i may be a geek, but …

I find the idea of a shadow system in our (American?) economy deeply fascinating and disturbing.  Did you realize that very rich people are making “bets” on how our markets are going to perform, keeping these bets anonymous & totally deregulated, and making a heckof-a-lotta dough when they get it right.  (One implication here is that wealthy people are not “betting on” [or investing in] legitimate economic initiatives within the market.  Rather, they’re merely “betting” around them.  If they win – as I said – they make some quick cash.  If they lose – maybe it’s only if they lose big – average Americans like you and I foot the bill.)

Sounds crazy, huh?  (Tell me there’s something I don’t understand.)

If words like “complex derivatives, commodity futures, and otc derivatives” make your head hurt (but you’re still sort of curious to know what’s going on), you might give this interview with Michael Greenberger a try.  Seems like we oughta get some of this stuff figured out (before we all wind up living together) …

lotta life today

Life is what happens to you while you’re busy making other plans.

—John Lennon

honored to introduce …

My partner in crime (who works so very hard to make it look like I know what I’m doing) has finally started blogging in her brilliant way.  Stacie started working with me this past October, after I begged and promised “office hours whenever” … she’s worth every prayer & plea I made.  (And many I didn’t.)  So grateful for our friendship and collaboration.  (Get to know her for yourself: http://boyzrus.wordpress.com/.) 

lord, in your mercy, hear my prayer

Therefore let us stop passing judgment on one another. Instead, make up your mind not to put any stumbling block or obstacle in your brother’s way.  As one who is in the Lord Jesus, I am fully convinced that no food is unclean in itself. But if anyone regards something as unclean, then for him it is unclean.  If your brother is distressed because of what you eat, you are no longer acting in love. Do not by your eating destroy your brother for whom Christ died.  Do not allow what you consider good to be spoken of as evil.  For the kingdom of God is not a matter of eating and drinking, but of righteousness, peace and joy in the Holy Spirit, because anyone who serves Christ in this way is pleasing to God and approved by men.

—Paul, Romans

barry manilow’s two blocks away …

Playing at the Sprint Center tonite and – I confess (as I put on my pj’s and prep for a serenade while I sleep) – I’ve turned a full one-eighty in my feelings about the upcoming move.  I’ve been thinking (while listening to Barry sing) … maybe creating a little distance between me & downtown isn’t such a bad idea afterall. 

(Sorry to offend any die-hard-Barry-Manilow-fans; it’s becoming clear to me: I just can’t pretend.)

Is Barry a song-writing legend?  I guess.  Is he an American music icon?  I suppose.  Is he someone I can hear singing two blocks away without cringing?  Apparently not.

Packing (with a smile) …

tom petty’s two blocks away …

Playing at the Sprint Center tonite and – I confess (as I put on my pj’s and prep for a serenade while I sleep) – I’m just a little sad that such downtown neighbors will no longer be mine.  (Moving day is just around the corner for me: a week from tomorrow!) 

I know it would drive some folks crazy to sleep where I sleep (with trains pulling in & out of Union Station, sirens screaming in the nite [KC’s quite tame, but a siren is, after all, a siren], and live music in the distance singing me to sleep.  I love it.  Positively.

Good thing I’m only moving a few miles away.  Though I won’t get to live inside the city, at least I’ll get to visit quite a lot.

Here are a few photos (and a short post) from a friend of mine who recently came to visit.  It’ll be fun to see where God moves me next for a (more indefinite) geographical commitment.  (My new lease is only a five-month-er; enough time to scope out the options).  It’s bound to be a pretty fun exploration … 

journalistic-pizzazz, i say

Holy Spirit: UK vicar applies for drinks license for his church.  (Do you ever get the feeling reporters spend more time on their headlines than on their stories?)

intuitive leadership conference

Gem #1: Seek God, not ministry to or for Him.

The perfection of the twelfth-century Cistercian architecture is not to be explained by saying that the Cistercians were looking for a new technique.  I am not sure that they were looking for a new technique at all.  They built good churches because they were looking for God.  And they were looking for God in a way that was pure and integral enough to make everything they did and everything they touched give glory to God.

We cannot reproduce what they did because we approach the problem in a way that makes it impossible for us to find a solution.  We ask ourselves a question that they never considered.  How shall we build a beautiful monastery according to the style of some past age and according to the rules of a dead tradition?  Thus we make the problem not only infinitely complicated, but we make it, in fact, unsolvable.  Because a dead style is a dead style.  And the reason why it is dead is that the motives that once gave it life have ceased to exist.  They have given place to a situation that demands another style.  If we were intent up on loving God rather than upon getting a Gothic church out of a small budget we would soon put up something that would give glory to God and would be very simple and would also be in the tradition of our fathers.

—Thomas Merton, The Sign of Jonas

from my (long-lost) friend

great fortunes i seek
so far away draw distant against my horizon
my back to you as my hope falls through
and further away
to imagine
by the time i get back
the efforts you have put to the edges
of all we own
how the grass has grown and faded
i will have never known
except by the eyes of you
the dew that slipped gently to the soil
and your lips having sipped the rains
–all passing
left to mist the clouded skies
–to taunt
the memories of all i’ve missed
forgive the abandon
should the leaves turn
darken, dampen and ache
falling only to nurture the foot of their making
returned green at the point of rebirth

—jlk

my favorite line from tonite’s local news …

(I’ve just gotta start getting some of these in writing.)

News report on Leawood City Counsel discussing coyote problem: At one point, one man stood up and spoke out directly on behalf of the coyotes.

C’mon.

I’m all for getting Leawood’s coyote problem figured out.  I’m okay if you trap and don’t kill coyotes.  But can we give the dramatic performance a break already?