.

I'm really glad I had the whole experience.  I was exposed to the realities of the poor.  I can't say that I really got a taste of it or that it hit me full on.  But I met and talked to some guys who have to walk everywhere and sleep on the streets.  

I'm glad I put some food in Charles' stomach and I'm glad I put a warm coat on his back, and I'm glad I didn't give him any cash :).  I also figured that since he said he was a Christian (whether he is or not) and I was buying him dinner, that he wasn't going anywhere, so I talked as much as I could about Jesus.  I told him one of my favorite passages, I talked about what I've been learning about trusting God in grad school, and about what we studied in Bible study the night before.  When he thanked me I told him to thank God, because I wouldn't be doing it if it wasn't for what God has done for me.  This kind of thing is outside of my comfort zone and risks my belongings and takes my time, but I think it's what Jesus would have done. 

I apologize if it seems like I'm tooting my own horn here, I don't mean to be.  This is something that happened to me.  I've been praying for opportunities to share the gospel and to be a part of caring for the poor and the oppressed, and so I guess I shouldn't be surprised when God gives me a chance to do both.

Life without mah internetz?

Last Monday the internet at my apartment was down all day. This did result in a few minor emergencies-I had to frantically redo some homework on campus so that I could print out the proper graph. However, I have recently been thinking about how I spend my time and if I am actually as busy as I think. That day definitely illustrated to me how much I use the internet for AND how much time I waste online. I also realized that I really could do without the internet. I'd have to either stay on campus or go back to campus after dinner to do homework in the evening and check my email less frequently, but that really isn't that drastic. After I finished my homework on Monday evening I sat down and read a book instead of reading news or browsing the internet. So what if I fall behind on reading xkcd or miss a deal on something at Newegg, having a slower pace could be nice. As an inadvertent illustration to my point, I'm writing this on campus while I'm in between events, and thirty minutes just wasn't enough time for me to feel like getting some homework done (especially since it isn't due until next Monday).

I've also decided that I think that my blog is one of the most unattractive blogs on the net, so I may play around with the template and color scheme.

have a fabulous Thursday

Home-schooling strikes again!

I just read an article about a twelve-year-old girl who got bored with high school coursework and is now attending a community college.  She is applying to go to Yale for pre-med next year.  The thing that I liked best about the article is that her parents said that others asked them "Aren't you rushing things?"  Which is a pretty valid question, but their response was that it was their daughter who has these goals and dreams, and so they're just being supportive.  I though it was cool that they aren't pressuring her, she's making her own decisions with their help.  Sounds like home-schooling at it's best.

My Hero for today...

is Daniel Ellenson.  He is the author of one of my favorite techno songs ever, Inside of Me,  and I just discovered that I can download it for free on his website.  If you're a fan of techno/trance, you should check it out.

In other random news, yesterday I went swing dancing and had lots of fun.  Apparently they also have a big Halloween swing dance, so I need to come up with a costume.

My class today was cancelled, so I need to get lots of homework done so that I can go camping tonight and still have enough time to do 3 homework assignments, grade lab reports, and study for a test and a midterm, all of which are due by Thursday.  Smile!  God loves you.

Politics (gasp)

One of the worst accusations politicians receive is that of being a flip-flopper, or of changing their position.  So when new information or more experience causes them to change their position on an issue, they're required to quietly and carefully start saying something different, while hoping that no one will notice that they said something else six months ago.

Today I read an article on a recent interview of Senator Obama by ABC's George Stephanopoulos.  In this interview Sen. Obama made it as clear as a politician can that if he becomes President he will not raise taxes if the economy is still in a fragile state.  This is a far different plan than what he presented when he was still one of several contenders in the Democratic Primary (largest tax increase in near history), and a moderated plan that he presented this summer as the presumptive Democratic Nominee (moderate tax increase no matter what).

