Links and things that I’ve run across recently.

The journey begins…

On Tuesday, I assigned the ISBN for the eBook edition of Walking in the Moment Between Tick and Tock“: 978-0-9816925-6-2.

I told Bowker about it, so I’m committed now. I told them it was to be released on June 20, which happens to be my birthday.

I also put the book up on GoodReads.

All I have left is to finish up the formatting, then upload to Amazon, B&N, and Kobo. But I’m also giving away copies of the ebook with its launch, through Father’s Day and my Birthday and the beginning of Summer—the beginning of Party Season. So stay tuned.

The Truth about Bananas

Apropos of nothing, a couple of photos I happened across on Flickr:

The top photo, as fans of the X-Files may know, spells emet, the Hebrew word for “truth.” The bottom photo sketches out the letters bet nun nun hey, which spells… Well… Guess.

A Fairly Sophisticated Email Break-in

This past week, a fairly sophisticated cracker broke into a friend’s Yahoo Mail account. He obviously read her email, in order to craft a scam that would sound convincing. He sent out to her friends (including moi) a variation of the “We were mugged! Please send money!” scam.

The thing was, this particular message the scammer crafted to include convincing personal details. It actually sounded like it could have been written by my friend. The message was written using fairly correct English, and it told a heart-wrenching story about how she and her husband (called by name) were visiting Manilla, Philippines, and they were mugged, and the robber stole all their cash, credit cards, and cell phones, and her husband had been injured and was in the hospital, but fortunately they still had their passports, though the US embassy was being less than helpful, and their flight was about to leave, but they needed to settle up with the hotel before the hotel manager would let them leave, and they needed money, and we were their last chance, so please send money.

Fortunately, I don’t think anyone was fooled, although numerous friends started asking—via other channels—whether they were actually in the Philippines, because none of us had heard that they had been planning a trip to the Philippines (because they hadn’t). And when we next saw each other, we had a nice laugh about it. But my friend still lost all her stored mail on that Yahoo Mail account, and all her stored contacts, and has since switched over to GMail.

Then, the next day, another friend had her Yahoo Mail cracked. (Though I don’t know any details of that incident.)

This prompted me to do a little research, which uncovered the following post: “How To Protect Your Yahoo Mail Against Hackers.” (Hint: it’s harder and stupider than it ought to be.)

Today’s Quote

We fear that when we stop, even for a moment, the sheer enormity of our lives will overwhelm us, we’ll be suffocated by its sorrows and its pains.

(Rabbi David Ingber)

This is part 3 in my series of how the Mac reminded me why I fell in love with software development, and why it still matters.

While reading Andy Hertzfeld’s anecdotes (and those of his colleagues) of designing the original Macintosh computer, I was inspired, inspired to take account of my own passions, the passions that these stories reminded me of. Today, I continue that list:

• I love to create new patterns. I love solving problems through discovery, inventing that which has never existed before. (From part 1.)

• I love applying principles in new ways. I love working with abstractions, and turning them into concrete expression. I love challenging the status quo, breaking through the limits of what everyone else says is “possible.” (From part 2.)

• I love achieving status through collaboration, which is compassionate conflict. I am not a baboon. I do not achieve a sense of status by beating up (literally or figuratively) on my colleagues and friends. But I do expect to be recognized for the ideas I bring to the table, and I want to be taken seriously.

The early Mac development oozed this sort of idea culture. It had to: it was originally a research project. And so you had a bunch of smart, creative people getting together to accomplish the formerly inconceivable. For example, when Andy displayed the very first image on the very first Mac display:

Even though it was starting to get late, I was dying to see if my routine was working properly, and it would be very cool to surprise Burrell when he came in the next day with a detailed image on the prototype display. But when I went to try it, I noticed that Burrell’s Apple didn’t have a disk controller card, so there was no way to load my program…

The only other person in the lab that evening was Cliff Huston, who saw the trouble I was having… Cliff told me that he could insert a disk controller card into Burrell’s Apple II with the power still on, without glitching it out, a feat that I thought was miraculous…

By the time I came in the next morning, an excited Burrell had already showed the image to everyone he could find…

Truthfully, this is sometimes a tough one for me, because I tend to believe my ideas are the best. And when you work with other people, you need to give credence to their ideas, too. And often their ideas aren’t nearly as good as mine!

Seriously, though, some of the most enjoyable professional experiences I’ve ever had have been working with others. My mind goes back to one particular meeting at YCRDI (the makers of Kurzweil® Music Systems electronic musical instruments). We were developing a next-generation synth, some years ago, before the company got bought out and the project was canceled and then the governing authorities nixed the merger but not in time to save our jobs—which is all a long story for another time. But back before all of that, I remember one day sitting at a conference table with one of the other engineers, and we were going through how the user experience would work on this product. And we were both throwing in ideas, and we were both arguing our ideas, and we were both making a difference, helping to make this product the best it could be.

What I bring to the table: I think in abstractions, so I can understand the problem and solution as a single big picture. I see the forest for the trees. I also attend to detail, sometimes obsessively, every semicolon and period in the right place. Once I know what needs doing, I tend toward perfectionism.

What others bring to the table: The ability to see the concrete differences between instances of an abstraction, to see the trees for the forest. And often, the foresight to identify all the ducks that need to be lined up to make a shooting gallery. Rather than “Ready, Aim, Fire,” I tend to “Ready, Fire— Hey, where’s the duck?!” And then I’ll sit around with my gun at the ready, in case a duck happens to waddle by. (Unfortunately, the duck was only an abstraction.)

That’s one reason, I believe why I often work so well with Tom Metro, one of my long-time friends and colleagues. We met at IEC (the centrifuge manufacturer from part 1), while we were still in college, and we’ve worked on and off together, on various projects, ever since. When we get together, he’s the one who asks all the challenging questions that need to be answered in order for the project to be a success. He’s the one who insists on segmenting the project into bite-sized stories and planning out iterations—sometimes with so much dedication that I feel like I ought to gouge out my own eyes just so I don’t have to look at it anymore. But I usually see his point, and he definitely appreciates the elegance good abstractions bring to a design. And beyond that, we share many of the same values and desires when it comes to development: quality, good documentation, efficient and effective processes, interesting problems.

(To be continued.)

Links and things that I’ve run across recently.

April Fools!

A couple months out of date…

From the April 1 Twitter blog:

Starting today, we are shifting to a two-tiered service: Everyone can use our basic service, Twttr, but you only get consonants. For five dollars a month, you can use our premium “Twitter” service which also includes vowels.

Unfortunately, the post had to be withdrawn from the Hebrew and Arabic versions of the site, because no one understood the joke.

(Not really. I made that last part up.)

In other news, you’ll never guess Twitter’s original name, when it was a group-SMS project started by Odeo. Yup… (from Wikipedia)

The original project code name for the service was twttr, an idea that [Evan] Williams later ascribed to Noah Glass, inspired by Flickr and the five-character length of American SMS short codes. The developers initially considered “10958″ as a short code, but later changed it to “40404″ for “ease of use and memorability.” Work on the project started on March 21, 2006, when Dorsey published the first Twitter message at 9:50 PM Pacific Standard Time (PST): “just setting up my twttr”.

New Book

I’m in the last stages of releasing a new ebook, inspired by a sermon I gave in April. Walking in the Moment between Tick and Tock is a collection of three inspirational essays, looking at the period between Passover and Pentecost, between Pesach and Shavuot, integrating insights from both Christian and Jewish thinkers. It tells the story of these holidays as linked parts of the same narrative, two ends of a single span.

During the launch, you can easily get a free review copy at timk.me/walking.

Diet Update

Since the last time I posted, my weight has stabilized at 175 pounds (± a few pounds). I still would like to lose a little more fat, so I’m still experimenting. I’m also still walking and doing strength exercises, in order to build muscle and further improve my cardiovascular health.

On the latter, my resting blood pressure measures around 120/80 (± a few mmHg), no BP meds at all.

My latest recipe experiment, with breakfast coffee: 1 Tbsp unsalted butter + 1 Tbsp virgin coconut oil in a cup. Heat for 10-15 seconds in microwave to soften. Add 2 Tbsp heavy cream. Whip with a whisk or stick blender. Fill the rest of the cup with coffee and stir to combine. Top with shaved dark-dark chocolate. (Obviously based on the recipe for Bulletproof® coffee, but not using Bulletproof®-brand beans, which may make me an apostate, but I don’t care.) Total nutrition: 322 calories per serving, including 34.2 g of fat (24.7 g of which is saturated, 2.6 g of which is medium-chain). And it tastes really good. This morning I had a double serving.

