Stream-of-consciousness blogging. I have a committed audience of one. (Hi, Son!)

I retired April 1st (no kidding). I was not adjusting to it very well. Friday I twittered that I was coming out of retirement to write a book. I have two working titles: Internet Wisdom, First Edition, and Sparky’s Booklet. I am not even sure what it’s about, yet. I started writing it in my commonplace book (c-book for short) a little bit at a time, out of order. I wrote “Begin my book” in my c-book on October 17, 2021. (That was 1183 days after I started gathering my thoughts in my c-book, by the way. I knew it was going to take a while to come together, not that the only reason I keep a c-book is to write books.)

I like to say that the first draft of my book is already written. All the words are in my c-book. Problem is, the words are not in the right order. And I don’t think the first draft is salable. Meanwhile, I blog.

I am writing this sitting inside Pikes Peak Brewing Company (PPBC). They have good fast Wi-Fi, and I am in the corner, an elbow away from my laptop’s power plug. As soon as I got here I ordered a dark meat chicken wrap from Tossed Food Truck. The band was on their final break. They started up and played until 4pm. I bought a Rocky Mountain root beer for $4 “plus change.” The “change” includes a brewer’s fee, which I am happy to pay. I ate my wrap. It was delicious! I had a nice chat with the owner, Morgan.

Before PPBC I was at Serranos, where I had the strangest “conversation” of my life. To protect the identities of my friends, I’ll call them Alex and Bob. Both are men.

Take a trip back in time with me. I join them. Bob reacts like an aggressive stallion. He doesn’t greet me. The exact words aren’t important. The message to me is, “You are intruding on my time with Alex.” He doesn’t tell me to leave, though, and I decide to stay as the third wheel. I am literally eavesdropping on their convo, and they are both aware of it! Alex is playing along with Bob. They are both talking about me, knowing I am here, and neither is inviting me to speak. So I remain silent. I’m learning things about both of them that they don’t talk to me about: their opinions on transgenderism, religion, etc. I learn that when Alex was growing up (some decades ago, but continuing after Vatican II), Catholic churches published the giving of every congregant. They published the attendance at activities such as pro-life rallies. These reports (confessionals?) were mailed to parishioners every month. As a Christian, I get it. I can see, theologically, how such transparency might help disciples grow spirtually. But that’s just not cool to do in America. Alex doesn’t know if the church still does that. But still. Wow.

Strange convo, right? It took me time to get used to the situation. I made mistakes, but Bob was consistent with his feedback. His message: “You may stay, but do not join the convo. This is our time to talk one on one.” At one point a laugh slipped out of me, and Bob mocked me. That worked. I didn’t make another mistake after that.

One final thing I want to mention today: AI. Generative Pre-trained Transformers. I like Brave Leo, built into the browser. This post’s image is a screenshot of the food truck’s home page and a convo I had with Leo about it.

Some of you were locked in a dark cell, cruelly confined behind bars, Punished for defying God’s Word, for turning your back on the High God’s counsel— A hard sentence, and your hearts so heavy, and not a soul in sight to help. Then you called out to God in your desperate condition; he got you out in the nick of time. He led you out of your dark, dark cell, broke open the jail and led you out. So thank God for his marvelous love, for his miracle mercy to the children he loves; He shattered the heavy jailhouse doors, he snapped the prison bars like matchsticks! — ‭Psalms 107:10-16 (MSG‬) (bible.com)

I first published this twelve years ago. [1]. I have lightly edited it. Take a journey back in time with me. It is in two parts because, ironically, it is too long for my modern micro.blog theme. Constraints. I mention that below.

It’s 0226. At least, it was when I started writing. At 0429 I realized I had more to read before breakfast. I got back to writing at 0504. (I’ve been using military time more and more. A symptom of the evolution toward 24-hour culture. What will this do to our natural rhythms of sleep and wakefulness? I’m the wrong person to ask. I have narcolepsy. No cataplexy, hallucinations, or sleep paralysis, thank God. Just a blurring of wakefulness, unconsciousness and REM sleep. Doesn’t explain the insomnia. In this case, my knowledge of my own sleep patterns leads me to conclude I couldn’t sleep because of my anticipation of my full agenda today: Discussing Early Christians Speak over breakfast with the men of StGAC, training for county GOP (unpaid) election work, then meeting fellow volunteers for the campaign to re-elect Amy Stephens for State House District 19. Then again, I would like to think that The Holy Spirit woke me up because I had work to do. Writing is work. To work is to pray. Therefore, by writing, I pray. And the purpose of prayer is to seek unity with the Creator of the Universe—thank you, Fr. Scott. But that’s enough theology for now.)