Critics of Mr. Obama might say that this was his plan all along.  First to court the liberal Democrats that he needed to make a strong showing in the Primary and then switch to a more moderate position when it's important to be able to court more conservative/moderate voters.  Personally, I think that if that's the case, he deserves the Presidency.  Anyone who can plan that far ahead to achieve success should be able to do at least a half-decent job of running the country.  Far more likely is that as time has gone on, Mr. Obama has been doing some thinking about what he'll really do if he gets to be in charge.  This thinking has led him to a position that, in my humble opinion, is much wiser than his original plan.  Which, if this is the case, simply means that Mr. Obama is willing to learn and adjust his position to what he believes is the correct one.  I consider this an admirable trait.  However, "change" would have to include a smaller government, a balanced budget, and a pro-life posiiton before such an admirable trait would cause me to consider voting for him.

Brightened up my day

This just in from the Wall Street Journal Best of the Web Today.  Fred Thompson spoke at the Republican National Convention and had this to say of Sarah Palin:  

Thompson describes Palin as "the only nominee in the history of either party who knows how to properly field dress a moose, with the possible exception of Teddy Roosevelt." It's not clear if he means TR might have been able to field dress a moose or Palin might not be able to field dress TR.

My work here is done.

Apple

Finally I have definitive proof that Apple has set out to make their products a status symbol so that people will pay more for Apple products that do less than what the competition is capable of.

I am Rich

Someone developed a screensaver for the iPhone and the iTouch that is priced at $1000. What does it do, you ask? Cure cancer? Solve world hunger? Give it's owner the ability to fly? No. It displays a glowing red gem, so that all your friends will know how rich you are. I'm just waiting for a rogue software developer to start selling the same thing for $3 a pop.

Has a sandcastle ever gotten the best of you?

One evening that I was in Oregon, I decided to go for a run along the beach. I headed down to the beach and started running along the edge of the water. It was high tide, so there was only a thin line of damp sand between the waves and the really dry sand. I ran right along the edge of the water, using the excuse that the sand is the most firm there, while it was really just because it was most fun. Within the first couple minutes I came to a huge sandcastle. Just as I approached it, a big wave came up and around it so that I had to either wait or run around to my right on the really dry sand. I decided to wait since I didn't want to get my shoes sandy. After a couple seconds it looked like the water was only a half inch or so deep in front of the sandcastle and so I went for it.

It was precisely at this moment that I discovered where all the sand for the sandcastle had come from: there was a hole about two feet deep right in front of it that I managed to skillfully locate by leaping directly into it. My right shoe/leg got soaked and I got sand and water all over me, but I wasn't really cold, and had just started my run, so I just decided to keep going, running through the shallows splooshing and splashing. As I went along the whole turn of events struck me as absolutely hilarious, so I started laughing at myself as I went along. I felt like I had been on the discovery channel, "Little did this jogger know that moments ago, local children had just completed a clever trap." So I continued along the beach, sometimes on wet sand, sometimes splashing through a foot of water. I started passing some people and got quite a bit of enjoyment out of the strange looks I got as I ran through the waves with a big silly grin on my face.

Camp, In Review,

Was wonderful. I was at Lake Ellen for three weeks. In contrast to two years ago, I was a counselor instead of an Area Director/Counselor. So much better! The first week I had 11-13 year olds, the second week I had 9-11 year olds, and the third week I had high schoolers. I had to adjust quite a bit, but each week brought its own challenges and joys. In those three weeks, two kids in my cabin recommitted themselves to Christ and two others prayed to receive Christ for the first time. It was thrilling to be working on the front lines encouraging kids to pursue God and righteousness and to be reconciled to Him. The staff were also amazing. If circumstances were different, I'd room with any of the guys that I worked with in a split second and whatever the non-creepy equivalent of close friendship is with girls would be the same. I'm really praying that God will make a way for me to be able to spare the time and money to be there for all summer next year.

Lake Ellen is probably my favorite place on earth. Nowhere else have I been so challenged to grow and seen God do such amazing things around me.

Sunset at Loon Lake


Derek Gladstone and Myself


Roughly the Trailblazers' team, from left, Derek,
Me, Joie, Rochelle, Andrew, and Sarah

Blogging Time!

I just caught up on reading all my friends' blogs. Okay, well, all of Megan's new posts. Apparently she's biking around doing sweet music stuff, which looks like fun. But you don't read my blog to hear about what my friends have blogged about. If you want to read Megan's blog go here. And you should. But anyways.

