That's Still Nuttin - 8,000

As of today, this blog swept past eight thousand visitors.

That's quite a few folks wandering by since December 9th, 2006, and with me posting less lately, due to the interesting nature of my life, it seems like a milestone I should mark by reprising my poem 'That's Nuttin!'

...And thank you for dropping by, all eight thousands of you. See, there was plenty of room after all...


That's Still Nuttin:

Eight thousand folks came knocking
Eight thousand at the door
Eight thousand people searching
Eight thousand, and now more

Eight thousand hidden smiles
Eight thousand who came by
Eight thousand from all countries
Eight thousand who drew nigh

Eight thousand quiet moments
Eight thousand friends to tea
Eight thousand 'I understand's
Eight thousand friends for me

Eight thousand people questing
Eight thousand asking why
Eight thousand gleaming stars
Eight thousand in the sky

Eight thousand cups of coffee
Eight thousand bits of toast
Eight thousand hands held in comfort
Eight thousand times a host

Eight thousand questions answered
Eight thousand, more or less
Eight thousand joined in prayer
Eight thousand joined to bless

Eight thousand is so little
Eight thousand is so small
Eight thousand is not many
I have space for one and all

So come in off the doorstep
Come in, come through the door
Come into my guest room
There's room for many more

Thanks to each of you for coming
I'm sad when your visits end
And please do come back often
And please do bring a friend

I'll be waiting by the doorstep
I'll have the kettle on for tea
Come by whenever you want to
And spend more time with me

-LE

GoD and DoG

This afternoon I found a wonderful video by Wendy Francisco entitled: GoD and DoG.


Wendy's website is Here, and her blog is Here.

Go in Peace to Love and Serve the Lord!

LE

p.s. Problems with displaying video properly made it clear blog template was out of step with YouTube and also with normal screen widths - so behold a wider blog. :)

"Wait, Wait, Cancel That, I guess it says 'helf'"

There is a Gary Larson cartoon that I won't replicate here because of copyright, but it shows a helicopter pilot circling a small desert island. On that island a man is hopping up and down, and waving his arms next to the word HELP,

....except that the edge of the P has been trampled out, and now it looks like it says HELF.

The pilot in the cartoon says: "Wait, Wait, Cancel That, I guess it says 'helf.'"

On the right, you should see a 'donate' button from PayPal.

It is there because, in our challenging economy, I need HELP, not HELF.

Help to stay in my house.
Help to pay my bills.
Help to have time to blog on occasion.
Please give generously.

Yours,
LE

After 2 Timothy 2, Reprise

This is a re-run of After 2 Timothy 2 (with some formatting changes), which text is speaking to me today.

Remember Jesus in your sufferings,
and if you are chained,
remember that the word of God cannot be chained.

Endure for the sake of the world,
that the world may also obtain salvation,
for if we die with Jesus,
we will rise with Christ,
and if we endure we will also reign with him.

Jesus cannot save us while we deny him,
but he remains faithful to us,
seeking us and consoling us when we despair.

Even in our denial,
in our guilt and sin,
Jesus must remain faithful to us,
because he cannot deny himself,
and there is great hope in that.

Jesus is our redeemer,
and seeks our redemption,
so seek to return to and keep true to Jesus,
even as he keeps true to you.

Peace,
LE

Some minor blog changes - you will notice the 'Zeitgeist' of tags is now alphabetical - much more useful. Some blogs that ceased to inspire me have been removed, and I have re-resurrected my rotating 'taglines' at the top.

A Bit of Spirit

I had written what I thought was a lovely post on Pentecost at my church, and the season after Pentecost, but then the gremlins of the internet consumed it in one foul gulp.

So, rather than spend another hour recreating it, with so many tasks calling me, let me instead post a link to an intriguing video by Quayola called 'Strata' which you can find here.

May you seek and find The Holy Spirit every day of this season, and for you, may it be ExtraOrdinary time.

Peace,
LE

Ch-ch-ch-changes

Today is SO busy
There is Sunday School to plan
A fallen tree to chop up with a chainsaw. (This tree, in fact)

And blogs to add:

Welcome:
The Geranium Farm (Long overdue)
titusoneten (Returned from a long silence)
This Passage (Just discovered)

I hope to add more later today.

Forgive me for not posting more!

LE

That's Still Nuttin:

As of today, this blog swept past two thousand visitors.
Not so long ago, on July 14^th , it hit one thousand,
And I posted a poem to commemorate the event, which poem I update below.
I promise, I'll wait till at least FIVE thousand before I make any more fuss.

p.s. I do see that lots of you are coming here wondering about your dreams and visions, and I do have a post that discusses discerning about the dreams, signs, visions and the like you have here, and I will be posting more on that subject. Please also feel free to post as comments dreams that you have, and I will share the ones that inspire me as blog entries. Do also feel free to share any comments, prayer requests, or other requests that you have.

...And thank you for dropping by, all two thousands of you. See, there was plenty of room after all...


