Thirsty

A fertilized human egg, the instant the sperm penetrates the egg, can begin growing in a petri dish. It can then be implanted in the womb of an adult woman, and given sustenance, it will continue growing. It's not the woman growing, it's the woman feeding the egg, which grows of it's own accord. How can I make this statement? Because that egg will grow in any woman that feeds it the way the female body naturally does. If it was just part of the mom, it would not continue growing separate from the mom. Instead, through the wonders of science, we know that the growth of a fertilized human egg will continue of it's own accord. In vitro fertilization. So why is such a huge chunk of our population convinced that halting the feeding of a fertilized human egg is different from halting the feeding of a newborn child?

I just this morning installed a stats collector on here and it has been put to immediate use. I see that a few folks are finding their way here from blogs4God , via a link posted today. Hello, welcome to my vain little corner. Please excuse the mess. For you, and as a reminder for my friends, this is a rickety little blog where you'll find some ramblings of my mind, produced from any number of paths my mind takes. I heartily welcome comments, thoughts, suggestions, rants, questions, and shameless plugs for your own blog. Please share!

Here is why I love sarcasm : it can beautifully illustrate the drama that one endures if one were only to keep his mouth shut and listen to everyone else.... the hordes of people who have about as much a clue as I do. (hint hint, that means not much of one ) It's so depressingly, hopelessly, entertaining. Augustine of Hippo: If you praise the works of God, then you will also have to praise yourself, for you too are a work of God. Here is how you can praise yourself yet not be proud. Praise not yourself but God in you. Offer praise, not because you are this or that kind of person, but because God made you; not because you are capable of doing this or that, but because he works in you and through you. In other news, I want one of these !

Does anyone know what happens if you lose the title to your vehicle? Like, not revoked, but I simply can't find it. Uh... my plates are about to expire. And I'm in a different state.

In case anyone, myself included, had forgotten that I am nothing more than a geek at heart... I just had one of my best days yet on the job, for one of the simplest reasons! Around the office here, Linux is somewhat of an ugly duckling. The team I primarily work with appreciates it for it's webserver capabilities, but beyond that, the company in general is strongly devoted to Microsoft . I run a Samba file server on the network, but it doesn't help anyone's perception of Linux because it's not a full member of the Domain, making it act all funny in Network Neighborhood. Well this afternoon, on a test machine, I was able to get Samba to a) fully join the Domain, and b) actually utilize some of the user & group permissions on the filesystem, which were inheritted from the domain controller. This is a huge step for my advocacy of Linux in the company, and saving them buttloads of money! You may now return to your previously scheduled program. Time for me to...

Maybe I'll try to update this thing once a week. Running is becoming a full-time focus, partly because the marathon is coming up - Sunday, October 10 - and I need to be in peak condition, but partly because it's becoming a social outlet as well. It's still slightly less than ideal, though. I'm settling with it now, but I have a fundamental problem with the idea of "exercise". I have great confidence in our abilities, as humans, to serve those in need. There are so many people in need of so many things... physically, mentally, spiritually. Catholicism calls our response to these needs Works of Mercy : Corporal Works of Mercy To feed the hungry; To give drink to the thirsty; To clothe the naked; To harbour the harbourless; To visit the sick; To ransom the captive; To bury the dead. Spiritual Works of Mercy To instruct the ignorant; To counsel the doubtful; To admonish sinners; To bear wrongs patiently; To forgive offences will...

J. R. R. Tolkien: I can recommend this as an exercise: make your Communion in circumstances that affront your taste. Choose a snuffling or gabbling priest or a proud and vulgar friar; and a church full of the usual bourgeois crowd, ill-behaved children -- from those who yell to those products of Catholic schools who the moment the tabernacle is opened sit back and yawn -- open necked and dirty youths, women in trousers and often with hair both unkempt and uncovered. Go to Communion with them (and pray for them). It will be just the same as a Mass said beautifully by a visibly holy man, and shared by a few devout and decorous people. (It could not be worse than the mess of the feeding of the Five Thousand -- after which our Lord propounded the feeding that was to come.) Thomas Merton: The importance of detachment from things, the importance of poverty, is that we are supposed to be free from things that we might prefer to people. Wherever things have become more important than people,...

What a beautiful feeling: it's Sunday night, listening to some Neil Diamond in an apartment that is slowly taking even more shape as a hospitable place of rest, and just basking in the feeling of tomorrow . Namely, a tomorrow unencumbered with the standard obligations. Chris is coming by in the morning and we're gonna hammer out at 16-miler before it gets too hot out. I'm really happy about this marathon training thing. It's really just a personal thing, a work of self-discipline and growth. I don't consider myself any more gifted than the next person on the sidewalk, the battle is against personal demons alone. In the process, though, I'm taking slight chances to reach out to people in my vicinity. I'm normally a pretty self-conscious, nervous person, and being tired after a run lowers some of my inhibitions. Funny, I always noticed how alcohol does that to me, and decided that perhaps some inhibitions aren't such a horrible thing. Hypocri...