"Can I Ask You A Question?" Blue.
Tonight at dinner we started wondering where grocery stores get all their products for their own specific brand? I doubt Safeway has their own mustard factory, diapers factory, toothpicks factory, etc. Is there any difference between the store's brand and name brands?
In order to find out the truth once and for all, we of course turned to the internet. One good place to look for random questions like this is on Yahoo Answers. People post questions there for others to answer. I did a search for the question, "Where do grocery store brands get their food?" Usually this works pretty well, but the related topics that Yahoo found were completely unrelated, and for some reason they just cracked me up. Most of them were pet related for some reason? Here's a few:
- Why has my dog stopped eating? (Hunger strike, obviously. But what issue do you think dogs find important enough to make that kind of statement?)
- Is it OK to feed my dog cat food?
- Should I teach my cat a lesson by not feeding her the canned food? (Huh?? What lesson?)
- Why does my cat ALWAYS throw up? (That's exactly how it was worded)
- Can anyone help - my cat is 6 years old and has had diarrhea all his life? (OK - I guess I'm on thin ice with the cat thread due to my previous post about feline homicide. Still, this was weirdly funny to me.)
- What are the most comfortable shoes (brand name please) to wear if you work in the food business? (Why does it matter what industry you're in?)
- Would you trust a robot to choose your wine or cheese?
Not At Your Local Megaplex
On Thursday we had a cool event put on by our church missions group that's focused on southeast Europe. It was a screening of a Bosnian film called "Kod amidze Idriza" (or it's marketed in English as "Days and Hours").
It is a relatively simple film that takes place almost entirely within a single house. The pace is pretty slow - it feels much more like other European films than a big Hollywood blockbuster. However, the actors do a wonderful job in keeping your interest and carrying the film.
Most literature, movies, etc. that are produced in the area tend to deal with the subject of the war. It was such a monumental event in everyone's lives. This film was interesting in that it only mentioned the war outright maybe one time, however I would say that the war kind of permeates the rest of the film. It comes out through the actions and motivations of the various characters.
Several good films have come out of Bosnia lately. In a discussion after our screening, one of the Bosnians who attended the event pointed out how the filmmakers have very limited budgets. The economy just isn't able to support big budget films. This has meant that they tend to have a very limited focus (like this film that just takes place around one house). No huge explosions or anything. It's a nice change to see a more artful film than what is typically at your local theater.
For some reason, we've heard much more about Bosnian films than Croatian films. It will be interesting to check out their films as well.
Minor Adventures
A couple days ago was just a weird day: my car broke down on the freeway, I walked 30 blocks to get the car back, our phone stopped working, and I killed a cat...
- 7 AM - Car breaks down. I'm headed to work when suddenly the radio turns off and the dashboard lights go dim. I pull off into a random residential neighborhood to see what's going on. Since nothing changes, and the car keeps driving, I get back on the freeway headed toward home. Then it loses all power together. So I get out, jump over the siderail, and wait for AAA (who I love, by the way!). The end result was that I had to replace the alternator and a few other things - not excited about this because I just spent a bunch of money on the brakes last week. At times like these I wish I had a horse. Or maybe an ostrich or a camel - they probably need less maintenance.
- The phone's been ringing incessantly for the last several days. When you try to answer, you just get some answering machine saying, "Hi, this is Jackie...leave a message!". I guess our line is crossed with someone else's? Good ol' Qwest phone service...
- I decided to walk back to the shop to pick up the car at the end of the day - not too far, about 30 blocks. It was fun and felt good to not be inside. Should do it more often! Maybe I'll go hiking tomorrow...
- When we finally got the car back at night, we were wanting to get out because we'd been cooped up inside all day. So we head out, and a few blocks from home I suddenly see this white flash near my right front tire. A cat had darted out in the road and we accidentally ran over it and killed it! We felt so bad! I've never hit an animal before. Now, granted, I have less of a problem with it being a cat than I would if it was a dog, but I still felt bad. I really hope the cat didn't belong to some kids or something!
Up To A "B" Average!!
We have a praise - as of today we are at 80% of our needed support! Praise God. There were some times in the past where we wondered how amazing it would be to hit 80! Woohoo!
Now we're just trusting the remaining 20% will come so we can leave soon.
Marketing For Those In Transition
The other day I was kind of subconsciously noticing a few license plate covers people had on their cars. Somehow this morphed into remembering how we have some temps who started recently at my work. Then, somehow, the two things mixed.
I was thinking about how most professions have these cool license plate covers that people use to advertise what they do - lawyers, doctors, accountants, etc. They all have clever sayings that communicate their profession.
But what if you're a temp? What's available for you to use around your license plate? So I thought I'd try out a couple ideas:
Maybe you have some ideas too? NOTE: Check out the comments posted below by a certain Yeti - hilarious.
Antique Painter of Lite
Recently I saw a little of Antiques Roadshow on TV (another crazy Friday night at our house, I know...) In case you hadn't seen it, it's the show where people dig out old valuable artwork and other items to get appraised for hundreds of thousands of dollars. They're usually things that were inherited from a distant relative and have been sitting in their attic for fifty years.
