Snowmageddon Quick Hits

Well, near-record snowfall just nailed the DC area.  In fact, I believe this storm will be the basis for a criminal on a soon-to-be-released episode of Law and Order: SVU.  Here are some of the more interesting things:

• It is much nicer to be snowed in with Internet access than without.
• My dad will never survive retirement.  Today he cleaned the snow off the satellite dish (reasonable), the roof of my parents' house (bad idea), his truck (reasonable), and shoveled the last half of somewhat lengthy driveway after plowing the first half killed his field tractor.  I have no idea how he's not going to go crazy when he's not working anymore.
• I can't believe the number of people chancing it on the road today.  I did see one guy get stuck on Adelphi Road this morning.  Sadly, most people driving had not cleaned the roofs of their cars.  I still say that in a snow emergency, you should be allowed to shoot drivers who refuse to clean their cars before they hit the road.
• I spent 90 minutes this evening digging my car out and am only halfway finished.  I am going to be sore tomorrow.
• Shuttle launch (Endeavour) at 4:39 on Sunday.  AM.  Very, very AM.  Oh, and that football game, too.  But it's not AM.
• I have easily gotten a very good return on my $10 investment in a collapsible snow shovel from Target.
• Oh, more snow is on the way.  It gets here the day we finally see temperatures above freezing.  Any rumors that I control the weather should be dispelled now.

PANIC!!!!

The prediction for this weekend's snowstorm in the DC area is for one to two feet of snowfall.  Thus, we all need to raid the grocery stores for all the eggs, milk, bread, and toilet paper we can get our hands on.  Then, we need to make a run on the gas stations and fill the tanks of all our vehicles and any gas cans we have sitting around.  Quick, the lives of your family and yourself depend on it!

Or, you can get a few extra things at the store, just in case, and settle in and enjoy the snowfall.  Besides, there is some sort of football game to watch about fourteen hours after the scheduled shuttle launch on Sunday.

February Already?

So, uh, where did that first month of 2010 go? It seems like just yesterday that I was getting annoyed at people mistakenly welcoming the new decade. Instead, my anger is directed at the Frederick County Republican Party for appointing Mr. Black Book himself, Blaine Young, to the Board of County Commissioners. Unfortunately, I see little chance of Governor O'Malley vetoing the decision.

But, there are some things to look forward to this month.

7th--Endeavour is scheduled to launch, taking the Tranquility module (the one Colbert tried to get named after him) up to the space station. Unfortunately, the launch is scheduled for 4:40 a.m. Only four more shuttle missions (unless another one is needed for a rescue of the last one) after this mission.

14th--Valentine's Day. I will try my best not to do any impressions of Scrooge this year. To the couples out there: enjoy yourselves. I will probably spend my weekend reading and watching the NBA All Star game (not much else to do).

16th--Mardi Gras. Note to self: leave campus right after class that night

26th--Frederick County Academic Tournament Finals. I should probably check if I need to be at Middletown High School for that.

27th--My sister's graduation ceremony. If I'm not busy, I'll try to be there for that. Yay for snowstorms postponing things.

It is only one week into the semester, so it is a bit early to give an impression of it so far. However, I will only have at most two exams this semester, provided I don't decide just to audit the class.

Frederick County Calls Again

I now have a new, unpaid position with the school system from back home. Apparently, the person who wrote the math questions for the academic tournament is no longer doing so and my name was mentioned as a replacement. I guess the debt I incurred having the access to the administration of my high school due to my mom working there is being called due. Thus, for the next month or so, I will be coming up with 15 mathematics questions each week covering precalculus, statistics and probability, trigonometry, calculus, and other high school math subjects. On that note, does anyone have any high school math books sitting around? My math books tend to be at the undergraduate and graduate levels.

Sermon 3?

I think it needs to be stated clearly: saying Pat Robertson is Christian may be blasphemy.

To start off, the people of Haiti (a nation that is 80% Roman Catholic, I believe) have experienced a horrible tragedy. The capital city of Port-au-Prince essentially was leveled by a earthquake measuring 7.0 on the Richter scale. Preliminary estimates are that over 100,000 people were killed. In short, this is one of the worst natural tragedies ever to occur in the western hemisphere. (Well, in human history, anyway. There was that big piece of space debris that crashed near the Yucatan Peninsula about 65 million years ago.)

Now, most scientists will tell you that the earthquake resulted from sort of geological phenomenon (I think this one is tectonic activity, but I'm not sure). However, Pat Robertson, in his infinite wisdom, knows the true cause: at the beginning of the nineteenth century, the Haitians sold their souls to Satan to overthrow the French.

