(This is the article I wrote for the June church newsletter.)

On my recent vacation I stopped by the Truman State University campus and visited some teachers and people I used to work with. One of them, a secretary who didn't know me well, but knew I was a minister, asked me this: "What do you think about them taking God out of everything? No prayer in schools . . . what's the world coming to?" I'm not sure if she honestly wanted to know what I thought, but I didn't tell her. We had one more stop to make, we were running behind already, and I wasn't about to try and start a discussion then and there. But it is something I've been thinking about, and my thoughts may surprise you.

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I'm posting this on my Linux computer, using w.bloggar. No, I didn't port it over, but I did get TightVNC to control my computer at work (which wasn't too easy since I have firewalls at each end). So now I can fix work computers while I sit at home in my pajamas eating fistfulls of Cheetos.

Marilyn, since I think you are the only person who knows about this journal, I am updating this especially for you! It was great to see you at the wedding. So, my topic for today is about traveling. This seems to be the great summer of travel for Lucas and me. In all, we have 3 weddings, 1 family reunion, 1 fourth of july celebration, 1 visit to fayette, 1 weekend of graduations, 1 trip to North Carolina, and Lucas has a trip to St. Louis for Nathan's bachelor party. I do like traveling, so this is good news for me! However, it is bad news on the job search front. I had an interview today at Hy-Vee (weee, exciting!), but am not hopeful about it because I told him I couldn't work any weekends until the end of July. He pretty much said he couldn't hire anyone who can't work weekends. Which, actually, is fine with me, because the position available was in the meat department, and I wasn't really that excited about looking at raw meat all day. Or for any length of time, really.


So, the job search continues...

I just found this wonderful website: FactCheck.org. It appears to be a nonpartisan site that checks out the claims made by our nation's leaders. Right now, the site seems to be devoted mostly to debunking or verifying claims made in Bush and Kerry's political ads. This site is a refreshing voice of reason in a time of distortion and manipulation. I particularly recommend the article that analyzes an ad that brags about Bush's record on education. It debunks claims about Bush's success with the educational system of Texas, as well as highlighting the major criticisms of No Child Left Behind.

Also, if you are of the Conservative persuasion, there are some criticisms of anti-Bush ads, as well.

I just realized I forgot to post about this one. Shrek 2 was: not as funny as the first, but funnier than most comedies out there. I prefer the humor here to that of animated features such as finding nemo. Shrek 2 was full of energy, jokes, color, and fun. I think where it wasn't as fun was just that it lacked real adventure, like the first. But it was a fun time on a bad day for me, and a good show for people of all ages. I swear, the sad look on the cat was hilarious. I get that look from people who want something in my office all the time.

So I've made going to the library to surf the Net and check e-mail part of my daily routine. I've come to two conclusions though about using the internet at the library.

1. Library computers suck. They also use terrible resolutions that you can't change.
2. Internet Explorer sucks. Gabe was telling me about an episode of The Screensavers that Wil Wheaton was on and someone called in about an Internet Explorer problem. Wil replied, "Go to the address bar in Internet Explorer, type in www.mozilla.org....." I thought that was pretty freaking funny.

So anyway, I spent like 2 hours on the phone with Dell tech support last night. My hard drive is shot. The data is lost. They are sending me a new one though. I should have it on Friday. I'm never buying a Dell again.

Caught this on Sarah's Downloads over at Tech TV:

YahooPOPs is hotmail popper for yahoo. It enables you to use your yahoo mail account with your e-mail client. No more going through the browser to look at your yahoo mail.

I don't use yahoo mail, but my parents do and I have been trying to get them to switch to a e-mail client for years. I hope this works well. I will be testing it this week.