The Baboons of Power

Still from April, David Kramer posted a longish post on personal power and its abuse:

Someone forwarded an article to me recently about a cheerleader being sued by her school because she would not cheer for her rapist, and another one called Redefining Masculinity. I searched around and found several articles with similar messages. The main point of these articles is that “masculinity” as it is defined in many cultures today, favors power derived from superior strength, aggressiveness, and risk-taking. The Manliest Man is the one who takes what (or who) he wants.

To which I replied (in the post comments) with a story (from Robert Sapolsky) about baboons, stress, and enforcing civility.

Living in a Crooked World

This post by Sherry Riter touched me:

My ultimate goals in life have always been to be loved especially as a wife, mother and writer. Sounds simple doesn’t it? What is that unseen thing we call love?…

I am loved by family and friends. I see it and know it. However, after two failed marriages, one of the ultimate goals in my life remains a failure. On a particularly lonely night with my heart aching, I revealed that I want Somebody To Love Me. “‘Cause I’m hurt and I’m scared and I’m lonely, all I want is somebody to want me ‘cause I’ve got so much to give.” Once again, it sounds simple, but obviously it must not be if I’ve had two marriages bomb.

I logically know that I can’t “make” someone want me, want to be with me or love me…

Sometimes I wish I could just wave a magic wand and realign all the crooked patterns that mix up our lives. Not just for my friends who are wrestling with pain, but for myself, too.

“What a heavy burden God has laid on mankind… What is crooked cannot be straightened; what is lacking cannot be counted…” (Ecclesiastes 1:13-15)

Comfort, comfort my people,
says your God…
A voice of one calling:
“In the wilderness prepare
the way for the Lord;
make straight in the desert
a highway for our God.
Every valley shall be raised up,
every mountain and hill made low;
the rough ground shall become level,
the rugged places a plain.
And the glory of the Lord will be revealed,
and all people will see it together.
For the mouth of the Lord has spoken.”

(Isaiah 40:1-5)

Patrick Stewart on Domestic Violence

This has been going round the Internet, a pair of videos of Patrick Stewart (of Star Trek: The Next Generation fame) talking about domestic violence, including his own experiences. A balanced view, with a true heart to help those who are hurting.

Stories like this can’t help but remind me that we live in a very very broken world. But by steps, maybe we can help to repair it, what the Jews call Tikkun Olam, “repairing the world.”

Here are links to the videos:

• Patrick Stewart on violence against women
• Patrick Stewart Gives Passionate Response to Question At Comicpalooza 2013

Read the “Walking” Book

Seriously. Read it. (Free, for a limited time.) This short book dovetails with some of the same themes from this post, including the following…

Today’s Quote

It doesn’t have to be perfect. It just has to be better.

(Fett, in an interview with Nancy Moran and Pooki Lee, by Bob Baker)

This is part 2 in my series of how the Mac reminded me why I fell in love with software development, and why it still matters.

While reading Andy Hertzfeld’s anecdotes (and those of his colleagues) of designing the original Macintosh computer, I was inspired, inspired to take account of my own passions, the passions that these stories reminded me of. Today, I continue that list:

• I love to create new patterns. I love solving problems through discovery, inventing that which has never existed before. (From part 1.)

• I love applying principles in new ways. I love working with abstractions, and turning them into concrete expression. I love challenging the status quo, breaking through the limits of what everyone else says is “possible.”

Ha!

My first computer-related job, at least the first one that anyone paid me money for. I started while I was still in high school, circa 1987, at a now-defunct small company, called “EFG,” who consulted on and resold name-brand universal life insurance. I ran the IT department. Actually, I manned the computer room.

(“EFG” stands for “Eden Financial Group,” which had at least one office in Dedham, MA. As I later heard, they fell apart shortly after I left. But I’m sure the one had nothing to do with the other. That company, by the way, has no relation to any of the other companies named “Eden Financial Group” that currently exist across the country.)

When I started, I worked with my predecessor, another student, who recruited me as his replacement because he would be moving away to college. One of the things we did there was to produce “illustrations,” that is, financial scenarios, what-if‘s, to show what would happen if a client took out a certain policy over a certain period of time and paid a certain premium into it, borrowed a certain amount against the face value during certain years, and so forth. Similar to the mortgage calculators you find online, except way more complex.

We had a spreadsheet that worked out all the figures—a Lotus 1-2-3 spreadsheet. And as I recall, this spreadsheet ran a script that prompted for the various inputs that it needed. And then we would print out the results to mail or fax to the client.

We also distributed this spreadsheet as stand-alone software (on 5¼″ floppy diskette) to field representatives. To do so, we needed to customize a number of fields in the spreadsheet—go to such-and-such a cell; enter such-and-such data; go to the next cell; lather; rinse; repeat until nauseous. We also needed, if I remember correctly, to configure the script to run automatically when loaded, or at least to show the correct page. And then save the file on a diskette. This process took some minutes—maybe a half-hour. And we did it many times.

After a month or two, I was wearying of the rote repetition and redundancy. (Rrrrr…)

I proposed that we could automate most of the process by adding a distribution script that would prompt us for the customizations, set the whole thing up for distribution, and create the distribution disk. Have the computer do all the hard work for us.

My coworker, a natural-born management type, probably felt some responsibility for me being there, that anything I did reflected on him, in one way or another. And he also must have created dozens (hundreds?) of these distribution diskettes, all by hand, over the months (years?) before I showed up.

I told him of my idea, and he said, “You can’t do that. It’ll never work!”

So of course, I did it anyhow. I was young enough not to know that something is impossible, just because someone else says it is. And it worked perfectly. And sped up the process immensely. And reduced the chance of human error, too. (But that was just a bonus.)

I’m sure the code was fairly straightforward, might have required a little finagling during one phase of the process—but I don’t remember which or why. No matter: for some reason, my coworker just couldn’t imagine a script to customize the spreadsheet for distribution, just as we had a script to customize it for printing on-site. But it seemed obvious to me, and I found the exercise extremely fulfilling.

What reminded me of that story was, oddly enough, Bruce Horn’s description of the Mac’s Resource Manager. “The Resource Manager,” writes Bruce, “was a solution to several problems… When I started talking with the rest of the team, Larry Kenyon and Andy Hertzfeld realized immediately the importance of resources, and realized that they’d have to make changes in the rest of the system to take advantage of the Resource Manager.”

Then this paragraph: “Bob [Belleville] told me to abandon the project, that we didn’t need it, and that I should focus on the Finder. Of course, the way I planned to fit all the pieces together with the Finder also required the Resource Manager, and I thought it would take much longer to try to code the system without it. I told Bob that I was going to do it anyway.”

I have so been there.

(Continued with part 3.)

Contentment makes poor men rich.
Discontent makes rich men poor.

Supposedly, Benjamin Franklin said that. I was unable, in my brief research, to confirm that these are actually the words of Benjamin Franklin. But it’s a good thought nonetheless.

I’ve written about this idea before, from a slightly different perspective, that our happiness is not primarily determined by our circumstances. Rather, to paraphrase the Apostle Paul: I can live in any circumstance, in any situation, whatever God calls me to.

Paul also addressed it from this side of the equation, in one of the most frequently misquoted lines from the New Testament: That money is the root of all evil… Except, of course, Paul never said that.

What he said was:

Godliness with contentment is great gain. For we brought nothing into the world, and we certainly can’t carry anything out. But having food and clothing, we will be content with that. (1 Timothy 6:6-8)

Money Money Money by the Pound

This is part of a much longer explanation (as are many of his famous lines). And one of the points he made, naturally, in his explanation: “The love of money is root to all kinds of evil” (1 Timothy 6:10, emphasis added).

Some time ago, on a whim, I Netflixed a film entitled Money Talks. In this humorous look at our constant crusade for cash, Allen Funt (of Candid Camera fame) turned his lens on numerous unsuspecting victims, as he tested how they would buy, sell, and humiliate themselves for money. And I sat in amazement as I watched how people confused money with happiness.

Interestingly, humanity managed to eke by without money for most of its existence. Because money is not happiness. With money, we can buy things that bring us happiness… or might bring us happiness… or we can buy things with which we try to gain happiness. Because money is just how we exchange good things that we do for others (in our jobs and businesses) for good things that are valuable to us (such as groceries, rent, and getting pampered at a day-spa).

Of course, we can do just as much evil with money as good, depending on our characters. Because money is just a medium of exchange, nothing more and nothing less. Our happiness is not about the money; it’s about the things you do and make, the good (or evil) deeds that you can accomplish in the world.

Here’s one area in which Christians tend to have a limited theological view. When we think of generosity, of doing good with money, we think of giving to charity. And this indeed is an important component of doing good. But this is so unnecessarily limiting, because it’s not about the money; it’s about the things we make and do.