I think Larry Sanger is onto something. I red Part 1 of his blog series, “How Not to Use the Internet.” I agree: it’s a problem that the internet distracts us. And I am also reading Charles Murray’s piece in the New Criterion, “Future tense, IX: Out of the wilderness.” (Thank you, Arts & Letters Daily for the teaser, “What conditions give rise to great artistic achievements? Wealth, urban centers, belief in God. Wait: What? Secularism is incompatible with creativity…”) In fact, Part 2 of Larry’s piece (Part 1 of which I finished uninterrupted—1737 words according to Microsoft Word), is sitting right ahead of Murray’s piece in my Instapaper folder. (I’m not reading my collection in sequence. And, by the way, Instapaper totally rocks! I’m reading that folder offline in my Kindle app as a .mobi “magazine.”) His piece is 5592 words and I’m 1794 words into it. Coincidence, I don’t think so.

When I red Murray’s sentence, “In literature, the organizing structure that created an eruption of great work starting in the late eighteenth century was overwhelmingly dominated by a new principle: the modern novel,” I was hooked. Who has time for novels anymore? Well, I do. Sort of. I recently became aware of Thomas Pynchon’s existence. It seems he wrote an award-winning postmodern novel. Murray assumes his readers know this. I haven’t red the first word of it, though. The book I’m focused most on is a pair of stories in one volume: Not Quite Dead Enough and Booby Trap by Rex Stout. This book is a milestone for me. I’ve red other long works electronically. In the 90’s I had an IBM PC-XT that ran on two AA batteries and fit in the palm of my hand. I red The Imitation of Christ on it. I got through it, but it took much longer because it wasn’t very comfortable. I had to use some custom software to rotate the text into portrait mode, and the LCD contrast was not restful on the eyes, unlike a modern Kindle. I still haven’t finished Pride and Prejudice. I started it on an iPod Touch. I red a chapter or three in paperback, and I downloaded it to my NOOKcolor™. (That e-reader didn’t survive a fall from the floorboard of my car to the pavement. R.I.P.) It’s still sitting in my NOOK app library on my iPad, beckoning me. I don’t know how quickly I’ll finish it. But I fully intend to get through Stout’s nostalgic, light yet profound pair of stories on my iPad. They’re both contained in the first ebook I ever checked out from my library. (Thank you, Pikes Peak Library District, for inspiring me in 1979 with the idea that technology can make the humanities better!) I’ve already “renewed” it once (re-download after timebomb auto-delete). I have sixteen days left before I have to repeat that awkward yet tolerable (hey, what can one honestly expect for free?!) process. And so, for me, the novel is well underway toward being supplanted by electronic text.

Murray is also elaborating on music as art. That went digital before books, as we all know. My lovely and talented wife giddily shared her new acquisitions as we carpooled home yesterday evening: Adele’s “Rolling in the Deep” and Carrie Underwood’s “Before He Cheats.” (Oops. A tiny bit of her privacy just leaked onto the internet. Sorry, Sweetheart. Forgive me?) This was also a milestone. She paid $1.29 apiece. She said it was the first time she’d bought tracks since obtaining an iPhone. There was no easy way to confirm they’re MP3s during our trip, but I seem to remember that Apple raised their prices at the same time that they began selling the open format. I get my MP3s from Amazon for 23.26% less.

Continue reading Part 2

[1] http://home.pcisys.net/~tbc/posterous/posts/2012/05/the-evolution-of-writing-onto-the-internet.html

My friend Mike prays as follows to begin his time with his Bible each morning. (An original.)

Grant by your mercy, heavenly Father, to focus my mind and soften my heart that these thy words may be written therein, to inform and guide me that I, better the man that you created me to be, might walk henceforth in your ways reflecting the light of your love to the greater glory of your name. Amen.

(Also read his books FATHERS (autobiographical) and What If….)

Where the corpse is, there the vultures will gather. 9f1e2241449ed2bfe4b4823be61280d8b47f6ee50b507b90d03f961fb36b0b6b923f017aa0d2b0316cb991ac36f7508ea29758e8ff77f71a9b138c10392a7678

In context. Luke 17:20–37 ESV via tbc0.com/archives/162

Syndicating my first “real” content from my “Minifeed” — a project of the Knowledge Standards Foundation. My post is about #prayer.

I know my Father hears my groans
I want to honor Him with words
A framework of memorized poetic / prose prayers forms a firm foundation; my groans are like incense rising up to Him; above memorized are extemporaneous prayers; above that and below groans may be tongues
tbc0.com/archives/135

I don’t have a micro.blog tag for prayer. It’s categorized as theology, cosmology, and culture, which I find to be a harmonious combination.

