Random

...Greg Boyd is good at shaking things up. Most recently he has riled up a few people with his sermons distancing the gospel from conservative politics. "When the church wins the culture wars, it inevitably loses... When it conquers the world, it becomes the world. When you put your trust in the sword, you lose the cross." He's way more on the mark than most evangelicals are ready to acknowledge. Attendance in his own congregation dropped by a thousand to 4,000.

...Curiously Cute -- the new Altoids sugar-free "smalls" -- still has a powerful peppermint punch.

...A laundromat in Berwyn, Illinois has embraced solar in a major way. My first thought upon seeing the article was, hey, my mother used to run a solar laundry operation in our home -- well at least part of the operation was solar. These guys in Berwyn are running the whole thing with sun power. And it's making financial sense.

...I had a gift certificate so I bought a copy of Eugene Peterson's paraphrase of the entire Bible "The Message//Remix" -- no big deal -- other than that they've added verse numbers in the most recent versions -- and that I purchased the "leather look" version. In some ways the leather look actually looks and feels better than many real leather bindings.

...We have passes for the fair tonight. Perfect weather for it. Since we live so close we can walk and avoid the parking lot. Since we live so close we also get to hear a lot of the featured artists -- for free! We just open the windows.

...I saw my first Schwarzenegger for governor sign yesterday. They are graphically strong -- the green and orangish-red color scheme is a fresh relief from the over-worked red, white, and blue. The tagline is "Protecting the California Dream".

Regardless of what strengths the governor brings to the office -- or lacks for it -- and no matter how often he talks about his immigrant dream -- that has got to be one of the most trite campaign slogans I've ever heard.

...For the sake of the spiders, I want to mention my brother-in-law Charlie's business -- ORI -- Office Rental, Inc. They rent office furniture in the Bay Area -- Oakland, San Francisco, Silicon Valley.

...Also, for the sake of the spiders, I want to mention my brother Greg's graphic design business -- YellowDogGraphix.com. Greg does a lot of logo and advertising design work.

...My church website of the week -- Turlock Covenant Church. Cheryl and I worshipped with them yesterday. I really like being with them -- it's almost as though I'm back at Cornerstone (They are the parent church of Cornerstone). They, too, are going through a pastoral change and Darryl Larson is the extremely capable transition pastor in that congregation.