The Jews have a concept called gemilut chasadim, “deeds of kindness.” This goes beyond tzedakah, giving to the poor. It is, in fact, more important to do for others than merely to give charity. Why? The Talmud gives three reasons: Charity is given only to the poor, but deeds of kindness are done for both rich and poor. Charity can only be given to the living, while deeds of kindness can be done for the living and for dead (by attending a funeral service). Charity can only be offered with money, but deeds of kindness can be accomplished through money or real-world help.

It’s not about money. It’s about what we do with it, or even without it.

Living Without Money

These ideas of Paul’s, about money and contentment, I pulled them from 1 Timothy 6. Interestingly, Paul was not making a case against money. He was making a case for doing the right thing, even when it’s easy not to. He was making the case for gemilut chasadim instead of mere cashflow.

He starts by talking about slavery, not about how slavery is some fundamental evil (although it is), but about how slaves ought to work hard and do well for their owners, even if those owners are also Christians—especially if those owners are Christians.

Like our modern conception, slavery in the first-century Roman Empire was a cruel and dehumanizing institution. Everything a slave had or was, it all belonged to his owner. Slaves were often mistreated, and could even be killed, and the law was cool with that. Many slaves were prisoners of war or people captured and sold by pirates. And some children were even sold into slavery by their families.

How could Paul turn a blind eye to that?

Because it’s not about the money. It’s about what you do with what God has given to you.

Paul’s world is not the world we now live in. (And thank God for that!)

1. They lived with a limited economic pie. Everything one person had, it was gotten at the expense of someone else. But since the mid-19th century, if we want to improve our lot, we can bake a bigger economic pie.

2. The only kind of capitalism they knew was the crony kind. And while we still wrestle with ever-present (and in some sectors, entrenched) cronyism, we much more commonly benefit from free-market capitalism, where even the poorest buyer can go into a Walmart and get the same deal as anyone else.

3. Slavery was accepted by the society of the day, and so if God put you in the position of being a slave, then—in Paul’s thought—you need to figure out how you can use that position to do good things for others. In much of the modern world, slavery is condemned (which is one of the reasons we have #1 and #2 above).

But the question remains the same: How can you use what God has given you to make the world a better place? If you have access to a vastly superior economic system than Paul had, that’s part of what God has given you with which to do good things. So rather than thinking about how much purchasing power—and how much power, generally—you can amass, think about how you can help your fellow man. Or as I’ve said before, how you can bring God into everything you do, and can find satisfaction in the good things you have. Whether working or playing, whether providing a service or just hanging with friends, deeds of kindness are something we do all the time.

And so now we can approach Paul’s words to Timothy with a refined understanding (1 Timothy 6):

As many as are slaves under the yoke, let them count their own masters worthy of all honor, that the name of God and the teaching not be blasphemed. Those who have believing masters should not despise them because they are brothers. Rather, they should serve them all the more, because they who benefit from the service of the slaves, they are believers and beloved.

Teach and exhort these things. If anyone teaches a different doctrine, and doesn’t consent to sound words, the words of our Lord Yeshua the Messiah, and to godly teaching, he is conceited, knowing nothing, but obsessed with arguments, disputes, and word battles, from which come envy, strife, insulting, evil suspicions, constant friction of people of corrupt minds and destitute of the truth, who suppose that godliness is a means of financial gain.

But godliness with contentment is great gain. For we brought nothing into the world, and we certainly can’t carry anything out. But having food and clothing, we will be content with that. Those who seek to be rich fall into a temptation and a snare and many foolish and harmful lusts, such as drown men in ruin and destruction. For the love of money is root to all kinds of evil. Some have been led astray from the faith in their greed, and have pierced themselves through with many sorrows.

But you, man of God, flee these things, and follow after righteousness, godliness, faith, love, patience, and gentleness. Fight the good fight of faith. Take hold of the eternal life to which you were called, when you confessed the good confession in the sight of many witnesses. I command you before God, who gives life to all things, and before the Messiah Yeshua, who before Pontius Pilate testified the good confession, that you keep the commandment without spot, blameless, until the appearing of our Lord Yeshua the Messiah; which God in his own times will show, he who is the blessed and only Ruler, the King of kings and Lord of lords, who alone has immortality, dwelling in unapproachable light, whom no man has seen, nor can see, to whom be honor and eternal power. Amen.

Charge those who are rich in this present world that they not be haughty, nor have their hope set on the uncertainty of riches, but on the living God, who richly provides us with everything to enjoy. Charge them that they do good, that they be rich in good works, that they be ready to distribute, willing to communicate, laying up in store for themselves a good foundation against the time to come, that they may lay hold of eternal life.

Timothy, guard that which is committed to you, turning away from the empty chatter and oppositions of what is falsely called knowledge; which some profess, and thus have wandered from the faith.

Grace be with you. Amen.

-TimK

A couple weeks ago, I was reading through Andy Hertzfeld’s anecdotes at FolkLore.org, about how he and his colleagues developed the original Macintosh. These stories brought me back, first to nostalgic times, then to a nostalgic purpose. I remembered all the reasons I first fell in love with software development, many of which are also true of my writing, and I finally understood what I would need in order to rediscover that lost love.

(He’s also collected these stories in paperback: Revolution in The Valley: The Insanely Great Story of How the Mac Was Made.)

The Macintosh was originally a tiny research project tucked away in a corner of Apple, still riding off the success of the Apple II home computer. The project was always up for being canceled, but the people working on it believed in it, and believed that it would change the world. They were bringing features years ahead of their time to a “low end,” common man’s computer, inventing new technology in the process.

I started a list:

• I love to create new patterns. I love solving problems through discovery, inventing that which has never existed before.

One of my career-defining moments happened while I was still in college. In the late 1980′s, I designed some of the embedded software for IEC centrifuges. I was one of the early developers on the Centra MP4/4R centrifuges. (Some of these are still in service today, over two decades later.) The company was migrating to a newer microcontroller, because Motorola had deprecated the one they had been using. I noticed that this new micro had a more powerful timer/counter, and we could wire it up in a certain way, and I could write software to measure the speed of the centrifuge using a different algorithm than we had been using, and we could increase the performance of the centrifuge by an order of magnitude. So I talked to the hardware engineer, and that’s what we did.

Of course, the new microcontroller was also powerful enough to allow me to experiment with a new speed-control algorithm, which eliminated overshoot, even at maximum acceleration. (Closed-loop controller engineers know what I’m talking about.)

In retrospect, I’m sure it was all overkill. As far as I know, IEC never set the new standard in centrifuge performance. Maybe those gains were not important to the customers. But they sure were fun to pull off. And that’s an element I see in the Macintosh’s development, the team pulling off miracle after miracle, rising to ever greater heights, with graphics, with the disk controller, with sound generation— When Steve Jobs had the Mac announce itself on stage, in 1984 that was très kewl.

(Continued with part 2.)

One reason I’ve been absent is because I’ve been working on a new book, a book that I’m now on the verge of releasing. (Exciting!)

Walking in the Moment between Tick and Tock a short, inspirational book (about ¼ the length of a full-size novel), looking at the period between Passover and Pentecost, between Pesach and Shavuot, integrating insights from both Christian and Jewish thinkers. It tells the story of these holidays as linked parts of the same narrative, two ends of a single span, and not as two independent holidays— I didn’t invent the idea, of course. But I found a number of profound insights connected with this idea.

Today’s double teaser from Walking in the Moment between Tick and Tock: From Passover to Pentecost:

Many Jews see this as a time of change, of personal development.

And we Christians should, too.

We are living this story, the story between Pesach and Shavuot. Between Egypt and Sinai. Between chaos and fulfillment.

We hate to grow, because growth means change, and change is hard… Sometimes it’s easier to be satisfied with the status quo, to find comfort in stability, to avoid rocking the boat, to avoid failure. As one of the characters said on Amy Sherman-Palladino’s latest TV series Bunheads, “Improvement breeds expectation. Expectation breeds disappointment. And disappointment breeds wrinkles.”

We all are genetically programmed to grow. But there are a couple of ways I
can sabotage that process in my own life.

---

Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly bookish meme, hosted by MizB of Should Be Reading. I’m trying a variation on the mainstream “Teaser Tuesdays” concept. Instead of quoting two sentences from a random page in the book, I’m selecting a snippet that reflects qualities I find in the book.

-TimK

The metaphors we use affects how we think of things. And how we think of things betrays the metaphors hidden in the reaches of our minds.

Being part of a Messianic Jewish synagogue, I continually encounter the power of how we think, power to bring people together, or to push them apart. Because there is a 1700-year-old chasm between Judaism and Christianity, a chasm that Messianic Judaism now straddles precariously, and promises to make both friends and enemies on both sides.

