Random

✽ It's been storming in Chicago -- amazing Chicago Tribune picture of double lightening strike. There is also a photo of the same strike from another angle, shot by a different Trib photographer.

✽ I'm watching the Evangelical Covenant Church's 125th annual meeting opening worship service live webcast from St Paul -- lookin' good.

✽ Sightings --

Cheap and marketable: these terms may describe both Touchdown Jesus and Saint Sarah. But one suspects that human will, and not an act of God, will be required to dispel the cult of Palin. ~ Jeremy Biles

✽ New proof that the Asian carp, "a voracious, nonnative fish, might be moving perilously close to the Great Lakes..." ~ NY Times

✽ New minimum wage rules making it harder for teens to get work? ~ WSJ

✽ "Beyond Camelot: Britain’s Un-American Austerity Program" -- The Brits approach to economic recovery by LaVonne Neff

✽ "Freesale" demonstrates God's love and catches people off-guard. ~ link

✽ Organic farming leads to global warming?

"We’ve known for decades that high-yield farming was our greatest humanitarian achievement, preventing at least a billion famine deaths. High-yield farms have also supported the shift to cities, where people take up less land per capita and have smaller families. That’s why the human population is now set to decline modestly after 2050.

Moreover, the high-yield farming saves this carbon at a very low cost — about $7 per ton. Emission cuts through other strategies typically cost $20 per ton, and far more for such expensive strategies as wind turbines, solar panels, and corn ethanol. ~ Dennis Avery