One of the things that I thought about in Zambia was about how many clothes I have, and that I should get rid of the ones that I don't wear, because someone else could probably use them. Over the last few days I went through my clothes and got rid of a bunch. I started with T-shirts. I discovered that when I hunted down every last one and counted them, I had over forty--Mildly disgusting to me. So I got ride of twenty of them or so, sweet! I also got rid of a bunch of other things, so now the only clothes that I have are ones that I'll actually wear, and I won't need a U-haul to get them down to Champaign in the fall.

One of the back speakers in my car blew out, which made me sad. I talked to Brian Spangler about it and he just happened to have speakers the right size and a receiver sitting in his basement that he wants to get rid of. Or did he just happen to have them? Hmmm. In any case, assuming that that works out, I will be one happy driver.

I read an article today on BBC talking about how the US needs to end its love affair with the car. Unfortunately, my love affair is just beginning :P.

That is the end of my random thoughts and a little bit about what I've been up to. Hope you enjoyed it.

Graduated

It's true. A Bachelor's of Science in engineering physics (should ep be capitalized? guess it shows that you still don't know everything after college) has now been earned by THIS. I also have a car now, which is cool. It's a '97 Saab 900s, nice and small and sporty (although no turbo).

The last week of class was the IV Senior send-off gathering. It was a lot of fun to think back on all the good times that I've had over the last four years. I didn't know until a couple minutes before that I had a chance to soapbox for a few minutes so I didn't say much when it was my turn. If I'd had more time to think about it, I'd have said something about spending one's time wisely. That the biggest thing that I regret about graduating is all the people that I know that I haven't had time to really get to KNOW. I wish I could be around next fall to welcome the new students and continue to lead a Bible study and be a witness in the EP department. But that responsibility now falls on those that are still there.

As classes and projects wore down, I had a little urge to just wander around campus and think about my college career. I didn't do it because I just didn't quite have the motivation to do it by myself. But then on Tuesday after I had everything packed up I went to noon prayer (since Tuesday was the day that I had noon free this semester) and we went on a prayer walk. So I had a chance to wander past the student's center, the PAC, Otts, and McGregor, the buildings that I spent the most time in while I was a student. I had nothing to do but think and pray and listen to the prayers of others and it was great. With each building I was able to think about all the things that I had done and the people that I knew and pray about those things. It was great.

My mind is leaking into the keyboard

It's official.

I accepted the teaching assistantship from U of I at Urbana-Champaign. Last week I was getting tired of waiting to hear from U of M, so I started moving forward with going to UIUC out of spite :D. I emailed the Grad InterVarsity chapter to see if anyone was looking for a roommate for next fall. My biggest priority in my future was finding a good Christian community to join immediately, and I figured having a Christian roommate(s) would be a good start. The next day I heard back from a physics grad student whose roomie is graduating. He's currently a small group coordinator for their chapter (which is what I did here at Platteville for a year, now I'm back to being a sg leader), and has a fairly inexpensive two-bedroom apartment. It's less expensive than other places because his landlord doesn't advertise much, i.e. I wouldn't have found it otherwise :D. He said it's big enough to host a small group Bible study, so I'm pretty sure that I'm going to land in the middle of a good Christian community if it works out. Then there's some other little things, like its unfurnished, but he has enough furniture for the living room, so all I need is a bed, dresser, and desk, which is what I just happen to already have.

Four hours after I heard about that, the university of minnesota finally got back to me and offered me a TA there, but I didn't even think about it seriously. Maybe because I had a cold, maybe because I don't have time to second guess myself, and maybe because the stipend they offered me was $17/month less than what UIUC offered :P. Actually, it's probably because UIUC's EE grad program is considered to be one of the best in the world (comparable to MIT and Stanford) and I just needed a little extra momentum to choose the better of two very good choices.

Other ways that God has been leading me to UIUC is that next weekend there is a Tau Beta Pi conference on that campus (TBP is an engineering honors society). Since I'm a member, I can go for free and get to see the campus, possibly attend Grad IV's large group meeting, and possibly finalize housing.

Final random thought of this post: I'm not actually that gung ho to get a masters degree. While I do enjoy my major, part of me would rather be a pastor than an engineer. I'm doing this because this is where God has sent me. He gifted me in this area and has given me enough patience to get some more schooling and that's all I know. Honestly though, I feel like I'm building a resume similar to the one that Paul lists in Phillipians 3. I'm really just waiting for the day God directs me to give all this engineer stuff up for the sake of his kingdom. Maybe that'll never happen, but I'll be ready for it if it ever does.