If you see Yeshua as the guardian of the chasm between the old and new covenants, then it’s easy to ask—for example—whether to follow G-d (Judaism) or whether to follow the way, the truth, and the life (Christianity). But if you see Yeshua as the builder of the bridge that brings Torah to the rest of the world, then that question itself becomes nonsensical. Instead, you begin to ask where in the Torah is Yeshua and his teaching reflected and how he fits into Judaism.

This question goes directly to the heart of the very definition of “Messianic Judaism.” The Messianic Judaism I know is attempting to reconnect these two now-separate sides of the Chasm, which requires rewriting the metaphors that both sides use, challenging the hidden assumptions we find underlying those metaphors. Rabbi Mark Kinzer described it thusly in his paper, “Prayer in Yeshua, Prayer in Israel: The Shema in Messianic Perspective” (see Israel’s Messiah and the People of God: A Vision for Messianic Jewish Covenant Fidelity, or the papers from Hashivenu 2007):

Messianic Judaism involves more than the subtle tweaking of an existing form of Jewish life and thought—adding a few elements required by faith in Yeshua and subtracting a few elements incompatible with that faith. Instead, the Judaism we have inherited—and continue to practice—is entirely bathed in the bright light of Yeshua’s revelation. In a circular and dynamic interaction, our Judaism provides us with the framework required to interpret Yeshua’s revelation even as it is reconfigured by that revelation. In this way our Judaism and our Yeshua-faith are organically and holistically “integrated.”

Each proceeds from a completely different metaphor. And I have also found, it can be very hard to get people to recognize—much less accept—a metaphor that they don’t already know. There are many, unfortunately, on both sides of the chasm, who see the chasm and deny the existence of the bridge.

But assuming that you’re willing to explore the surface of the bridge, here are a couple new metaphors that I’ve found stimulating.

The One-Man Israel

I mentioned Rabbi Mark Kinzer’s paper on “Prayer in Yeshua.” One of the major themes in this paper is the idea of Yeshua as the One-man Israel. This is a distinctly Messianic Jewish idea, which flows naturally from the idea of Yeshua as the bridge-builder. Over this bridge, as the chosen Messiah, he brings the blessings of Israel to the whole world. As Rabbi Kinzer puts it, “we make the radical and scandalous claim that Yeshua constitutes the true center of Jewish life, just as Israel constitutes the true center of Yeshua’s ekklessia.”

God promised Abraham that “all peoples on earth will be blessed through you” (Gen 12:3). As the Messiah, this is Yeshua’s appointed mission. This is why certain of his actions are so significant. For example, when Yeshua touched a man with leprosy in Matthew 8:2-3— Touching a man with an unclean disease like leprosy would make you unclean. But instead of the uncleanness flowing from the leprous man to Yeshua, healing flows in the opposite direction. Similarly, in Matthew 9:18-26, when the woman with issue of blood touched him, healing flowed from him into the woman, rather than her uncleanness affecting him. And then he touched Jairus’s daughter, who had died, and instead of the uncleanness of the corpse defiling Yeshua, life flowed from him into the daughter.

And as God’s anointed king, Yeshua becomes the anointed representative of Israel. Every Christmas, Christians celebrate the birth of the Messiah by quoting the Magi, “Where is the one who has been born king of the Jews? We saw his star in the east and have come to worship him” (Matt 2:2).

Isaiah 53 also poses a fascinating parallel. Christians see the prophet as speaking about Yeshua, his suffering and sacrifice. Jews see the chapter as speaking about Israel, about their suffering and sacrifice. It seems an irreconcilable debate, except that with Yeshua as the One-man Israel, both can be true. Furthermore, the sacrifice of the Jews is seen by some Rabbis as atonement for the world, a role we also accept for Yeshua’s substitutionary sacrifice.

The Living Torah

Christians often have a hard time getting the concept of Torah, partly because it’s often translated “law,” because it started with the commandments Moses brought down from Sinai. But “Torah” is not the law of a modern secular state, which is how we usually think of “law.”

In many cases, a better translation for the Hebrew word Torah might be “teaching.” Indeed, Torah comes from the Hebrew verb horah, which can mean “to point out,” hence “to instruct.” And Yeshua surely takes on the role of a teacher, building upon the teaching that came before. A repeated meme in Matthew’s sermon on the mount is “You have heard that it was said… but I tell you…” (Matt 5:21,27,33,38,43). In each case, he reinforces the moral lesson of the original commandment and adds to it.

So we see Yeshua as the living Torah, the Word become flesh (John 1:14).

In another sense, too, Yeshua is the living Torah, because by his work he renews the covenant of Torah. We call it the “New Testament,” i.e., the renewed covenant, for this very reason. It’s timely that the Holy Spirit should be poured out upon the disciples on the holiday of Shavuot, which in Christian circles is called “Pentecost.” The symbolism in Acts 2 suggests a parallel to Mount Sinai: the wind, the fire, the Spirit descending on those gathered. And in a twist of irony, Shavuot became the holiday on which the Jews celebrate the giving of the Torah to Moses.

-TimK

This coming Sabbath service at our synagogue, I’m doing one of the Torah readings, from the Gospels, the first part of John chapter 11.

You may notice two funny things in that sentence. Firstly, as part of our Torah service, we don’t only read the standard parshah from the Torah (the first five books: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy) and the corresponding reading from the Haftarah (a selection of readings from the Prophets). We also read a passage from the Besorah, that is, the Gospels, following the Chayei Yeshua reading cycle (“Life of Yeshua” reading cycle).

The other funny thing is that I a Gentile am scheduled to read. As is typical, in our synagogue, it is deemed inappropriate for a Gentile to read from the Torah or Haftarah in Hebrew, and in particular to say the aliyah blessing: “Blessed are you, Lord, our God, master of the universe, who has chosen us from all peoples, and given us his Torah.” This is not something that one can rightly say who has not become part of Jewry.

On the other hand, we do allow Gentiles to read the English translation. (I have done so several times.) And most notably for this post, those Gentiles (like me) who know a little Hebrew, we can take a turn reading from the Gospels, translated into Hebrew. Why? Because the Gentile church for all its failings through history, it took a key part in preserving those documents. And so there is no reason why I personally should not also share in that work of God’s provenance.

As it turns out, if I could have chosen any of the upcoming passages to read, this week’s would have been my first choice, because this is a deeply meaningful story from the Gospel of John, with some twists that we often gloss over. In fact, I was thinking about approaching the rabbi in charge of scheduling the readings, to ask him whether it might be possible for me to read this week. But I never got a chance to, because he asked me first. (He had no idea what I was thinking.)

I want to focus on one part of the story, in John 11:17-37, and present a few thoughts.

Martha

Mary and Martha had a brother, Lazarus, who died from some disease. Yeshua knew he was sick, and yet he didn’t get there fast enough to heal him. In fact, he seems to have been moseying along, taking his time, intentionally, on purpose. By the time Yeshua got there, Lazarus had been in the grave for four days.

Mary and Martha were still sitting shiva in their house, and many others had come to comfort them. For a week after a close loved one dies, a Jew mourns. He does not bathe or shower; he does not wear nice clothes or jewelry; he does not shave; he may even cover up his mirrors so he doesn’t see how sad he looks. He does not take part in intimate pleasures with his spouse. He does not even study Torah.

However, he does usually open his home during certain times, for friends and family to visit. It is considered a great mitzvah, a “good deed,” to comfort a family who is sitting shiva. Mourners will often talk about the one who’s passed, share stories of his life. When it’s time to say goodbye, a common blessing is: “May the Omnipresent One comfort you among the other mourners of Zion and Jerusalem.” That blessing has deep meaning for me, which goes beyond mourning a loved one, and I’ll touch on that later on in this post.

When Martha hears that Yeshua is coming, she goes out to meet him. “Lord,” she says, “if you had been here, my brother would not have died.” Then she adds, “But even now, I know that whatever you might ask of God, God will give it to you.”

A hope against the odds. A hope against hope. Might there still be a chance for her brother to live out the rest of his life?

Yeshua answers, “Your brother will rise again.”

Martha is trying to process this.

Have you ever wanted something really bad, and then you actually got it? Usually, when that happens to me, I can hardly believe my eyes. There’s some part of me who still believes my senses are deceiving me. I check, and double-check, and triple-check. Did I make a mistake? What did I do wrong? Because things could certainly not have gone that well. Could they have?

I think Martha wants to believe that Yeshua is saying what she thinks he’s saying. But she’s checking and double-checking her reasoning. She is afraid of getting her hopes up, only to have them dashed by the reality that her brother… is dead.

