Tag: Friends

six degrees of Christianity

This is cool.

Co-Occurrences of Names in the New Testament (more complete data)

It’s like 6 degrees of Kevin Bacon or Friend Wheel, but for the names and people of Scripture. Basically its a visual representation of people who are connected in Scripture by being mentioned together 3 ore more times.

Very cool way to visualize how Scripture seems very big on relationships with one another.

Related ::
Wikipedia :: six degrees of Kevin Bacon
Doug Pagitt talks about hope and being relational
SSL :: Facebook Friends Wheel

how to be interesting

Thomas shares a great post on how to be interesting.

  1. Take at least one picture everyday. Post it to flickr.
  2. Start a blog. Write at least one sentence every week.
  3. Keep a scrapbook
  4. Every week, read a magazine you’ve never read before
  5. Once a month interview someone for 20 minutes, work out how to make them interesting. Podcast it.
    Collect something
  6. Once a week sit in a coffee-shop or cafe for an hour and listen to other people’s conversations. Take notes. Blog about it. (Carefully)
  7. Every month write 50 words about one piece of visual art, one piece of writing, one piece of music and one piece of film or TV. Do other art forms if you can. Blog about it
  8. Make something
  9. Read:
    * Understanding Comics – Scott McCloud
    * The Mezzanine – Nicholson Baker
    * The Visual Display Of Quantitative Information – Edward Tufte

I think I’m a pretty interesting chap – but one trap I find myself sinking into is sharing so much with the world via the interweb that I don’t stop and take time to share that with others in real life. And other times, I forget to take the time to find out what makes other people interesting and sharing those things with others.

I think that’s one thing I try to do when we host dinner parties, or work on the something beautiful podcast, or introduce friends – make each person see what makes the other person interesting.

In other words – this person must have some qualities/values that I find to be interesting – so be sure and share those qualities with others when you introduce them.

And also, find the beauty in each person around you. Each person has a story. Each person has value. Each person already has “interestingness.” Find it & share it.

Something I’ve also found that helps add to a person’s interestingness is reading and responding to those random surveys on MySpace. I’ve found out so many random thoughts, ideas and history behind so many of my “acquaintances,” friends and family through MySpace surveys.

Twitter has also helped bridge the time/space gap between many (new) friends as well. In fact, many of the suggestions above can be done with 140 characters or less via Twitter, rather than a full blown blog… or you can incorporate the two together.

Related ::

Thomas’ blog post
the original post from Russell Davies
share your photos for free on flickr
get a free blogger (google) blog
get a free wordpress blog
get your own free Myspace profile
micro-blog for free on Twitter
Twitter tools for WordPress

Continue to pray

The latest from Sara:

I just wanted to let everyone know that Elliot Skaggs will be born this upcoming Monday, April 28th. I have a c-section scheduled for 7:30 that morning, so please be in prayer for us, for Elliot, for the Doctors, for everything surrounding that day.

I am confident that God’s grace is going to cover us on Monday, just as it has for the past three months. He has been so good, so faithful, and so abundantly compassionate towards us, and I know He won’t stop now as all that we’ve expected for 14 weeks comes to a head.

I still believe that God can perform a miracle, and that He alone can make Elliot perfectly healthy. That He can place normal sized, fully functioning lungs in Elliot where there were none on the sonogram just a week ago. That He can give him a functioning kidney, completely void of cysts, though the doctors have told us it’s impossible. I believe that He can. But even if He does not, I believe that He will take care of us, and that He will take care of Elliot – even if that’s by taking him to Heaven. The five year old son of one of my best friends reminded me that I shouldn’t be sad if God takes Elliot to Heaven, because “it’s so beautiful there, and Elliot will be much happier there anyway”. And Parker is right. There is suffering and pain and sin on this earth that my son will never have to know. He will be immediately swept into the loving arms of Christ, and though I will long to hold him in mine, I know that there’s no better place for him to be.

