I Am Concerned...

People keep leaving Mary birthday wishes and saying something like 'we hope David does something nice for you'. What do you folks think of me? Did you think I would just forget or something? Geeesh....

For your information, over the weekend I gave her a nice gift and tonight I took her out for dinner.

Apparently I am not as thoughtless as I get credit for being...

For My Fellow U2 Fans...

Irish rockers U2 have revealed they picked a space-age circular stage for their world tour — kicking off spectacularly tonight at Barcelona’s giant 97,500-capacity Camp Nou stadium.

Bono & co’s 100-date, £90m U2360 tour will arrive in Dublin next month.

U2’s small central set, tipped to rotate, is beneath a giant, four-legged construction dubbed the “Claw” measuring a world-record 50metres high, 58m wide and 47m deep.

Based on Los Angeles Airport’s Theme Building, the Claw is so big that roadies first arrived four weeks ago to build it.

The tour, the band’s first since 2005’s Vertigo, is their most expensive in their 33 years together, in which time they have been touted as the best live act on the planet.

Full BelfastTelegraph Article

Thanks To Keith at BagOfNothing

A Challenging Quote From Jim Elliot

A friend shared the quote below on her Facebook page this morning. I had never read it before, but I found it incredibly challenging.

"We are so utterly ordinary, so commonplace, while we profess to know a Power the Twentieth Century does not reckon with. But we are "harmless," and therefore unharmed. We are spiritual pacifists, non-militants, conscientious objectors in this battle-to-the-death with principalities and powers in high places. Meekness must be had for contact with men, but brass, outspoken boldness is required to take part in the comradeship of the Cross. We are "sideliners" -- coaching and criticizing the real wrestlers while content to sit by and leave the enemies of God unchallenged. The world cannot hate us, we are too much like its own. Oh that God would make us dangerous!"

Quote by Jim Elliot, 1927-1956

Thanks To Ronne Rock at Adventures Of A Christ Stumbler

It Is My Bride's Birthday!

Today is Mary's birthday. Since she is not on Facebook you will have to leave any birthday wishes in the comments area below.

Poignant Father's Day Note From Garron

Mary and I met my parents in Brenham over the recent Father's Day weekend. After touring the ice cream Mecca (Blue Bell plant) we headed out to Washington-on-the-Brazos State Historic Site (a trip every Texan should take).

At the end of our visit we had a few minutes to walk around the Star of The Republic Museum. Part of the museum has exhibits setup especially for children. Since this was Father's Day weekend the museum staff had placed a notebook out for the children to write in. Each page of the notebook had three fields that included a place for the child's name and the statement "My father is a hero because". The children were then given a space to write their own comment.

While thumbing through the pages Mary and my mother came across the page shown below. The first and last entry are the types of things you would expect to read on Father's Day, but the middle one was heart breaking. Click on the picture below to blow up the picture so you can read what Garron had to say.

Fall Down, Go Boom

Very interesting photos of a building that fell in Shanghai. It fell like a book that was upright, and then on its side.

Click on the image below to see the entire gallery.

Thanks To Keith at BagOfNothing

You Call That a Strike?!

In the seventh inning of a recent game between the Red Sox and the Braves, Atlanta’s Peter Moylan fired a two-strike fastball to Kevin Youkilis. Although the home plate umpire called it a ball, Braves fans could’ve been forgiven for thinking the pitch nipped the outside corner. Viewers in Boston, however, knew the ump made the right call.

This difference of opinion wasn’t the result of home-team favoritism. Rather, it stemmed from differences in the local television broadcasts. The Red Sox telecast on NESN is one of only three in Major League Baseball that places its main camera directly behind the pitcher in straightaway center field. The other 27 clubs, including the Braves, put the camera off-center, about 10 to 15 degrees toward left field. That offset angle means the vast majority of baseball fans get a skewed sense of the pitcher-hitter confrontation, the matchup at the very heart of baseball. For fans of the Braves and most other teams, judging balls and strikes is a matter of guesswork.

Read The Full Slate Article Here

Thanks To Keith at BagOfNothing

Pictures From The International Space Station

The Boston Globe has another amazing series of photographs. This set is from the International Space Station. Click on the image to see the full series.

Earlier this week, NASA released an amazing photograph of an eruption of Sarychev Peak Volcano, taken by astronauts aboard the orbiting International Space Station (ISS). Seeing that great photo prompted me to dig into the archives and see what other imagery I could find from recent NASA archives. Collected here are a handful of photographs of Sarychev Peak Volcano, and more, taken by astronauts aboard the ISS over the past few months. (35 photos total)