“I know,” she says, “that he will rise again, in the resurrection in the last day.” Because, she thinks, we’ll all rise again.

That is, in the bodily resurrection in the World to Come.

Now comes the first line that sticks out at me:

Yeshua says, “I am the resurrection and the life. He who has faith in me, even though he dies, he will live. And anyone who lives and has faith in me, he will never die, forever.”

Yeshua starts with the phrase “I am” (ἐγώ εἰμι). This is the same name God gave himself, in Exodus 3:14. When Moses asked, “Who should I say is sending me?” God told him, “I am who I am” (אֶֽהְיֶה אֲשֶׁר אֶֽהְיֶה).

And Yeshua emphasizes this point. None of this “resurrection in the last day” stuff. “I—the one you’re talking to right now—I am the resurrection.” He holds life itself in his hands. Can anyone besides God do that? From what I understand, Martha would not have thought of it any other way.

“Do you believe this?” he asks.

I imagine Martha thinking for a moment, letting that sink in. Then she says, “Yes, Lord. I do believe that you are the Messiah, the Son of God coming into the world.”

That word “believe” there: “I believe” (πεπίστευκα). She’s not just saying she believes him. She’s emphasizing it, cause and effect. “What I have believed, I still believe. I keep on believing. And that belief continues to fuel my hope for the future.”

She’s kind of like the cowardly lion in The Wizard of Oz. “I do believe in ghosts. I do believe in ghosts.” Except that she has a positive belief, and she’s looking to Yeshua to confirm her hope.

Another interesting tidbit is the tag, “the Messiah, the Son of God coming into the world.” We usually think of the phrase “Son of God” as expressing Yeshua’s divinity, and the phrase “Son of Man” as expressing his humanity. But as Daniel Boyarin points out in his book The Jewish Gospels, “Son of Man” more likely expresses his divinity, referring to the “one like a son of man” in Daniel’s vision. Meanwhile, that would make the phrase “Son of God” another name for God’s Anointed One, his Mashiach (“Messiah”), as in Psalm 2:

The kings of the earth rise up and the rulers band together against the Lord and against his anointed (meshicho מְשִׁיחֹֽו)…

He said to me, “You are my son; today I have become your father.” Ask me, and I will make the nations your inheritance, the ends of the earth your possession.

Mary

Meanwhile, Mary has been back at the house. Martha returns, takes Mary aside, and quietly tells her, “The teacher is here, and he’s asking for you.”

She gets up immediately, and all the friends and relatives who’ve gathered in her house to comfort her–though probably not doing so good a job at that, because they’re all pretty sad, too—they think she’s going out to the tomb, to mourn there. So they follow her.

But when she gets to where Yeshua is waiting, she collapses on the ground. She’s in tears. She’s falling apart. And she manages between sobs to eek out, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother—my brother… would not have died.”

We usually translate Mary and Martha’s messages using the same words. But the way John wrote it, in Greek, he rearranges the words. You can do that in Biblical Greek. He rearranges Mary’s words to put the word brother last in the sentence, in the power position.

Mary is not saying the same thing as Martha, and she’s not saying it in the same way. Whereas the appropriate response to Martha was to enter into a deep theological dialogue, there ain’t no way Mary’s gonna understand any of that.

Instead, when Yeshua sees Mary crying, and all the friends and relatives gathered with her crying as well, his spirit is moved, and he becomes agitated. Delitzsch’s Hebrew translation (which we usually read from) says, “He began trembling” (וַיְהִי מַרְעִיד), which takes some liberties with the original, but it’s not a horrible translation. I imagine him eeking out the question: “Where have you laid him?” And then he breaks down himself.

Yeshua cried.

Then they all said, “See how he loved him!” Again Delitzsch comes up with a wonderful paraphrase: “Behold, what great love with which he loved him!” (הִנֵּה מָה רַבָּה הָאַהֲבָה אֲשֶׁר אֲהֵבוֹ).

Comfort

One of the central Jewish prayers, the Kedushah, it has three sections.

In the first, the cantor quotes Isaiah 6:3, “One called to another, saying…” And then we all respond, “Holy, holy, holy—kadosh, kadosh, kadosh—is the Lord of Hosts! The whole earth is full of his glory!” And on those first three words, “kadosh, kadosh, kadosh,” we lift ourselves up on our tippy-toes, in an attempt to reach into God’s presence. Sometimes, I just like to linger there. “Kadosh… Kadosh… Kadosh…”

Then in the second section, we recite Ezekiel 3:12: “Blessed be the glory of the Lord from his place.”

That word “place” is the same Hebrew word, makom, translated “Omnipresent One” in the blessing said to a mourner above: “May the Omnipresent One (haMakom) comfort you.” When you’re in the midst of sorrow, sometimes it seems God is a million miles away.

There’s a beautiful symmetry to the Kedushah. Sometimes we feel God; sometimes not. But he’s still always there.

And sometimes the right kind of comfort comes when we engage God.

And sometimes when we weep at his feet.

In both cases, from the third section of the Kedushah, quoting Psalm 146:10: “The Lord shall reign forever, your God, O Zion, for all generations.”

Around this time of year, I’m invariably reminded of the line Tony Campolo popularized: It’s Friday, but Sunday’s coming. Because Good Friday is the day we remember the Crucifixion; and Easter Sunday, the Resurrection.

But this year, it occurs to me that we’ve focused on only part of the story. Easter Sunday isn’t the end of the story, but the beginning.

What did Jesus say after his resurrection? “This is what is written: The Messiah will suffer and rise from the dead on the third day, and repentance for the forgiveness of sins will be preached… I am going to send you what my Father has promised; but stay in the city until you have been clothed with power from on high.”

And so they waited. And they counted the days. And they prayed. For 50 days after Passover, they counted the days, until Shavuot arrived, the Festival of Weeks.

In the Jewish tradition, Shavuot is when God gave the Torah to Israel, and Israel became a nation, rather than just a bunch of refugee slaves from Egypt. And so Jews actually count the days between Pesach and Shavuot, and they pray each day, and wait for the fulfillment of the promise. Some Jews see this as a time of change, of personal development.

In the same way, Easter is not the climax of the story, but Pentecost. We are embarking on a period of self-discovery and personal change, during which God may have an opportunity to transform our lives. May we be sensitive to his direction.

Happy Easter!
-TimK

Tonight begins the first night of Passover. So I thought I might post some brief comments on some of my favorite lesser-known Jewish films.

And since it’s Passover, let’s start with When Do We Eat? (subtitle: Sex, Drugs & Matzoh Ball Soup), the story of a really dysfunctional and hilarious Passover seder, starring Michael Lerner, Leslie Ann Warren, Jack Klugman (one of the last films he appeared in), Meredith Scott Lynn, Shiri Appleby and others.

The Passover seder contains 15 steps, with eating the meal somewhere near the far end of those. (Hence the title of the film.) Even Ira Stuckman’s “world’s fastest seder” inspires hunger, as the family… Well, let’s see…

Ira and Peggy haven’t exchanged a tender moment since God knows when. Jennifer, the estranged half-sister, shows up with her lesbian lover. Grampa Artur, still living in fear of the Third Reich, is bitter at his son for forsaking the family business. Meanwhile, Ethan is desperately seeking spiritual fulfillment and so has recently taken up hasidism, Nikki finds her spirituality in her career as a sex surrogate, Zeke has slipped a tab of Ecstasy into his father’s Mylanta, and everyone thinks Lionel is autistic. And it only gets better from there.

Woven throughout the story is the idea that joy drives out conflict. Which is true. As Ira’s view softens, and he becomes less centered on himself, he starts to connect with his family. At first, everyone thinks it’s just a drug-induced hallucination. (Whether or not it actually was is a questioned left unanswered at the end.) Then he actually begins to change, and the atmosphere around along with him.

A poignant reminder that if you can only find the joy in a situation, or even if you can just laugh, you’ll be better able to repair your corner of this broken world we live in.

-TimK

Links and things that I’ve run across recently.

Another Skinny Dip in the Jury Pool

I’m sorry. I still haven’t written up this story. There is a story behind it. A couple weeks ago, I served on a jury, for a short criminal trial, a case that should never have even been brought to trial.

You may be familiar with the classic scene in the prototypical courtroom TV drama. The jury is returning, after only having deliberated for an hour. The sympathetic defendant asks his attorney, “What does that mean? Is that good or bad?” The lawyer responds, “It’s good if the verdict is ‘not guilty.’”

The truth, as I discovered, is far simpler. When the jury returns after deliberating for only an hour, what that means is that the court bought them lunch, and it took them that long to finish eating.