To begin with, I would like to know the source providing evidence to this claim. I highly doubt Haitians proclaim that they got their independence because they sold out to Satan. If the source is the French who were overthrown, we may need to consider the source carefully.

But, for the sake of argument, let's say the Haitians of 1804 did sell their souls to Satan for independence. I'm going to go out on a limb and say they are all dead now. I think I would have heard if someone was over 200 years old. But what does that mean in regards to the Haitians alive in 2010? Well, they didn't sell their souls to Satan. Now, yes, the Bible does say that God reserves the right to visit punishments to the third and fourth generations, as opposed to visiting goodness to the thousandth generation of offspring of the righteous (Exodus 34:7--there is also much to be expanded upon here, and if I were giving this as a sermon, I would), but today's Haitians are well past that fourth generation mark. So already, Robertson's conjecture is running into trouble with the Scriptures. And don't forget the story of the city of Nineveh, that had essentially sold out to the devil, but repented when judgment was pronounced by Jonah and was spared by God (the Scriptural source for this is obvious).

Since we have this trouble of finding support in the Scriptures for Robertson's conjecture, may I propose a hypothesis that has backing of Scripture: sometimes bad things happen to the righteous? The Scriptural basis is a good portion of Acts and the entirety of Job. Bad things happen to good people. Peter was jailed, both Peter and Paul were executed by the authorities in Rome. Oh, and I don't think that Jesus guy did anything wrong at all. Yet he was beaten, bloodied, and nailed to a cross.

Going back to the religious demographics, we see that four out of five Haitians are Roman Catholic. That means the vast majority of the population is Christian. So they have been reconciled to God. Thus, Satan no longer has claim to their souls. Maybe Robertson should focus on that. You know, the power of the Crucifixion in reconciling the world to God? There is one potential problem, though: they are Roman Catholic. We know how some evangelical "ministers" believe the Catholic Church is Satan incarnate (*cough* Hagee *cough*).

So, how about we focus on what Christ would call us to do here: help those in need through this disaster? You know, feed the hungry, shelter the homeless, clothe the naked, care for the sick, etc.? After all, these are the things for which God is going to call us to account on Judgment Day. So let's focus on taking care of that piece of business, and let God worry about who actually sold their souls to Satan. In a way, we all kind of sell our souls when we sin. But the key part of Christianity is that our souls can be redeemed by accepting Christ. So faith in Christ kind of makes the entirety of Robertson's argument moot.

Actually, Robertson's behavior reminds me of the priest and Levite from the parable of the Good Samaritan. Let us heed instead the actions of the Samaritan in this tragedy as Christ calls us to "Go, and do likewise" (Luke 10:37).

Okay, argument over. Well, should I need to come up with a sermon quickly, I may have a good starting point.

I Should Probably Make a Clarification

Reading over my last couple of posts, and after an afternoon with my mom's side of the family*, I realize I may have misrepresented my feelings on a certain subject. Granted, it has not caused any problems (that I know of), but it will probably be for the best if I clarify things now.

Just so everyone is on the same page, I have NOT sworn off dating. It is just that with all the graduate school stuff that will be coming down the pipe in the next year, it is probably not in my best interest to be actively seeking a dating life. If I were asked on a date (highly unlikely, I know), I would consider it. However, if I were to be set up on a date, I may agree to it, under a few conditions:

1. The date in question must be with a straight human female. Stuffed or inflatable ovine animals are out of the question. (I'm looking at you, Jess.)
2. Giving me notice ahead of time is a good idea.
3. For now, let's leave out any dating websites.
   

So, yeah. I'm not optimistic about this front, but stranger things have happened to me recently. Who would have thought I would have passed both qualifying exams?

*At lunch this afternoon, the prospect of grandchildren for my mother was raised. Hence the dating thing being on my mind tonight.

2010: And So It Begins

As promised, the look ahead for 2010:

1. This will probably be the year of the preliminary exam. I will be using the reading course and research assistantship the spring (and possibly this summer, as well), to prepare for it. I think my advisor may want me to get it finished this fall or early 2011.
2. Depending how hard I work this spring and summer, I could have a master's degree sometime this year.
   
3. I believe there is a wedding in my group of friends sometime this year. I wish them luck, as my observations lead me to believe that planning and preparing weddings has a difficulty level just lower than that of the millennial problems.

Apparently, I don't have a whole lot of different things on my plate this year (yet). But, items one and two should keep me busy for the most part.

And if anyone wants to stop by in the next three weeks or so, please do. Let's just say 2010 has gotten off to a boring start thus far. I may be nearing my Law and Order limit.