Blog-Linkity Goodness 9.30.09

1. First, let me just say, I'm not going to get into the whole Black History Month, reparations, reverse racism conversation. I grew up in public school with black friends, some of those being my best friends at times. Overall, I don't understand the whole racism thing, but then again I wasn't around for the things that went on 40, 50, 60 or even 200 years ago. I do understand that there are people in all races that can ruin perceptions for their own races by the actions that they have chosen to display. One bad apple spoils the whole bunch, right? It's not a black/white issue. It's not a Native American, Latin American, Asian American issue. It's the fact that we haven't fully learned how to love each other with the love that God has shown us. That's the real issue here.

This kid is 11 years old. And his wisdom confounds me. Mad props to his parents for instilling beliefs in him that all men are created equal and are responsible for his/her own destiny despite his/her race, creed or socio-economic background.

Although I have to admit that I was guilty of using this word is reference to a coule of friends in high school, I now agree with this kid. This word sends chills up my spine when I hear it in any forum these days.

Just take a look.



2. Another video. If you've got 12 minutes to spare, please watch this. I need this guy to yell at me every day to snap me out of my sin-filled false reality. This is complete boldness in the Word of God and the only Truth can save us from eternal damnation.

"A good tree cannot bear bad fruit and a bad tree cannot bear good fruit."



3. This post by Melanie blessed my soul in a big way today. I love when married women share their insights on being single, because they've all been through it before. And she's right, the hardest part of waiting is the waiting. But I can't sit around a wish for the day when I will be "made whole" by another person because I'm being "made whole" right now in God.

4. Bryan Allain never fails to give me a laugh first thing in the morning. And this post that he has up today is classic and priceless. And if involves Jack Bauer.

5. And just for a little bonus, I found this while Google searching the Wikipedia of Jack Bauer.

6. John Travolta coming to his senses about Scientology? Let's hope so. I've actually prayed about this many times. When his son died, I prayed for this family for a week. I felt a little stupid for praying for a celebrity, but celebrities are real people too, right? I don't understand how someone can be a part of a religion that doesn't acknowledge sicknesses that its members have. They just ignore it or call it something else and don't treat it or cry out to God, the Only One who can cure it, on behalf of that person. This is why God made people who become doctors. I'm going to keep praying that this situation while drive Travolta and his wife as well as other people to look closely at what they really believe and eventually find the One True God.

7. Lastly, as a former cheerleader, this caught my eye. These girls have been using scripture on their signs since 2003 and now they are being told it's a violation of the First Amendment. Personally, I think the whole First Amendment card is played way to much to the point that people are confused of what it actually means. Anyway, if cheerleaders can put sayings on signs that say, "Cage the Tigers" and get no response from PETA (the most overly sensative organization on planet Earth, I think these girls should be able to put whatever they want on their signs as long as it's family friendly. And this coming from the girl that okay-ed a sign her senior year that said "Burn Natchez (Matches) Burn". Yikes.

S.W.A.T.

This just makes me miss home.

Cleverness: It Runs In The Family

This may not be the best email I've ever received but it sure is the best I've gotten in a long time.

I asked my dad earlier today what I should do (besides vacuum) about ants in my car. (Sidenote: I do not leave food in my car. So that is not why they are there. I blame it on the rain. Yeah. Yeah.)

This was his response to my email:

"Ask them where they need to go and take them or drive around until they need to go to the bathroom. Stop at a quick mart and when they get out to go, shut the door and drive off leaving them behind. If that doesn’t work get some ant bait at HD or Wal-mart."

Clever Daddy.

Random Dozen

1. Please share one middle school memory. It can be good, bad, ugly, funny. Pictures or words, I don't care, just share.
Two come straight to mind. 1) There was a fight one day in seventh grade and a girl got her face bashed into the floor and her hair pulled out. Don't ask me why that is stuck in my head besides the fact that I managed to stay clear of the of the girl who beat her up for the next year and a half. 2) My friends and I rolled our eighth grade English teacher's car after Mississippi State won the Egg Bowl that year. She was an Ole Miss fan. She also happened to be our best friend's mom. We talked our art teacher into letting us out of third period to do it. Fake suspension papers were drawn up. Good times.

2. What's your favorite Beatles song?
Wow. Seriously. This is so hard. I'm going to go with "Hey Jude" right now.

3. If I asked you to describe your most comfortable outfit, what would it be?
Most definitely, t-shirt and capri sweatpants.

4. Would you rather host a party or be a guest?
Guest. The host has way too much to think about it. As a guest, you just show up.

5. Do you think we will move completely from traditional books to digital ones, and if we do, are you OK with that?
I don't think so. There are way too many people in this world that love to mark all over books just like me.

6. Do you learn best by reading, listening or experiencing?
Definitely, experiencing. I'm a hands-on, see-it-to-believe-it, watch-and-learn kind of girl.