Contrary to Popular Belief: Challenging Copyright Myths

And now for something vaguely political…

I was surprised to learn that there is a local Pirate Party here where I live. And there is probably one near you, too.

Politically, I’m not sure I get the Pirate Party, at least not here in the US. Issue-oriented political parties generally don’t do too well here in the US, unfortunately. This means that third parties are marginalized, sometimes by their very existence. However, it does represent an encouraging vibrancy in the debate over intellectual property and its abuses.

And in that vein, Rick Falkvinge, founder of the Pirate Party, challenges 5 widely held misconceptions about copyright. Having studied copyright many years ago—and the basic concepts have not changed since then—I have always realized these as uncontroversial truths. Unfortunately, in the intervening years, entrenched industry special interests like the RIAA and MPAA have publicized ideas, unchallenged, like “copying is theft.” (It isn’t; depending on the circumstances, it may be infringement, a legally distinct concept.)

So this debate comes a couple decades late. But better late than not at all.

Is Your ISP Turning to the Dark Side?

This is followed up by a critique by the EFF of the so-called Copyright Alert System, which enlists ISP’s as industry enforcers, to monitor networks for copyright infringement and target subscribers who are alleged to infringe. Unfortunately, it does so not from a balanced perspective, but from an industry-extremist mindset. (I say this as an author who himself has a distinct interest in legitimate copyright.) As a result, the CAS is likely to foster widespread abuse…

Trademark Bullies in Space

…as occurred in the case of indie-author M.C.A. Hogarth’s offbeat novel Spots the Space Marine, which Amazon removed at the behest of a game company who claimed trademark rights in the term “space marine.”

When I read that, my first thought was, How asinine! See, most trademarks only apply within an industry or market. A highly-distinctive name, like “Xerox” or “Exxon,” might be protected as a trademark across all industries. But even if someone down the street opens up a shop called “Top Shelf Wine and Spirits,” I can still name my business “Top Shelf Books” (neither one of which is a very good name for a business). Because my readers are unlikely to be confused and think I’m selling alcohol, and his customers are unlikely to think he wrote my books.

Considering that “space marine” has been in the common science-fiction lexicon for almost a century, it represents the height of hubris for this game snob to think he somehow “owns” it.

So where we cannot win in court, we appeal to the bureaucrats at Amazon, who will gladly do our dirty work for us.

Fortunately, Ms. Hogarth found powerful allies, in the EFF, Cory Doctorow, Wil Wheaton, and others, and Amazon backpedaled.

May all indie authors be so fortunate.

Personal Status

Progress on Character Fiction 101 is slow and steady. Scrivener tells me I’m up to about 7,000 densely-packed words. Not that this means anything. I still need to flesh out the sections on drama and conflict, plot points, how choosing a title relates to seeing your vision for your story, and how to actually put your story into words. And I’ve only roughed out two of the diagrams: the “Human Needs Chart” (including the 10 basic human needs and and 37 component needs) and “Where Ideas Come From” (four sources in two dimensions). I know of at least two more (the “Four Conflict Types,” also in two dimensions, and “The Plot Cycle,” which illustrates conflict resolution, climax, arc, layering), off the top of my head, that I need to draw up. I may find an artist who can turn these concept drawings into poster-quality artwork, which would be très kewl. I hope you can understand why this is taking so long.

For about 3 weeks, my weight hovered at 180 lbs. Stuck. And I still need some hypertension medication to bring my blood pressure down into a comfortable range. And my waist-to-hip measurement says I still need to lose a few more inches around the middle. So this week, I’ve completely cut out sugar and white flour, I’m minimizing the grams of carbohydrates in my food and maximizing the dietary fiber, and I’m eating only two large meals per day (and avoiding food for the rest of the day). I’m down to about 177 lbs now, and hopefully going down again.

I love cookies.

Today’s Quote

How To Be An Artist (In Twelve Words):

Show up. Be curious. Seek beauty. Explore the edges. Acknowledge progression. Share.

(Dan James, on A Big Creative Yes)

When this post goes live, I’ll likely be waiting in line at the courthouse. I’m scheduled for jury duty. They do this to me once every number of years. This’ll be the fourth time I’ve been “called” to fulfill my “civic duty.” But if I’m impaneled, it’ll only have been the second time I’ll have served on a jury. And no matter how it goes, I hope I’ll at least get a good story out of it.

In the meantime, my Beloved and I have been overindulging via Netflix on Emergency!, which is an updated version of the 1970′s classic Chicago Fire— Wait. Stop. Reverse that.

I was actually impressed that so many of the new generation have enjoyed this old show.

My brother the real-life paramedic reports that he knows a bunch of people who love this show, even find it motivating.

Me, it reminds me of the importance of working your calling. The topic of “Why become a fireman?” comes up in all of these shows. And the answer is always, “because it’s in your blood.” I don’t know how true that actually is. It appears, most successful people make their job into their calling, rather than finding a job that reflects their “passion.”

Nonetheless, I do think it’s important to work your calling, that is, to be the person God made you to be. This occurred to me in a recent conversation, in which we were talking about certain people who have developed extraordinary careers. And the question was raised: Would you like to have the life they have? No, I don’t think I would, because along with the greatness comes a torrent of suffering. And I don’t think I’d be up to the suffering part. They got to where they were because they were working their calling. When you’re working your calling, you find the hope that sees you through the suffering to the greatness.

What does any of this have to do with Emergency!? Watching fictional rescue workers reminds me of that truth.

But I’m still impressed with the breadth of the show’s fandom.

The coolest online post I ran across was from someone who had found a series of Emergency! coloring books from 1977. I don’t think I’ll be coloring these pages anytime soon. But they’re still cool to look at.

Much of the medical technology featured regularly on the show was on cutting-edge of the time.

And occasionally, we’ll even see a medical idea that has since been overturned. For example, in one episode, a patient with a peptic ulcer was ruminating on the question, “What was so stressful about my job?” The doctors went right along with it. In the 1980′s, it was established that most peptic ulcers are caused by a bacterial infection, not by stress.

On the other hand, part of me completely understands the fandom. I love watching them ride the fire truck, with the siren going.

-TimK

Links and things that I’ve run across recently.

Happy Valentine’s Day!

Look at this Valentine’s bear that Abbie’s boyfriend Anthony gave her.

Grr… He’s showing me up.

Happy Ballantyne…

As it happens, this morning I listened to an interview with Sarah Ballantyne on the (back-episode of the) Livin’ La Vida Low Carb Show podcast (from last July).

Sarah lost 120 pounds and eased a host of food-intolerance issues by giving up grains, eggs, and other foods, and sticking with a strict autoimmune-protocol Paleo diet. She talks about her story and some of the science behind her experiences with inflammation.

Will This Get Me Laid?

While looking for something else, I dug up this classic piece by Holly Lisle on Men, Women, Writing, and Getting Laid. According to Holly, being a male writer is more likely to get me laid. But you women writers, forget it.

(As a guy, I think she’s oversimplifying. But it’s still an entertaining read.)

A Scene from Scrubs?

Via the Telegraph, 6 September 2011.

Doctors at the Memorial hospital in Istanbul are employing music as medicine. It may look like a scene from an off-kilter half-hour sitcom, but they say this music therapy is actually working.

Pictured: Dr Erol Can (center) bowing a yayli tanbur (an Ottoman violin), with Professor Bingur Sonmez (left) blowing flute, and Mehmet Susam (right) on guitar.

Personal Status

The great storm Nemo, succeeded by a night of almost no sleep, slowed up my progress this week. However I did get some done.

Character Fiction 101 — This has turned into a research project, in particular on story titles. As far as finished content, ready to be published, no significant progress. (Lots of notes that still need to be digested.) I’m also preparing a post for BeTheStory.com on the topic.

This morning, my bathroom scale read 177.6. But my waist is still at ~38 inches. (Which is probably the most important measurement, and I’d like it to be more like 35 or 36.) Sigh.

Today’s Quote(s)

It’s easier to fool people than to convince them that they have been fooled

(Mark Twain… Maybe. But neither I nor anyone else I’ve seen has been able to dig up an actual citation.)

It’s easier to pull up a witty quote attributed to Mark Twain, in order to make those with whom you disagree look stupid, than to figure out the real reasons you disagree.

(Me. And that is a citation.)

It’s easier to learn the entire Talmud than to change one negative character trait.

(Rabbi Yisroel Salanter… Again, maybe.)

Now that the storm is passed, and we’re all dug out—which is a whole other story, for another time—we can look back at the fun, the pain, and even the beauty Nemo left us.

The funnest part, of course—for many of us—was being bundled up safe at home, with plenty of supplies, while the cold world raged outside. Some of us lost power, unfortunately, at least for a period of time; and with power, heat.