But I was thinking that if the roadshow came to my town, I'd like to go. I think it would be funny to bring in a big framed Thomas Kincade painting. I'd tell them "I don't know...I got it from my great aunt. As far as I know, she found it in 2002 at a gallery in Southcenter Mall right next to Linens N' Things..."
Christian Agnostic?
I am only partway into Lesslie Newbigin's classic "The Gospel in a Pluralist Society." I've known of this book for a while, and had read one chapter a year ago in our pre-field training, and I've been wanting to read the rest. It's kind of dense reading, but really excellent. Most likely I'll be posting a bunch of quotes on here as I go along.
One quote caught my attention so far. He's talking about how we are so enmeshed in our culture that has a huge value of pluralism, where "facts" are considered generally applicable to all society, while the area of "values" is only applicable to each individual's choice. Of course the culture defines how we determine what the facts and values are.
How is the gospel, or the basic idea that there is a God who is claiming to be the one with the ultimate purpose for all people, to be communicated in this context? In this climate, Newbigin says that "any confident statement of ultimate belief...is liable to be dismissed as ignorant, arrogant, dogmatic." However, the part that I liked, was that he says that we do have to keep in mind that:
"It is essential to the integrity of our witness to this new reality that we recognize that to be its witnesses does not mean to be the possessors of
all truth. It means to be placed on the path by following which we are led toward the truth.
There is indeed a proper place for agnosticism in the Christian life. There is a true sense in which we are - with others - seekers after the truth... When Christians affirm, as they do, that Jesus is the way, the true and living way by whom we come to the Father, they are not claiming to know everything. They are claiming to be on the way, and inviting others to join them..."
What do you think about that sentence? I think I like this statement for a couple reasons. First, I think I am a product of my culture that is highly skeptical of truth claims. A major reason for this is that, as Newbigin notes earlier, so much abuse has been done in the past by people who claim to have a corner on the truth. Secondly, it allows me a position of humility so that I feel more confident in being able to hold some truths as applicable to everyone. And they're not things I came up with at all - they are truth claims made by God on us.
Plus, having some agnosticism in my Christian faith just makes God more fascinating, don't you think? Who wants to have everything figured out? God is way, way too great for my mind to have him all down into a science.
All this being said, I am only a couple chapters into the book - probably a dangerous time to write a review. Maybe by next chapter I will see that I've completely misunderstood him, which, will probably end up in even more quotes on here!
Fieldtrip
Yesterday we decided to take a day trip to Mt. Rainier. It's one of those things we wanted to do in Washington before we left, but we had never found the right time. It turned out to be a really fun day - mostly just driving, but at least it made for very pretty views. We drove up as far as you can drive to the lodge and visitor center area (which were both closed).
In another reminder that we aren't truly authentic northwesterners, our visit to the mountain consisted of driving around, walking around some, and eating lunch at the lodge. Meanwhile, we overheard another couple's conversation with a ranger about whether they had the right ice gear for their hikes, a working GPS unit, etc. See, most people around here spend their weekends snowshoeing on a glacier somewhere, while we just like to enjoy the scenery. I guess if some people need to be mountaineers, other people need to be valley-eers? Either way we're getting to enjoy God's beautiful creation.
Here's a few pics of the mountain and the national park:
Where's Waldo?
I love this picture. Where to even start? The first thing I think of is how when we were in an argument as kids, and we'd say "Oh yeah?? You and what army?"
"Oh..."
Flew With The Flu
We are obviously very behind with our posts. This is due to a couple trips we just made - first to California, and then to North Carolina.
It's been a good but somewhat frenzied month. We moved into this new house and were here for five days (the majority of things are still unpacked), went to California for 10 days, came home again for two days, then flew to North Carolina for another 10 days. And we're finally home again! Time to unpack and explore our new surroundings.
The flight home today was a little brutal, though. We had a 6 AM departure, so we had to leave the house at 4:00. At 2:00 I woke up from my sleep with a good case of the flu. "No big deal", I think, as it's probably just something I ate and it won't be a long term thing. So we go ahead and start the drive to the airport, and sure enough, my dad has to pull over on the side of the airport road for...ahem...obvious reasons. I'm on the side of the road at 4:30 in the dark and the rain, holding onto a fire hydrant (hope this isn't too much info!). Not the ideal way to start a cross-country flight. We tried in vain to get our flight changed, but it was going to be hundreds of dollars (apparantly Delta's not too concerned with public health on their airplanes).
So the rest of the day was an endurance test. Not fun. Let's just say that there were a lot of "logistics" to figure out. Very relieved to finally be home.
But - the rest of our time was really great. Some highlights:
- Both sides of our family getting time with Emma (or meeting her for the first time)
- Getting to share the Croatia ministry in the California church Amy grew up in
- Sharing about the Croatia ministry in the inner-city church plant that my parents have become members of
- Emma had a few firsts - sitting up on her own, and rolling over. We're just trying to teach her to shake now. Oh - she also started teething.
- Watching my 8 & 10 year old nieces' soccer games. Gotta start 'em early.
- Getting time with our mission headquarters staff in Charlotte. We also spoke at an orientation for new missionaries about our experiences so far. Hopefully we encouraged them and didn't scare them!
A whole lot more happened, but since I wasn't good about posting it along the way, this summary will have to do!
