top 12 list (of top 10 lists) on 12-12-12

It’s December 12, 2012, and we ought to celebrate!  You know we won’t experience the good fortune of a matching number month-day-year again until next century (and I fear I won’t be around to enjoy that one).  So…

• Eat a dozen donuts for breakfast.  
• Use the word twelve in every conversation you have today.  
• Run twelve miles… or twelve minutes.  
• Spend twelve dollars on a gift and give it to the twelfth person you see today.  
• Memorize the names of the twelve apostles — or if you’re Jewish perhaps the twelve tribes of Israel (are Jews any more likely to have memorized the twelve tribes than Christians are the twelve apostles?).
• Have a moment of silence at 12:12 (the one that hasn’t happened yet) in order to reflect on this rare occasion.

I don’t care much what you do.  But do something!  Celebrate this twelfth day of the twelfth month of the twelfth year in this century.  And if you do indeed decide to celebrate, leave a comment telling us all what you’re doing.

Oh, what’s that?  What am I doing on 12-12-12?  Well, for starters I’m offering you guys…

a very bieber vbs

Now, I don’t keep up with church VBS materials and their markets.  As a matter of fact, I didn’t realize until recently (two days ago) that VBS curriculum is big business.*  Apparently, it’s very big business.  Let me tell you…”vast amounts of money can be made in the service of God Amighty.”**

It was Paul Wilkinson, on his blog (a good one, by the way, to which I’m subscribed), who informed me the sale of VBS materials is indeed big business.  I also learned from Paul that a lot of companies are creating these materials really heavy on entertainment and really light on Bible.  While I suppose this is a concern to me, it’s not why I’m writing this blog post.  Something MUCH more important is taking place.

God’s third language

As I turned to leave Ibondo village, I realized I’d forgotten to pray for the interns I was entrusting to Matayo for the weekend.  So I turned to the preacher and said (in Swahili), “I want to pray for these guys before I head back to Geita.”

the 5 most likely origins of wedge salads

I have a new favorite TV show.

Yeah, my friend T brought a couple of seasons of “Modern Family” on DVD, and I think it’s hilarious.  But that’s besides the point.  I only bring it up because an episode of my new favorite show reminded me of something that really bothered me while in the U.S. last year.  I’ve not mentioned it until now, but I can’t keep it in any longer.

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Wedge salads?!  Seriously?

chasing chickens

Yesterday morning we vaccinated nearly 800 chickens.  And I learned something interesting:

No matter how athletic, agile, or elegant one may normally be, it is impossible to appear graceful while chasing a chicken. 

poorly placed holiday apostrophes

Yesterday I mentioned my frustration with (what should be known as) Mothers’ Day being touted as Mother’s Day.  That’s just wrong.  Now, in that day belonging to Saint Patrick, the apostrophe shall come before the “s.”  The same with Lincoln’s Birthday. But when our intent is to celebrate mothers everywhere (plural), clearly the holiday should be referred to as Mothers’ Day.  On this I will not budge.

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“So,” I thought to myself, “how many of our other holidays have been ruined by poor punctuation?”  Well…here’s a list* to at least get us started:

white people exercising

This just in:

My level of displeasure and frustration with Tanzanians pointing at, yelling to, and taunting me is directly proportional to how far and how fast I’ve run that day.*

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*Not unlike chafing.  Today was somewhere around 10 x 9-minute miles, and it’s the most irritated I’ve been in weeks (double entendre intended).

For the three most common things I hear while running, see tanzanian kids say the darndest things.

walking helmets

Some parents make their kids wear helmets while learning to walk.  Seriously.

acquitted

I’m a sucker for humor.

I like to think of myself as relatively consistent when it comes to disciplining Baylor, my two-year old.  But if her offense is funny enough, I sometimes can’t keep from grinning — or even laughing.  And if my daughter can make me laugh as she breaks my rules, I feel like she’s somehow earned her own pardon.

scratch ‘n’ sniff blog post

I recently heard about a new TV that will allow us to smell what we’re watching.  Samsung’s working on it and it’s (creatively) being called “Smell-o-Vision.”  Sounds to me like something out of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory or a really old SNL skit (do you remember the “Bass-O-Matic?”).  Anyway, you can read more about Samsung’s smelly TV here.

But all this got me thinking…. Frankly, if the engineers at Samsung (with their inferior brain size and second-rate lab equipment) can do this with television, I should be able to do it with my personal blog.  So I did.  But, as astoundingly intelligent as I am when it comes to technology and applied sciences, I just could not find a way to get the smells to emanate from the computer screen without having to scratch the screen itself.