What the Future May Hold

Spring break is in about a week and because of one professor in particular and work I'm going to be quite busy until then. Yesterday I had a few hours free and decided to get a jump start on a difficult and potentially time consuming lab project that's due next Wednesday. After only about three hours of work I got part one (of two) working properly and was able to check off with my professor. Let me tell you, I felt pretty good about getting that done, so when I ran into some friends who were going downtown for cheap tacos I went along and did some relaxing, which was amazing. Around this time I started thinking "Man, the only way my day could be better is if I had an email from a grad school or employer waiting for me."

I called UMN and UIUC about a week and a half ago, and they both said I should be notified by the middle of March, so in the last week or so I've been reminded a few times of filling out those cereal box offers when I was little (like <13 years old). I collected all the UPC symbols then laboriously addressed an envelop and sent it off. And began to wait the 8-12 decades it takes for them to process it and send the toy to me. By the time it got within a few weeks of the predicted time period, I'd start wondering every day before the mail came, "Maybe today is the day. It PROBABLY isn't, but wouldn't it be cool if it was?" And I'd get all excited and then disappointed until the day it finally arrived.

Which brings me back to the present. I've been checking my email even more obsessively than usual because every time it crosses my mind I think "Maybe they sent the email today/this morning (/in the last five minutes). Yesterday after thinking that my day could only get better if I got an email, I actually didn't check my email until much later because I didn't want to expect my day to be THAT amazing. When I got home we had a ton of people in the house for the Platteville Safe Spring Break Party Challenge, so it wasn't until 10:30ish that I looked carefully enough at my email to realize that I had an important email.

The electrical engineering department at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champagne accepted me in to their program and offered me a "half-time" teaching assistantship (which means I get free tuition and money to live on in exchange for working as a ta). When I could breath again, my first impulse was to show it to my roommates (weaving around the 4 million people that still populated our house), call my parents and tell them, and show it to a couple other people that were at the party.

When I was thinking about whether or not to blog about it, my first thought was that this is kind of an impersonal way to tell some of my good friends, and I'd rather tell them personally. But then I decided that next to the people immediately around me, my closest friends read my blog, and so I decided to go for it.

I'm still not going to UIUC for certain, or even grad school for certain, but I now have a concrete option for the next couple years of my life. Before now all I had was potential, which doesn't put food on the table :).

Yesterday It Was Spring

And now it's winter again.

Phooey











-the end

Had a Jehovah's Witness stop by

Yesterday morning a Jehovah's witness stopped by and caught me in between classes. He was a bigger guy and looked like he was in his 40's or so. I had a few minutes so I invited him in.

He talked for a few minutes how its hard to "find peace" in this world with everything that's going on. I'd say more about what he said, but he pretty much just repeated and elaborated on that idea. Then he read Isaiah sixty five verses twenty-something. It was a prophecy about a time of peace and prosperity returning. His point in that was that many people don't have that today. He said he was going around encouraging people to look into the Bible to find peace.

I sat quietly and listened, resisting the urge to grab my Bible that was sitting on the table a couple feet away from me and waited for him to finish his thoughts. When I had a moment I said that I don't even look for peace in this world because it can't be found. I have peace through my relationship with Jesus Christ, by living for him. With that he basically said "good for you, its too bad lots of people aren't like that" and left.

What struck me as odd was that I didn't even know whether he was a Jehovah's Witness or Mormon. I figured it out because the literature that he offered me was watchtower, which google told me is Jehovah's Witness. My thought afterwords was "Wow, even these guys have gotten pansy in the way they share what they believe." I mean the guy no disrespect. He clearly meant well, but his approach was really weak sauce.

Not much activity here

Most of my blogging energy has been directed towards our Zambia team blog so check in there if you miss me :D.

Weapons of Mass Destruction

For those of us who are still willing to consider the possibility that President Bush was not out to invade Iraq from the beginning and didn't spread a net of lies to convince everyone to agree with him. Here is an article by CNN that says Saddam Hussein admitted to pretending that he had WMD's in order to intimidate Iran.