And for anyone who’s seen my sha256sum tweets, here is my style:

$ cat tbc0.com/archives/135;sha256sum tbc0.com/archives/135
On prayer

I know my Father hears my groans
I want to honor Him with words
A framework of memorized poetic / prose prayers forms a firm foundation; my groans are like incense rising up to Him; above memorized are extemporaneous prayers; above that and below groans may be tongues, but He has not seen fit to give me that gift
ef7397fdb68c04bca0446cd04b2be05cd8c518cc7e68cd7eed492e6fa3eee47977a2f8b59b41533548c808ae9e02de4b19d588b5093123a8d5ccaed2987fd3cb  tbc0.com/archives/135
$

Image credit: svgsilh.com/image/2025655.html

This prophet lived about 2700 years ago. How much longer must we wait for this to come to pass? I’m especially thinking of the new law in Texas that protects unborn children after their heartbeat is detected. Clever design of the law. But this prophecy is protection for those who accuse, not the accusers. The ESV puts it a little differently than Prof. Peterson’s paraphrase. “You shall refute every tongue that rises against you in judgment.” The other parts of the prophecy sound good, too. Lord Jesus come quickly.

“Afflicted city, storm-battered, unpitied: I’m about to rebuild you with stones of turquoise, Lay your foundations with sapphires, construct your towers with rubies, Your gates with jewels, and all your walls with precious stones. All your children will have God for their teacher— what a mentor for your children! You’ll be built solid, grounded in righteousness, far from any trouble—nothing to fear! far from terror—it won’t even come close! If anyone attacks you, don’t for a moment suppose that I sent them, And if any should attack, nothing will come of it. I create the blacksmith who fires up his forge and makes a weapon designed to kill. I also create the destroyer— but no weapon that can hurt you has ever been forged. Any accuser who takes you to court will be dismissed as a liar. This is what God ’s servants can expect. I’ll see to it that everything works out for the best.” God ’s Decree. — Isaiah 54:11–17 (MSG)

Good politics begin with good theology. Prayers are essential. I was struck by Listener prayers for our nation, podcasted this morning.

I love that the first prayer offered is #24 For an Election, from the Book of Common Prayer:

Almighty God, to whom we must account for all our powers and privileges: Guide the people of the United States (or of this community) in the election of officials and representatives; that, by faithful administration and wise laws, the rights of all may be protected and our nation be enabled to fulfill your purposes; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

I should have prayed that before now. Never too late in tight races, though.

I wondered about one of the other prayers and found an English translation. It’s a prayer by Calvin.

Here is my own lightly edited version of that one for good measure:

Father, the depravity of our nature is so great that we cannot bear prosperity without some wantonness of the flesh immediately raging in us and without becoming arrogant against you. Grant that we may profit under the trials of the cross; and when you have blessed us, may we, with lowly hearts, renouncing our perverseness, submit ourselves to you, bearing your yoke submissively. And may we proceed in this obedience all our lives, and so contend against all temptations as never to glory in ourselves, and feel also convinced that all true and real glory is laid up for us in you, until we shall enjoy it in your celestial kingdom, through Christ our Lord. Amen.

How providential is it that Notre Dame burned during Holy Week? Then how providential that in the first week after Resurrection Sunday this is a headline? “Crystal Cathedral, home to the ‘Hour of Power,’ transforms into Catholic seat”

Oh. My. God. And I mean that with all reverence. This is amazing. Crystal Cathedral, founded by televangelist Rev. Robert Schuller, is on the verge of being dedicated as Christ Cathedral! (christcathedralcalifornia.org)

“We’re buying a used cathedral. That’s never happened before.” Doesn’t God work in mysterious ways?

Rev. Schuller says this a lot: “God loves you, and so do I.” I have found myself using that more and more lately. Somehow, between high school and college, I was mostly added to Rev. Schuller’s bulk mailing list. Mostly. One letter off. He (not he but the computer printing the letters) called me Rimothy Chambers. I can’t remember whether he had my college address or my family forwarded my mail. I distinctly remember, though, that I was a freshman at MIT, living on the first floor of the west building of East Campus. (That’s an odd name for a dormitory, I know. But I just double-checked to see if I only remember it as a nickname. Nope. It’s official, in its constitution). I can say I lived in Hayden House, though nobody calls it that. (But if you’re reading this and go to the trouble of telling me the names from your memory of the other 5 EC houses, I’ll put something in your crypto wallet.) Anyway, while living in the dorm I wrote Rev. Shuller a letter asking how he could love me when he didn’t even know my name. I kinda gloated when the Crystal Cathedral went bankrupt nine years ago. How forgiving God is of my self-righteousness. Who am I to judge Rev. Schuller?

I am so encouraged by this turn of events. I hope to worship at Christ Cathedral the next time I’m in the area.

Image credit christcathedralcalifornia.org/explore/architecture/

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I don’t believe in luck. Studying quantum mechanics ruined it for me. (Not that I understand the math. Yet.) Well, QM and coming to believe the core doctrines of Christianity. No room for luck. God is Love.

That’s as I said today in a “just for fun” discussion; TechWell Hub. (Slack account required but requests are promptly accepted).

Milestone: my first post after upgrading to the paid micro.blog service.

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