Various & Sundry, July 22

I have a new laptop. This means transferring all the files from my old laptop to my new laptop, see? I tried to do that on Tuesday morning--all morning--to no avail. This morning I got on a customer service chat and we figured it out. Did you know that a USB cable is not the same thing as an ethernet cable? Boy do I feel dumb. Sometime I'll post the chat between myself and the very patient Manolo, who I hope was wearing terrific shoes.

In the meantime, here are a few of the interesting things I discovered this week.

First of all, how cool is it that a Little League team from Uganda is competing in the Little League World Series this year? I think it's mighty cool. "Rev. John Foundation Little League from Kampala, Uganda, won the Middle East and Africa Region Tournament today with a 6-4 victory over 17-time World Series qualifier since 1991, Arabian American Little League from Dhahran, Saudi Arabia." Go, team! I also recommend the Uganda Little League Baseball blog which explains some of the struggle there is for this team to get to the World Series--such as the $35,000(US) it cost them to play in the regional tournament. How much does it cost U.S. teams to travel to regional contests? Anybody know?

I loved this satire at Internet Monk, Group Seeks Genesis Ban.

A spokesperson for “People Involved in Saving, Securing, and Defending the Old-Fashioned Family” (PISSDOFF), said that decent citizens have come together to protest the publication and distribution of Bibles containing Genesis. They say that our culture cannot go on promoting materials like Genesis to our children without devastating consequences.

For theology geeks, David Congdon has a great post (as usual) about what the controversy about Rob Bell's book Love Wins is really about. If the words "Calvinism vs. Arminianism" set your heart a-flutter, this post is for you. If those words mean nothing to you...really, you're just as well not knowing.

For Kiva lenders and others interested in aid and development, Saundra Schimmelpfennig at Good Intentions are Not Enough reposted what I think is a fair and clear-eyed look at microfinance generally.

Finally, The Daily Dish has had a very interesting thread in which people have talked about lessons learned on the job--particularly their first (often crappy) jobs. This post was particularly philosophical with one person describing how working at the drive-through prepared him/her for ordained ministry. Another talked about working at Sears and wished everyone had that experience.

That's when it hit me -- it isn't the job that teaches you anything. After all, there are plenty of people who are or were waiters who never learned a damn thing from their job. It's whether you bothered to learn from whatever job you might have: Successful people learn lessons where ever they are. That's the difference.

Here's to life and learning.