Others, like my own brother and his wife, worked into the storm (and some of them, through the storm), in emergency-response and medical fields, and for that we thank them.

And after it was over, then came the basking and romping, and some great photo-taking. I’ve collected a number of photos my friends have posted.

Like this little fella (posted by one of my other sisters-in-law), waiting for another shovelful:

Unfortunately, when I see this shot, all I can think of is: How come their bathroom is never overrun with snowflakes?

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L.B. took a picture from her back porch. Unfortunately, you can’t see much, because—hey!—giant snow drift, that’s why!

And this was common. My mom posted this photo of their front walkway and parking lot. Can you see the sidewalk? Can you see the cars? They’re there, believe it or not.

Fortunately, their condo association hired someone with a front-loader to scoop out the snow, and then someone with a shovel to clear the sidewalk.

Unfortunately, even after you do dig out, sometimes you find that the job is only begun…

(More stories like this, from my own camera, later.)

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I mentioned my brother before, who is a paramedic. He managed to get this shot on his cell phone. The extreme fuzziness is the snow. (It was a blizzard, after all.) The round thing is someone riding their bicycle. Yes, that’s right.

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I love this sequence, captured by my friend E.O.P.:

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And another friend, C.S., entitled this one, “Procrastination…”

…to which I replied, “It’s makin’ me late. It’s keepin’ me way-ay-ay-ay-aytin…”

After procrastination comes, “I love this!”

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One of my other sisters-in-law posted a quiet “after” photo from Canada:

I can almost hear the ripping of the water.

On the other hand, when my sister-in-law—the first one I mentioned, who camped out the storm in town—when she arrived home, this is what she saw:

Beautiful, if you get the shot before the shovel.

And lastly, my friend Julie Lavender posted this view from the DreamFarm Café, where she records her syndicated radio show of the same name.

Stay toasty!
-TimK

The bill has come due for the mild winter we had last year. And since Punxsutawney Phil (played by the classic actor Bill Murray) has predicted an early spring—which here in New England means snow, rain, sleet, hail, and 90-degree swelter, all within a 24-hour period… Since Phil has predicted an early spring, God has apparently decided to cram all the winter originally planned all into an 18-hour period.

Almost 35 years to the day (almost) since the Great Blizzard of ’78. (Of course, that year, Phil did see his shadow. So clearly, Phil isn’t always too accurate.)

According to the National Weather Service (which is sometimes right), we can expect “snow accumulations of more than 2 feet.” Fortunately, I remembered to store the GPS location of my car, so that I can find it again later.

(So I don’t accidentally dig out the wrong car.)

“LIGHT SNOW,” says the NWS in all caps, “WILL DEVELOP BY THIS MORNING… BECOMING HEAVY LATE IN THE DAY INTO THE EVENING COMMUTE… WHITEOUT CONDITIONS ARE ANTICIPATED AS ROADS BECOME SNOW COVERED BY THIS EVENINGS COMMUTE. STRONG NORTH-NORTHEAST WINDS ARE ANTICIPATED WITH GUSTS UP TO AROUND 60 MPH… RESULTING IN BLOWING AND DRIFTING OF SNOW. DAMAGE TO TREES AND STRUCTURES ALONG WITH SCATTERED POWER OUTAGES ARE ANTICIPATED.”

Sounds like fun, eh?

Fortunately, we’re all stocked up and bundled in. And I intend to update this post with photos from just outside my front door, for as long as the power holds out and I can still open it. As you can see, the skies have just begun flurrying, and a light sheet of white powder has just begun to accumulate on the ground.

Or in the words of the Beatles, “Here comes the snow. Here comes the snow. And it’s alright da da da da da da da da da da da da da da daaaaaaa.”

-TimK

P.S. I’m posting these photos also on my Facebook page.

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UPDATE: Feb 8, 12:00 noon

Still flurrying, and the Little One (who’s not so little anymore) is finally awake after staying up until 3:30 in the morning. Ah, to be young and without school in the morning.

I made some more progress on “Writing a Character Story,” including some more thought and research on what makes a good title for a novel or a story. And my current conclusion: it’s mostly just a bunch of B.S. In non-fiction, title matters. In fiction, not quite so much. Unfortunately, people don’t read fiction for personal development; they read it because all their friends said to, even if the book sucks.

So I took a break for a late breakfast and an episode of Emergency!. I’m ravenously hungry, probably to make up for yesterday’s paltry 1103 calories. (No joke—I kept track and added them up.)

The most exciting conversation so far this afternoon:

Girl 1: Will you dye my hair today?

Girl 2: Yeah.

Girl 1: Yay. [A beat.] Not right now, though.

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UPDATE: Feb 8, 2:00 PM

A little more, but I can still see the sidewalk. The footprints are my Firstborn Daughter’s, who just walked back from her friend’s house, where they are planning to work on a sewing project together.

However, I think I found the formula to keep my Little One from escaping the house—the threat of a blizzard. (All of her friends live too far away, apparently.)

So we finally broke out that new Wii game she got for Christmas, Avatar: The Last Airbender – The Burning Earth, the last of the series, which we’ve been wanting to play for a long time.

So I haven’t gotten any more writing done so far today, but I have been able to spend some rare time with my daughter, which (in this case) actually is more important.

More than 900 calories later (and only about 32 grams of carbs), my hunger is finally satiated. Part of the problem with keeping track of what I eat is… I never decided how long I was going to do it, and now I don’t know when to stop. I have almost 4 weeks of data. Is that enough for a representative sample?

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UPDATE: Feb 8, 4:14 PM

Now that’s more like it. Still waiting for the “blizzard” part— That’s not a dare to God, by the way; just an observation from someone who’s lived most of his short life in New England.

The most interesting factoid, sent to me by a friend, is that “Nemo” is not the “official” (i.e., state-sanctioned) name for this storm. As you may know, I have a deep libertarian thread running through my politics, and this fact delights me to no end.

As the story goes, the demand to name winter storms developed organically on social networks, especially Twitter. The Weather Channel, seeing that they were in a position to benefit from having these storms named, approached the NWS and NOAA, who promptly did nothing useful. So TWC took the initiative.

According to The Verge:

The National Weather Service does not endorse the practice and has told forecasters not to use the name. A harried spokeswoman told The Verge that the government agency has never named storms and does not intend to start. “The Weather Channel started naming winter storms, that’s their project,” she said…

[Says Bryan Norcross, a Weather Channel meteorologist,] “[Critics] like the fact that the storms are named. They get that in this modern era of short communication, having a name makes it clearer. They just wish that the National Weather Service were doing it so that there wouldn’t be a competitive aspect to it… Because we’re a private business and a private entity, we can move faster than these agencies can move.”

It may feel as if a private entity has hijacked what should be a government function, especially considering the value it’s adding to The Weather Channel’s brand… But the fact is, having a name for the storm that’s battering the Northeast has been really helpful. Just ask the New York City Mayor’s Office, which started referring to the storm as “Nemo” almost immediately.

Ha!

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UPDATE: Feb 8, 6:10 PM

I wish I could remember what I’ve been doing for the last two hours. A typical afternoon-evening at the King house. A thousand little things. That’s why I get most of my work done in the morning and early afternoon.

We’re finally into the “blizzard” portion of the snowstorm… I think. Unfortunately, it’s too dark out to tell, really.

It may be difficult to see, because it’s so dark out (and the outside lights are not illuminating at the appropriate hour), but you can just barely follow the sidewalk. This is why:

One of the few advantages of renting an apartment in a complex. Not too thrilled with the disadvantages, though.

I did finally get an opportunity to get this picture taken, though:

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UPDATE: Feb 8, 10:51 PM

One more brief update for tonight.

I think I’ve finally found Nemo.

(You knew I had to work that pun in there at some point, right?)

It’s like a religious experience.

And my right foot is I think about to fall off.

Good night, cold world!

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UPDATE: Feb 9, 6:02 AM

I was awakened by an alarm, which wasn’t turned off to let us sleep in on Saturday— Oy. Since I was up, I figured I’d take a quick photo.

There’s still snow falling… or blowing around. Accumulation is up past the bottom of the front door. I know there are cars out there somewhere. And a sidewalk… maybe.

A better photo after the sun comes up.

Right now, I’m watching old Mythbusters on Netflix. I love old Mythbusters episodes. Better than the new ones.

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UPDATE: Feb 9, 10:31 AM

One more quick update.

See? I told you there were cars out there… I think…

Still a little snow, and a bunch of wind. But much better than overnight. Roads are still impassible.

Now, the digging out begins.

I’m collecting a bunch of storm photos from my friends to post on Monday.

Stay toasty!