7. If you are (or when you were) single, what is the kiss of death for you concerning the opposite sex? (That is, what is one trait or behavior or habit or anything at all that immediately turns you off from considering that person a potential match for you?)
Smoking cigarettes and dipping are definite deal-breakers for me.

8. Snacks. Salty or sweet?
I like a mix of both but I guess I'll say salty.

9. Look around you in a four foot radius. What object is around you that you didn't realize was there or forgot was there? How long has it been there?
My "FAITH" photograph art piece. I forgot to get Dad to hang it when he was here and just haven't thought about it since.

10. What is your favorite Tom Cruise movie?
A Few Good Men. No question.

11. You buy a bottle of shampoo and discover that you don't like what it does to your hair at all. What do you do with that full bottle?
Save it for a rainy day. Or a day I run out of the kind that actually like.

12. Your favorite Fall comfort food? (Last week it was beverage.)

Candy corn.

Things That Have Made Me Happy Today

1. This little bit of goodness from Ree at Pionneer Woman. Just look at that picture. Pinapple wrapped in bacon?!?! Is this what they will serve in heaven along with Krispy Kremes and cookie cake?

2. My sister sent this to me today and I immediately want to pick up and move to NYC only for the reason to go work at FAO Schwartz. And well, the afore-mentioned obsession too.

3. Shanna is a friend I acquired through other friends that I grew up with. (And she also happens to be married to a guy I went to high school with.) She went to school with my church friends and one thing my church friends were good at were intermingling friend groups. Anyway, it makes me giddy inside to see people use their unbelieveable talents to glorify the Father, and that what Shanna does along with Blake (who just happens to the husband of another one of those friends, Sarah.). The duo started back at MSU at the Wesley Foundation and have been leading worship since. They are simply called, "Blake and Shanna". Based in Nashville. And they are good. The proof is in the video. I've been watching/listening to these all day long.

Entitlement vs. Grace

Lately, I've been struggling with feelings of entitlement and envy.

I've watched a person who destroyed the dream of my future receive every single bit of that dream in a matter of eight months. And I don't think this person deserves it one bit.

Aren't I entitled to enjoy the dream that I had before they even have a chance to enjoy anything else in this life?

Aren't I?

Nope.

You know why. Because in my life...yeah, that life that God has given me, I'm not entitled to anything. I'm not even entitled to his saving grace. That's why it's called grace. Because it's undeserved.

I don't deserve it, yet I receive buckets of it every. single. day.

We've all gone through life, being coddled and groomed to think that we deserve certain things in life. Sure the U.S. Constitution entitles us to certain "rights" but the only reasons we are entitled to those rights are because God in his infinite wisdom and marvelous grace decided that he wanted us to be American citizens. Now, that doesn't mean that we are more or less special than anyone who was not born in the United States. It just means that we should be thankful for the freedoms and the rights that we have been given and not abuse them.

So, therefore, I have to constantly remind myself when I go into "That's not fair" mode that life's not fair. That the "Boomerang Theory" that I've conjured up in my mind (good deserves good, bad deserves bad) is not how God does things.

And that grace is poured out like rain on me every day, not because I deservie it or an entitled to it, but because God loves me.

Blog-Linkity Goodness 9.16.09

Some webby goodness on this dreary day.

- Jessica Turner at The Mom Creative shared this precious video of Mr. Rogers. I don't care what people say about him, this guy was a huge part of my childhood afternoons.

- My dad shared this video the other day on his blog. Stupid pet tricks is my favorite. I don't know why this is so funny, but it so is.

- Allison at Anointed With Grace wrote an amazing post about extending grace to others. Read it now.

- This post by the Pioneer Woman gave me an excuse not to be ashamed about my recently acquired mismatched flatware.

- I love Annie Downs' writing. I love her videos even more. Or maybe equally because her writing is pretty hard to beat. Anyway, her video about buying a mixer is pretty darn funny.

- I also love history, Mississippi, the SEC and football. This article by The Clarion Ledger's sports editor, Rick Cleveland (a.k.a. The Guv), is probably one of my most favorite things I've read in a long time.

- And of course, what is an edition of Blog-Linkity Goodness if I didn't link to Stuff Christians Like? Take a look at John Acuff's Five Commandments of Church League Sports. (And just as a bonus, read what his thoughts are on the whole Kanye West thing. He makes a very valid point and I'm now convicted of my judgment.)

Outburst Montage

First we had this...



Then this happened...



Then this guy showed up...


And not to be outdone...



Can't we all just get along?

For the apologies, click here, here, and here.

P.S. Did anyone see Michael Jordan's rant at the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame ceremony? Craziness. I think we need to start handing out Xanex before every big event from now on.