That's Still Nuttin:

Two thousand folks came knocking
Two thousand at the door
Two thousand people searching
Two thousand, and now more

Two thousand hidden smiles
Two thousand who came by
Two thousand from all countries
Two thousand who drew nigh

Two thousand quiet moments
Two thousand friends to tea
Two thousand 'I understand's
Two thousand friends for me

Two thousand people questing
Two thousand asking why
Two thousand gleaming stars
Two thousand in the sky

Two thousand cups of coffee
Two thousand bits of toast
Two thousand hands held in comfort
Two thousand times a host

Two thousand questions answered
Two thousand, more or less
Two thousand joined in prayer
Two thousand joined to bless

Two thousand is so little
Two thousand is so small
Two thousand is not many
I have space for one and all

So come in off the doorstep
Come in, come through the door
Come into my guest room
There's room for many more

Thanks to each of you for coming
I'm sad when your visits end
And please do come back often
And please do bring a friend

I'll be waiting by the doorstep
I'll have the kettle on for tea
Come by whenever you want to
And spend more time with me

-LE

Against Virtual (((Hugs))):

Note: In case you haven't seen, 'virtual' hugs are signified electronically with parenthesis of various sorts: So if I think 'Tom' needs a hug, I might post the following as a response to him in a blog or message:

{{{Tom}}} or (((Tom))).

More parens apparently mean tighter or longer hugs. I bet there is even a whole systematics of meaning for different numbers and types of parentheses.

Well, the whole thing bothers me - it seems fake, distant, and makes me feel like us hairless apes with keyboards are substituting virtual, safe, distant friends for real, close, messy and troublesome friends. Add to that the fact that we tend not to hug people anymore in real life (too likely to be 'bad touch' perhaps). All of which seems in a direction away from goodness...

So without further ado, I bring you:

"Locust Eater: Against Virtual Hugs"



Parenthesis upon a screen
Aren't extra nice,
nor are they mean;

Don't warm you up
Don't make you frown
Won't cheer you up
Won't make you down

Don't bump your glass
Don't muss your hair
Don't grab your ass
Don't make you glare

Don't squeeze you tight
Or hold you wide
Don't light a fire
In your inside

Can't pass a germ
Or make you love
Less warm than handshakes
Wearing gloves

Like fake kisses in the air;
Closeness, they say, we do not dare

I s'pose they're nicer than a sneer,
But I'd prefer...

...you drank my beer

And spilled the stew
Stepped on my foot
Played pranks with glue

Made a stink and stole my watch
Poured some ink onto my crotch

Burned the toast
Drank up the milk
Ate the whole roast
And stained my silk

Threw up on my bedroom floor
Bashed a big hole in the door

Woke me up at half past three
Made me laugh so hard I peed

Kicked my cat, then broke a chair, Ruined my hat -I'd know you're there.

No, hugs of text don't satisfy;
Hug someone real, who is nearby.



...If you come by and ask, I'll ACTUALLY hug you...

-LE

Blog Changes:

I know that these blog change posts are boring...

• You will notice that I moved everything from the left to the right.
• I am now just tagging 'books' of the Bible and not chapters or book numbers, with the exception of Isaiah 55, which is popular.
• I added extra padding around titles of blogs (looks more poetic that way).
• I pulled out the feedburner footers which, tho cool, were slowing things down.

I am considering further reducing or re-doing my tags, trying to clear out synonyms, and get closer to just tagging 'topics'. It's hard to do that kind of a thing when you are a 'p', every word should be a tag.

Peace

LE

Update 26-Sep-07: I have updated the sidebar to make it a little wider and reduce wrapping - but better than that, I added a 'skip to main' hyperlink for people with mobile/text-based browsers at the top of the body section. (You should only see this if you are visiting this site via a mobile/text-based browser.)

Blog Business

I have switched back to SiteMeter from StatCounter. I do think StatCounter caught more clicks, but it was annoying to use - I just wanna see all the clicks in order with where they came from, as possible, and StatCounter wants to break it out seven ways from tuesday, and do graphs and such that won't display on a handheld device anyway.

On the linking front I let 'Secret Dubai Diary' go as a link, but added Stories About Becoming and Soul Friending, both blogs by SB, and A Seeking Spirit. You might be amused to see a poem I wrote for one of Sketchy Beast's characters, Cornelius, which is here.

And I am leaving the Blogging Episcopalians toy in, even though it doesn't work right. I'll come back to that some day in the future.

What's wrong with this blog? Hmmm. I have too many topics, and I wish that they were on the right side nowadays. Maybe a template change is in order. A task for some other day, that is.

Peace,
LE

That's Nuttin!

A thousand folks came knocking
A thousand at the door
A thousand people searching
A thousand, and now more

A thousand hidden smiles
A thousand who came by
A thousand from all countries
A thousand who drew nigh

A thousand quiet moments
A thousand friends to tea
A thousand 'I understand's
A thousand friends for me

A thousand people questing
A thousand asking why
A thousand gleaming stars
A thousand in the sky

A thousand cups of coffee
A thousand bits of toast
A thousand hands held in comfort
A thousand times a host

A thousand questions answered
A thousand, more or less
A thousand joined in prayer
A thousand joined to bless

A thousand is so little
A thousand is so small
A thousand is not many
I have space for one and all

So come in off the doorstep
Come in, come through the door
Come into my guest room
There's room for many more

Thanks to each of you for coming
I'm sad when your visits end
And please do come back often
And please do bring a friend

I'll be waiting by the doorstep
I'll have the kettle on for tea
Come by whenever you want to
And spend more time with me

-LE

Ch-ch-ch-changes...

