Have You Seen These things

The latest opinion poll from the Associated Press shows that now 52% of Americans are opposed to the so called "Obamacare" government takeover of health insurance.

When I checked into it, I saw that the poll was of 1,001 people's opinions. Apparently, the majority of these sorts of polls are of a similar number of people. Then, the numbers are extrapolated to show us what we all think.

1,001 people seems like an incredibly small segment of the population to poll and help us determine what everyone's opinion is. It would also seem to matter who they asked. Even if it was a random 1,001 people across the country, it could still be an unbalanced poll, just based on the sheer lack of numbers in the sampling.

I am sure that after the speech tonight, the polls will show that 53% of us are now in favor of the new healthcare ideas. It is easy to get that figure. Just ask a different set of people.

Wait a second

I am still asked, from time to time, when I will return to full time ministry and in what capacity I would consider doing so. Here is a stab at an answer:

For those of you that don't know the story and Without delving more into my calling, gifts and abilities, personality, etc., I, in brief, accepted a position here in a way that I campaigned for, pushed for and rushed into without necessarily thinking it through as much as I might have.

So, I decided that in relation to future full time ministry stuff, I would wait on God. I know that usually a person pursues this sort of calling and hops up and "candidates" for Churches and positions and all that, but I figured that it would do just as good to wait and see if God will make it happen in his time. Besides, if I am not trusting him, what is the point?

I think I am in some good company, in waiting like this. In the Bible, Joseph waited for years in a dungeon before he moved on to better things, Abraham waited for years for God to give him his promised son (and didn't wait for part of the time, creating problems), Moses waited forty years before God moved him back to lead his people out of Egypt, then led them around for another forty before they got to the promised land, David waited a good fifteen years after he was anointed King of Israel before he was actually appointed King of Israel.

I'm no Joesph or Abraham or Moses or David, but God is still God. So, I will wait for his time.

In the meantime I will do the best I can at what he has put before me; my job, my family and my friends.

Who can take a rainbow....?

Well, it is a unique and somewhat clever way to make a buck.

Monstews.com, in Great Britain, will take your children's artwork and make it into a "professional illustration". At 47.5 British Pounds (somewhere around $65 - $70), it might seem a bit pricey. On the other hand, what is wrong with adding some color and background to one of your kid's masterpieces and making it into something you will keep forever?

May as well go take a look at it, just to see what they do.

Monstews.com

Don't Whisper at My Dog

There are some places in Tucson where strange people congregate, but I don't think any of them beat where we went yesterday.

Every three years, we have to have our dog's rabies shots updated. I thought we just took her to the Humane Society's clinic and paid for her license a few weeks ago, but Diane told me that, no, it was three years ago and it is due again. So, we found a place that said it offered a daily vaccination clinic from 2pm to 4pm every weekday. Very good. We loaded her (the her being Penny the half Great Dane half Lab dog we have) and took her across town to the Spay and Neuter clinic to wait in line for her shot.

It was quite a crowd. Among it was a 10 month pregnant lady, a woman who didn't know if she had signed in with her real name or her artistic name (no, she was not an exotic dancer), a man with some very pretty diamond stud earrings, a girl with the biggest tattoo of a silhouette of a chandelier that I have ever seen( well, to be fair, it was the only one I've ever seen, but it was a big tattoo), and various other characters.

One thing they all had in common: they could not control their dogs. Well, the tattoo girl and a couple of others had cats in a carry box, but the rest of them all had dogs that would drag them around, frighten everyone with their barking, lunge at each other and all sorts of craziness. One guy had two rottweilers that kept slipping out of their collars and threatening people.

So, I now think that anyone with a dog should be required to read this book before they do anything else.
By the way, I was hoping the tattoo girl would have a really good story as to why she chose a chandelier. It turns out that she just thought it looked cool. I guess it did.

Things you should know

Not Dr. Richard Kimball...

This morning, we were in the area for the Town Hall meeting in Green Valley that Gabrielle Giffords, our representative in congress was presenting. I went on the walk through of the auditorium, as I was part of the contingency team and needed to see the layout. But, I was nowhere near the facility for the actual event.

