Itchy & Scratchy

I used to not get poison oak, bad, until my mid-twenties. Now I get it so bad, I get it somewhat systemically (read: my lymphatic system is kind enough to spread it for me to the "warmer" parts of my body)
I currently have a student who has it pretty badly.
My lips started itching a couple of days ago.
I think I contracted it from grading his homework.

moral: homework can be bad for you!

Testing twitterfeed

Anyone else use Twitterfeed?
Happy with it?
Use something else?
Let me know, thanks.
peace

WOW!

Go here, read this!

HT: Tony Jones

Thinking

“Whatever course you decide upon, there is always someone to tell you that you are wrong. There are always difficulties arising which tempt you to believe that your critics are right. To map out a course of action and follow it to an end requires courage.”

Ralph Waldo Emerson

Recent Happenings...

Ok so it's be a while, and I hold a loose definition of "a while"

First and foremost we welcomed the newest addition to our clan on May 31He is a wonderful little guy. We have been graced with great kids and I love them dearly.
Christy is radiant when she is a mom and I love to watch her love my kids.
I added his name to the roster on my arm and got a little something else on my other arm. If you want to see those head on over to my Facebook page.

We have been crazy busy this year. Obviously waiting for the new guy to show up. Surgery on my hand again. Work. School (including one class I am taking this summer...argh). And all those pesky animals Christy likes to let hang around (in fact I get to stack hay tonight when I get home from class...woo hoo!) Big garden.
Pics coming.

Hope you all are doing well, please drop me a line.
Peace

Lyrical Addiction

Check this interview with Bill Mallonee over at Homebrewed Christianity.

To Ryan and Holly

Wow

It's extraordinary to me that the United States can find $700 billion to
save Wall Street and the entire G8 can't find $25 billion dollars to saved
25,000 children who die every day from preventable diseases. - Bono

Yellow and Blue

I experienced pride and cowardice simultaneously. Maybe that is not so rare. Maybe cowardice is born from a sense of pride, a sense of protecting what is yours to the point of running away with it.
I did not want to talk about it with her because she seems so smug and certain that I am not safe to say my thoughts without a feeling of condemnation. Why do we have to protect our ideas so vehemently, so violently? I felt that if I didn’t come away converted to her idea there wouldn’t be any satisfaction unless I at least felt like I was guilty for holding to my idea. So I refrained from uttering a syllable of my thoughts other than the refrain, “I don’t really want to talk about this.”
I am tired of the two-side systems of our societies that cannot seem to operate unless they have some perceived threat of the other who is always out to undermine or destroy what is theirs. And yet, isn’t that what I am making of her, and her, and him, and them?

Um...

My wife and I have worked with kids for years who are considered severely emotionally disturbed in the highest non-corrective, restrictive environments in the state of California.
We have experienced a lot of violence.
But NEVER on the scale and organization as this

damn!