Just A Big Whole In the Sky

I remember where I was when I heard about the attacks on the Twin Towers. I remember watching it on the Today Show. Matt and Katie. Katie and Matt. The image was forever burned into my head -- the Towers, smoke billowing from them like two oversized smoke stacks on a warehouse.

I remember hesitantly going to my U.S. Government class that day. I didn't want to leave the dorm room. I wanted to just stay and watch it all. I started to class, the sun bright in the sky, but the mood was somber, as people here and there started to find out the news.

I remember sitting in my seat, front row, middle section, third seat from the left. I remember my teacher coming in, starting up the lesson, only to stop not even five minutes later. He was speechless, heartbroken and confused. I'll remember his words forever, "I just can't teach government when all of this is going on."

He dismissed us, and I trekked back to my room. There I found out two more planes had crashed.

I remember just four years before I was there at The Towers. I stayed in the hotel at the World Trade Center on a choir trip to the big city. I remember being enamored with the fact that we didn't have to go outside to get on the subway. And I remember being overwhelmed by how big it all was.

I remember going to the Statue of Liberty two years later, for the second time, and looking back at Manhattan, the towers literally towering over everything. It was that one mark of the skyline that was unmistakable.

This summer was my first time going back to New York City after the attacks. Just like they say, the skyline wasn't the same. At all. There was a big whole in the sky.

Before, everywhere you looked, there were the Towers. It was like it was NYC's own little compass, helping you to navigate the concrete jungle. But this time, there were no Towers. The compass was gone. And to a tourist, all sense of direction was gone.

It was my first time to actually go to Ground Zero. We walked around, Kumar (our tour guide) spitting out facts and stories. Finally, we reached this huge window in the middle of the plaza that looked out onto the construction site. Where there used to be towers that seemed to go up into the sky without end, there was now dirt, steel beams scattered about, and various construction equipment.

Then Kumar told us a story that I'll never forget. He said that when he was little, he used to get made fun of and beat up at school. That why most of his stories started with, "I remember this one day, when I was skipping school..." (No worries. God got him. He was saved one day while skipping school.). He said on the days when he would have a bad day at school, his mom (who raised him and his brother alone after his dad died) would hug him tight, take him to the window and they would stare out at the unmistakable Twin Towers.

She would point out the blinking light on the top and tell him that as long as that blinking light is there, everything would be okay. That was Kumar's sign of hope. Then he told us about the first time he went down to Ground Zero after the attacks. How there was just a big hole in the sky. And how that blinking light was no longer there.

Everywhere we went, Kumar would point to a place in the skyline and say, "Right there, where there is nothing but sky? It used to be nothing but towers."

It was so interesting to hear his point of view, to see St. Paul's where the workers would go to sleep on their "off" shift, and to see the work that had been done already and the miles and miles of work there still was to go.

The memorial is set to be complete in 2013. That's four years from now. Can you imagine?

September 11 will never be the same for this country. And especially for my generation. Sure we'll go about our lives, doing what we do. But like our parents remember where they were when they saw the moon landing or when they heard that JFK was shot or when the Challenger exploded, we will always remember 9/11.

But with that, I'll always remember that God always works things out for the good of those who love him and are called according to his purpose. We don't always know what that purpose is, but the good thing about that is that we don't have to.

Because we aren't in control.

He is.

Blog-Linkity Goodness (or craziness) 9.10.09

- This is what Charlie Sheen's says about 9/11. No wonder I've hated everything he's done in the entertainment industry. He's nutty anyway.

- American Idol has replaced Paula Abdul. And they've put Ellen in here place. Brace yourselves America. I remember when she was a guest host on this past season of So You Think You Can Dance. She was funny, but I think I might have had to throw something at the TV had she been there all season. She and Kara should make an interesting pair.

- This is probably the greatest prank attempt for college student, but the most dumb one at the same time. 470 feet of extension cord? Really? Ever heard of this?

- Only in Detroit (I know, I was stuck there overnight this summer) can a person get 45 traffic violations and NOT go to jail because "Detroit and Highland Park police lacked jail space". And only in Detroit will you get a response like the following from an officer of the law when asked about the lack of jail space: "It's just a little hole in the system," says Lt. William Wilson of the Ferndale Police Department. "And so, there's the ability to keep skating along like she did."

- This is like shouting "Go To Hell Ole Miss" during the National Anthem. Except it's kinda funny in this situation.

- Who talks about their sexcapades in a Capitol hearing room?! Apparently, this guy.
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In other non-news related linkage:

- I don't cook, but this recipe for shrimp quesadillas on the Pioneer Woman's blog makes me want to actually attempt to cook a meal.

- This post of John Acuff's about child-like bravery was very inspiring.

- Laminin by Louie Giglio. I've shared it before and I'm sharing it again. It's so powerful.

Until next time...