Have a Happy and Safe 4th!


And... here I am with a few minutes and nothing urgent to do for once, so....

....It has been a while since I have poked at the blog to improve it, and so here are Today's:

Changes to this blog: (I may update this post later in the day if I get more things done.)

1) Refreshing of the links:

a. I have gone through links, and those which I don’t feel a huge attachment to, or which I look at less often, or which haven’t been updated in ever-so-long I have removed. I also looked at who was getting ‘outclicks’ and kept those who were getting those. On this list are:

i. TitusOneTen – Silly blog about Episcopal Church Life, but not updated since… May! Is it possible? Maybe it will come back to life in the fall, and I will re-add it.
ii. Richard Pettinger Photos – Beautiful pictures and interesting bits of faith, but I rarely look at it, and no one clicks there.
iii. Fresh Spam – Not updated since May. (UPDATE: A Reprieve - there has been an update - so I have re-added FS to the blogroll.)
iv. Releasing The Word: I never, ever go there, and no-one clicks on it. I probably should, but I don’t. Updated regularly too.

b. Links I probably should have deleted but didn’t:

i. TWIVNTY – The author promises to do SOMETHING with it soon, and it gets outclicks.
ii. Turns in the Road – nice site, nice pictures, but I don’t look at it much. It DOES get outclicks. The host needs to turn off the automatic music video that runs when you hit the site. Which video I loved the first 15 times I visited.

c. New Links – things that I found inspiring and interesting over the last several months:

i. Slyphnascency – Poetry, struggle and light from a ‘Pixie’. Oh, and she linked my site.
ii. What Not to Crochet – Updated a few times a month, will bend your mind with scary crocheted objects.
iii. Amazing Filtered Things – Amazing pictures.
iv. I have more to add here, some nifty stuff that is hiding from me, but I only get so many minutes with my own computer, and that time is up, I can tell by the way a small, impatient person is pacing behind me.
v. Muck-n-Mire - wonderful pictures of flowers and plants.
vi. SketchyBeast - interesting and odd drawings.

d. Rearranging Links – The links I visit most or get the most outclicks should be first, and I have tried to honor that.

2) Tracking my Visitors: I have been with Site Meter for ever-so-long, but they have changed a number of things which made me reconsider that, and now I am with StatCounter. We will see how StatCounter works out. Items leading to my decision were:

a. They supposedly started adding cookies from ‘Specific Click’ that get loaded on my visitor’s computers and track their activity beyond just my blog. (Spyware! Evil! Evil!)
b. They started requiring ‘cookies’ (little bits of data or code that get stored on your computer to store information about your visits).
c. Their stats stopped working at all on my laptop, and on my mobile device.
d. Often the counter wouldn’t load even on computers that were normally compatible – and I am pretty sure that those visits were not counted.
e. I am pretty sure that the stats counter slowed down the loading of my blog.

More as it happens!

LE

A Bit About This Blog

This entry has been revised since first written; It was last revised on 23-Apr-09.

May this blog inspire you.
May it make you love more passionately,
Feel more spiritually,
Think more wholistically,
And be more connected with the Light.

The writing here is semi-anonymous, and that is for your benefit:
You can imagine the writer might be female, or male, old, or young, dreadlocked, bald, sporting a perm or cute bangs, tall, short, dumpy, thin, of whatever race you like.
Cast the writer in your own guise, or in the guise you like.
This identity exists to affirm, encourage and grow YOU.

But if you need to learn more about me, there is at least one post that identifies me clearly, and it is not a secret. If you look for it, you will find it. So you can choose to find out if you must. Many people in my life know of my work here, and visit this blog.

The theology here is not intended to be consistent. Instead it is intended to help point the way towards, or illustrate spiritual truth as we encounter it in this world, as best I can make it do so. And sometimes, sometimes it will be just me, expressing my struggle.

Posts will be relatively short, just enough to savor, enough to contemplate - because you are busy, and because life is short... ...you don't have time to download the unabridged guide to joy, instead you need a signpost, a suggestion, a hint. After all, God is whispering in your ear every day...you just need some reinforcement... -and the occasional reminder to listen.

All posts are subject to revision, although mostly I don't have time to do such things.

Links are provided to web-sites I have found inspirational. I will change them on occasion, and will generally note those changes. Feel free to forward me link suggestions.

Feel free to comment on what is posted here, or to add your own, unrelated stories or thoughts. Please be polite. Impolite or cruel posts don't belong here and will be removed, as will posts only intended to advertise. Welcoming, inclusive and inspirational posts do belong and will be preserved.

Feel free to use what is here if it inspires you, just cite this blog as your source, and provide a link to the entry, if possible.

May God bless you, walk with you, inspire you, and energize your spirit.

-Locust Eater