Random

• Cheryl spoke about her songwriting to a PIBC class tonight. The class aims to teach teachers about using the arts in the elementary school classroom. It went well.

• I'm flying south tomorrow to participate in Survivor Chuuk -- and for a few meetings with our PIBC staff down there. I return to Guam on Thursday afternoon (so I'm not totally missing Valentine's Day). However, Wednesday night I'll be incommunicado on Tol -- where there is no electricity, internet, or cell-phone coverage. So, if you have a question about something in the reading assignments, etc., you're on your own for a few days. You'll survive.

• I'd never thought of John Calvin as a bi-vocational minister. But when you think about it that's what he was. John Throop has a fine article on bi-vocational pastoral ministry -- Dual Roles, Maximum Impact. Our Covenant colleague Greg Du Bois gets quoted.

• The non-white portion of the US population is growing faster than the white portion. -- not really breaking news but... "Non-Hispanic whites will make up less than half the nation's population by 2050, according to a new study." -- Link

It seems to me that there is so much cultural fusion going on that at some point all of the old categories are somewhat moot anyway -- not that everything will become homogenized but that what is emerging out of the new mix will be a new set of categories. People will still belong to groups but the definitions will not be anything like the definitions of 2008.

• Small is beautiful. The sale of gas-sippers in the US is up 33% since last year. -- Link

• Honolulu just eliminated the fee for solar-panel permits. Hawaii has already been leading the pack as 5,500 solar systems were installed in the state last year -- the largest number in the US. -- Link (via)

• How to clean your kitchen sponge with a microwave oven -- Link (via)

• Just so you know -- Viking women probably dressed in a much more provocative manner than previously believed. -- Link