A different sort of evening

Had a fun evening with my life and friend Eric Lidji tonight.
Laurie picked me up from work today and we started the evening off with an enjoyable time shopping at Gap Body. It definitely wasn’t because of what they sell at Gap Body – but because of who I was with.
After we left, we browsed several other shops in the Mockingbird Station area before heading to Light Fantastic.
I remember going to Light Fantastic several times with my dad when I was growing up and he owned his own electrical business. He would go there from time to time to pick up lights and chandeliers for his customers. This time it was window shopping for us – or at least what we might like in the somewhere distant future.
After light shopping we made a visit to World Market where Laurie grabbed a couple different bottles of wine (both apple flavored) and I grabbed a “Make Your Own Six Pack” of various beers. A bottle of Shiner Black Lager, a couple different bottles of St. Arnolds and two brands I was unfamiliar with.
After our shopping trip we headed over to Cafe Brazil (an old favorite of mine – and one of the places Laurie and I went to on our first date) and we met up with Eric who was in town from Alaska for his sister’s Bat Mitzvah.
Eric and I worked together for more than a year at the Waxahachie paper.
Always enjoy conversations with Eric, either in person or now usually via the Interweb. He has great insight on things and great perspectives.
We talked national and local (Ellis County) politics, the newspaper business, the oil business (which he now covers in Alaska) faith and general catching up.
It was a great time only made better by the Chicken Chipotle Enchiladas I had for dinner.
And as the conversation wound down, Laurie and I headed back to Red Oak for a quiet wrap up to the evening.
Tomorrow – we meet with the Home Owners Association to figure out what they’re doing with all the money they get in our neighborhood. Should make for another interesting evening.

Today in review

Don’t do this too often, but thought I’d give you all a wrap up of today’s events…

a. woke up around 5:00
b. got up around 5:30
c. made some coffee and got a txt message from Smiley around 5:50 announcing the birth of their new baby boy, Aiden Sean (jump over to their blog and wish the new parents a big congrats).
d. took my time getting ready for work
e. rode the bus to work and sat next to my new bus-mate Judd
f. slow day at work – especially after lunch
g. walked the 4 or 5 blocks to DART headquarters at lunch to get a bus pass for April
h. watched the afternoon pass by in my cubicle
i. made plans with my wonderful life, Laurie, to visit Shari and Smiley and baby Aidan after work
j. Laurie calls on her way to pick me up to inform me that there’s a tornado warning for a huge area surrounding our house
k. realize everyone else in Dallas is apparently trying to get information from WFAA.com – because it no workie
l. Laurie picked me up and we made the short drive to the hospital and visited with our friends
m. came home and saw no sign of rain or thunderstorms in our neighborhood
n. made chicken sandwiches (not chicken salad but chicken breast – like Chick-Fil-A) for dinner
o. worked out at the gym
p. went grocery shopping
q. read some more in “Jesus for President”
r. thought about working on my “lesson” for our community group tomorrow night – didn’t want to turn the alarm off and then go outside in my PJs to get my book out of my truck
s. remembered i needed to take a pic for my 365days project
t. took the pic while listening to the Homebrewed Christianity podcast
u. decided to write a summary of the days events on podcast
v. now im jealous that Laurie is already sound asleep and i’m not
w. staring to feel some soreness in my back
x. xylophone
y. y? because i can
z. time to get some Zs

Homebrewed Christianity

My buddy Chad Crawford has started a new blog and podcast on the world wide interweb.

home brewed Christianity

“Home brewed Christianity is Christianity that’s made at home. It’s good and it’s delicious. It can be a little dark sometimes, it can be a little bitter sometimes. But that’s what we look for in our Christianity. This is not corporate Christianity. This is stuff that we make ourselves that we enjoy.”

Christianity and beer. Some might not like the combination, but I think it’s great.

I’m listening to their original/test podcast – sounds like they’re using blogtalkradio.com or something similar and one of the guys is breathing a little heavy into the phone – but I’m looking forward to seeing what Chad and his friend Tripp talk about.

Visit the podcast page on iTunes or visit Chad’s new blog, Chad talks to strangers.