Nice to know that the "independent" report that chronicled over 900 false statements by the Bush administration between 2001 and 2003 is still hardly proof that Bush is a liar, besides the fact that the "independent" report was funded by a liberal group that has been funded by someone who publicly compares America today to Nazi Germany.

In Case You're Interested after all my talk about Kenya

Here's a really good article about the current conflict in Kenya and how the church there is responding.

http://www.urbana.org/_articles.cfm?RecordId=1160

American Media: The Image or the Mirror?

I was reading news this morning and noticed a headline about the ongoing tribal violence in Kenya. After I read the article, which was located on the BBC's website, I started wondering if any American news services were covering the same story. Being the inquisitive person that I am, rather than simply wondering, I investigated.

First on the list: CNN. I navigated from the US section to the main page to the "WORLD" section. On all three the headline was about the Democratic Primary race in South Carolina. Since when is that world news?!?! A 30 second search of this page and I couldn't find any reference to the conflict in Kenya (I figure that's more than the average American would spend, and the average one wouldn't be looking for that specific article.)

Next for the chopping block was Fox News: They actually had "world" events on their world page. Fox also had an article about the Kenyan conflict too. However, it was buried in a list of about 30 minor articles at the bottom, I'm still not impressed.

Last of all was Reuters (which I didn't check until later, I started this blog post about 9:15 am). Unfortunately for the sake of this post, Reuters had a fairly large feature about the Kenyan situation. At this, I returned to FoxNews and CNN, which even more unfortunately for this post, now have featured articles on the world section of their websites.

But, for the sake of the first half of this blog, lets say that's not true. I was going to go on a bit of a rant on how either the American media or Americans in general have little interest in what's going outside of their own little world. The title raising the question of whether its the media that doesn't care and the general public follows, or if the media is simply catering to what Americans are interested in. But in any case, I have some news articles to read about what's going on in Kenya :D.

Culture

A couple days ago I came across a new band... well, a band that's new to me. Within Temptation is a goth-rock group with a female lead vocalist, very comparable to Evanescence. The main difference that I noticed is that they use an orchestra to powerful effect in several of their tracks. Within Temptation would be accused of being a copy cat band, except that WT has actually been around longer than Evanescence. They started in Norway in the late 90's, and were well received in their home country. It took about a decade for their popularity to spread to Holland and the rest of Europe and then finally to the states. They released a new cd in 2007 on a deal with an American record label.

What I find interesting is that it seems that the pinnacle of musical success is to sign a deal with an American record company and record in the US. In many things it seems that reaching fame in America is the "top." The only exception I can think of is soccer. The best MLS (Major League Soccer, also known as MajorLy Sucks) players migrate to European Leagues. I'm reminded of an article I read about understanding other cultures. It said that everyone knows American culture because it spreads everywhere. But most Americans know little about other cultures, when traveling they take at least a little bit of their own culture with them. Even on missions trips Americans tend to stay in nice clean American hotels and eat nice American food. In France I've heard that there's a law that requires radio stations to play at least as many songs by French artists as by American artists. Our culture is pretty invasive, so it takes more effort for us to get to know other cultures than it does for others to get to know ours.

Something I heard today (well, I started this blog two weeks ago)

I was listening to Christian radio this morning and the DJ read the days "Word on the Way," the Bible verse of the day. He talked about it for just a minute, and I don't remember the verse, but his application for it is that it is wrong to think that what your denomination believes is right and other denominations that disagree with you are wrong. He said if you think that, stop, because that's what divides Christians.

That kinda bugged me, because if I don't think that what I believe is right, what's the point in believing anything? I understand the importance of accepting the possibility that I am in error and respecting the beliefs of those who disagree with me. It is really important for Christians to avoid over-emphasizing minor theology, especially when it comes to unity in the universal church, but I believe what I believe because I think it's true. By definition, it follows that I believe that those who disagree with me are wrong. Could I be wrong? Absolutely. But that doesn't mean that have to agree that someone else is just as right as I am when one of us is clearly in error.

What divides Christians is not individuals standing for what they believe. Divisions are caused by Christians who are unwilling to agree to disagree.