Links and things that I’ve run across recently.

What Else When the Power Goes Out?

I suspect that there may be an unusual number of new birthdays between Halloween and Thanksgiving this year.

(Too subtle? Remember that the power went out for a half-hour during the Superbowl? Now try counting the number of months from the Superbowl—the beginning of February—until the beginning of November.)

Unfortunately, You Have to Be a Computer Geek to Get This Joke

Told my doctor I was idempotent. He said he could give me something for it but it wouldn’t change anything.

(Tweeted by Ian Malpass)

Co-ink-ee-dink!

Here’s a cute story, by Sandra of Add Humor and Faith…mix well, about some astounding coincidences.

Frankly, I don’t think I would have taken this one so well. Had this happened to me, it would have totally wigged me out.

Tempe Brennan Would’ve Had a Field Day

You’ve probably heard this remarkable story by now. But if you haven’t, this is so kewl.

Faced with human remains unearthed from under a parking lot in Leicester, England, researchers took advantage of some fascinating 21′st-century forensic science to confirm that the bones were in fact—not those of Jimmy Hoffa—but were in fact the 528-year-old skeleton of King Richard III.

When I first saw a link to this story, I thought it was a hoax, or a joke, or something. Never expected the depth of the actual story.

Enterprise, Meet Nyan-Cat!

I ran across this gem by accident. Couldn’t resist reposting it.

(And already, I can hear my Little One—who is not so little any more—asking, “Cool! Where can I get a hat like that?!”)

The image appears to have been altered (i.e., “Photoshopped”) from a scene in the episode “Q Who,” just before Q appears. I wasn’t able to determine the original source of the altered image.

Personal Status

Character Fiction 101 — I’ve decided to release this as a series of units: short ebooks of 99¢ each. The first is “Writing a Character Story in 5 Easy Steps.” It was about ⅔ done, but then I decided to go back over it and double its size by fleshing out certain points (so that the essay can stand effectively on its own) and adding additional examples (to increase its value). I’ve completed all the major planning I should need (knock on wood). Final word target: about 10K words, which I plan to have basically finished by the end of next week.

Other writing projects are currently on hold, but I’ll switch to one of them, temporarily, once I release “Writing a Character Story.”

In other news: My Beloved darkened and shortened my hair. (Pictures to follow.) Apparently, my press agent contacted her and insisted that I take off about 10 years. (Just kidding.) This is also why, by the way, I am currently down to 181 pounds and 37½ inches (according to my inaccurate bathroom scale and maybe-accurate sewing tape measure, respectively). And I can almost fit into those “thin pants” that have been hanging in my closet, collecting dust.

Last week, I found out a friend of mind had started a diet around Christmas. He cut out sugar and other “high-calorie foods” (his words). And shed 20 pounds in a month and is now talking about, “How do I stop losing weight, because I’ve reached my weight goal?” Grrr…

(Seriously, though, I’m happy for him that he so easily found a diet that worked for him. On the other hand, I do not plan to “stop” losing weight, ever, nor to go back to my previous, much-less-healthy diet, ever.)

Today’s Quote

A fire station just isn’t a fire station without a pole.

(Paramedic John Gage, Emergency!)

That’s a Foundation Course (offered online) at MJTI, the Messianic Jewish Theological Institute, taught by Dr. Jen Rosner.

This is a topic I have a deep interest in, as a Gentile dwelling in the land of Messiah.

I see a 1700-year-old chasm between the People of God and the People of God. And for the first time in history, a movement that is attempting to re-integrate the two. If I might be allowed a Star Trek reference, I feel like a Romulan dissident working with Spock to reunify my culture with that of the Vulcans.

Or in the more eloquent (though less geeky) words of Rabbi Mark Kinzer, from his essay “Prayer in Yeshua, Prayer in Israel: The Shema in Messianic Perspective” (see em>Israel’s Messiah and the People of God: A Vision for Messianic Jewish Covenant Fidelity, or the papers from Hashivenu 2007):

Messianic Judaism involves more than the subtle tweaking of an existing form of Jewish life and thought—adding a few elements required by faith in Yeshua and subtracting a few elements incompatible with that faith. Instead, the Judaism we have inherited—and continue to practice—is entirely bathed in the bright light of Yeshua’s revelation. In a circular and dynamic interaction, our Judaism provides us with the framework required to interpret Yeshua’s revelation even as it is reconfigured by that revelation. In this way our Judaism and our Yeshua-faith are organically and holistically “integrated.”

These Foundation Courses at MJTI are intended for laypeople and offered online (over the Internet). I’m taking mine for credit (toward a Foundation Certificate), but I know others who have audited some of these courses (at a discount). I’ve taken two so far, of varying quality. I hear through the grapevine that they’re still working out the kinks in the online Foundation Courses (and I believe it); however, the better of the two that I’ve taken was taught by Jen Rosner, and she clearly knows what she’s doing when it comes to online courses. I highly recommend her classes, including this one (sight unseen).

You can be sure, I’ll be writing more on this topic in these pages.

-TimK

P.S. You can see the “Jewish-Christian Relations” course description here, and register here.

P.P.S. I receive no monetary compensation from linking to MJTI or its courses (just in case you were wondering).

P.P.P.S. Check out this video (and part 2 and part 3 and part 4).

I stepped on the bathroom scale this morning, and it read 182 and change, for the fourth time in the last four days. If you recall, for most of last week my weight was hovering around 184, and I couldn’t figure out why. I still don’t know why; the best I can come up with is that I caught a cold on the 17th, and while I was sick, I was unable to lose weight (but there’s no good proof of that).

In my writing projects, I commonly hit stagnation blockages of a similar sort. You’d think I’d be used to them by now.

However, after not making any progress for almost a week (more precisely, 6 days), to see my weight drop to 182.8, then to 182.6, then to 182.4…

I experienced a bout of acute joy.

So much so that I felt inspired to take a quick photo in the mall bathroom mirror this morning.

My pants no longer stay up by themselves. (Seriously.) I dug out from the back of my dresser an old belt that used to be two sizes too small. It now fits my waist wonderfully, but pulls my jeans into a baggy bunch at the top. For the time being I guess I’ll have to wear my overshirt on the outside, so I don’t look too much like a homeless guy who can’t afford pants that actually fit.

(Compare the picture of me from this past August, after I had lost “only” ~10 pounds from the time my doctor had used the term “pre-diabetic”— OMG! I just realized, A/B comparing these photos, I really have gotten smaller, haven’t I? And not just from around the waist.)

Last week, though, to have tried, succeeded for a little, then to have begun failing (or stalling), I felt a little like life was playing mind games with me. No fun. Discouraging.

Small setbacks should never be a reason to stop trying. I don’t know how many times I’ve given up because of discouraging setbacks. I’ve lost count. But one of my resolutions (as it were) this year is to seek motivation to pursue the changes I believe in, even if they seem out of reach.

So months from now, after I’ve lost the 15 or so pounds I want to lose, and I’m struggling with some writing project or other that doesn’t seem to be going anywhere, and I’m afraid that I’ve reached the end of my emotional rope, I’m going to look back at this moment. I’m going to remember the time when I thought I wasn’t able to reach a healthy weight. And I’m going to keep chugging on.

When that time comes, you remind me of this.

Keep chugging on!

-TimK

After posting a “Bits & Pieces” post yesterday of over 1200 words, I suddenly realized that I had enough good material in there for a whole week of actual blog posts… if I made them a little shorter. And I’m thinking that would probably be a better approach. Starting today.

According to Weather.com, last night began a “wind chill advisory”:

THE NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE IN TAUNTON HAS ISSUED A WIND CHILL ADVISORY… WHICH IS IN EFFECT FROM 7 PM [Thursday] EVENING TO 10 AM EST FRIDAY…

* HAZARD TYPES… DANGEROUSLY COLD WIND CHILLS.

* WIND CHILL READINGS… AS LOW AS 18 BELOW.

* TIMING… TONIGHT [Thursday] INTO FRIDAY MORNING. [Didn't we already do this part?]

* IMPACTS… HEIGHTENED THREAT OF FROSTBITE OR HYPOTHERMIA FOR THOSE VENTURING OUTSIDE. [I'll bet!]

[ . . . ]

LIMIT YOUR TIME OUTDOORS. REMEMBER TO DRESS IN LAYERS AND WEAR A HAT AND GLOVES TO PROTECT YOURSELF FROM THE COLD.

Yesterday [Thursday], it was so cold, I actually parked closer to the mall so I wouldn’t have to walk so far to get to Starbucks!

This morning, I didn’t even dare leave the car.

No, I’m not cold. My fingers are just falling off.

Stay frosty!

-TimK