Just prior to the meeting,some of the guys that were posted there wanted something to eat. So, I went with a couple of the guys to go pick something up for them at the nearby McDonalds.

While we were there, the former Surgeon General of the U.S., Richard Carmona, stopped in. He was supposed to be doing the inroduction for the meeting and said he had already driven by, but he didn't want to go in yet since it was still early and there was already a large crowd. He chatted amiably with us for a bit, then left for the meeting.

Does anyone else find it a bit ironic to see the former Surgeon General at McDonalds? I half expected to see him step out for a cigarette or jaywalking on a busy street. Okay, maybe not. But it still seemed a funny place to see him.

In his defense, I didn't see him eating. Neither was I.

Probably worth the read.

During the decade plus I spent as a Church Leader*, I spent much of my reading energy devoted to reading about leadership and Church issues. While some of the best leaders in the world are Church Leaders (it takes some serious leadership skill to drive all volunteer organizations wholly based on one of life's taboo topics, religion), certainly not all the leaders and books worth reading are involved with the Church. Now that I am out of the game, as it were, for a time, I have tried to broaden my reading to take in some some other fields.

One of the latest I have finished is Lance Armstrong's "It's Not About the Bike". In this autobiographical work, Lance traces his career, from his start as a biking prodigy as a teen to his phenomenal rise to the top of his game. This provides a stark and jolting contrast to his diagnosis with cancer and his battle to beat it.

When I first picked up this older read (it was written in 2000, when I didn't have too much time for books of this nature), I thought it would be a Lance liked to race, Lance got cancer, Lance is really tough and beat cancer sort of work. It did have some elements of that, but the book tried hard to underscore the frustration and difficulty a very human man found in realizing how vulnerable and mortal he really was and his efforts to fight through the disease and ultimately to return to racing in spite of numerous set backs both physically and in his chosen field.

Ultimately, it was an inspiring and rewarding read.

I think I will buy a bike.




* aka clergy, clericals, ministry, priesthood, presbytery, the cloth, the desk., clergyman, divine, ecclesiastic, churchman, priest, presbyter, hierophant, pastor, shepherd, minister; father, father in Christ; padre, abbe, cure; patriarch; reverend; black coat; confessor., dignitaries of the church; ecclesiarch, hierarch; ebdomarius; eminence, reverence, elder, primate, metropolitan, archbishop, bishop, prelate, diocesan, suffragan, dean, subdean, archdeacon, prebendary, canon, rural dean, rector, parson, vicar, perpetual curate, residentiary, beneficiary, incumbent, chaplain, curate; deacon, deaconess; preacher, reader, lecturer; capitular; missionary, propagandist, Jesuit, revivalist, field preacher., churchwarden, sidesman; clerk, precentor, choir; almoner, suisse, verger, beadle, sexton, sacristan; acolyth, acolothyst, acolyte; chorister., [Roman Catholic priesthood] Pope, Papa, pontiff, high priest, cardinal; ancient flamen, flamen; confessor, penitentiary; spiritual director., cenobite, conventual, abbot, prior, monk, friar, lay brother, beadsman, mendicant, pilgrim, palmer; canon regular, canon secular; Franciscan, Friars minor, Minorites; Observant, Capuchin, Dominican, Carmelite; Augustinian; Gilbertine; Austin Friars, Black Friars, White Friars, Gray Friars, Crossed Friars, Crutched Friars; Bonhomme, Carthusian, Benedictine, Cistercian, Trappist, Cluniac, Premonstatensian, Maturine; Templar, Hospitaler; Bernardine, Lorettine, pillarist, stylite., religieuse,, postulant., [Under the Jewish dispensation] prophet, priest, high priest, Levite; Rabbi, Rabbin; scribe., [Mohammedan] mullah, muezzin; ulema, imaum, sheik; sufi; kahin, kassis; mufti, hadji, dervish; fakir, faquir; brahmin, guru, kaziaskier, poonghie, sanyasi; druid, bonze, santon, abdal, Lama, talapoin, caloyer.