Kitties...

Well, I guess I gave away the big surprise in the title of this post, but I have two precious little kitties that came to live with me. They are currently staying in my "extra" (read my girl's) room. As they get used to the noises and smells around here, then I'll let them get used to the rest of the apartment and we'll see how it goes.

So... want to see a picture?

Yes? you betcha! :-)

They are brother and sister, Ben is the ginger one and Lil Rock (Lil Raquel) is the gray one. They are pretty cute, so far. :-)





Well, that is about it for now.
BS

Friday evening funny...

Ok, so I'm not usually into this You tube thing, but these are too funny. I beg of you, watch these four videos. They are awesome.

Number 1


Number 2


Number 3


Number 4


Enjoy!
BS

Churches, pubs...

So, here is my reader question for the day (for the two of you that read this thing). What is the difference between the pub and the church?

I can tell you what the differences are for me.
1) I like going to the pub.
2) I feel like I'm accepted at the pub
3) I feel like I can go to the pub whenever I want and not on a specific day at a specific time for a specific reason. Even if I just want a glass of water and to sit quietly where there are people milling around. I can just sit and watch.
4) I can go to the pub "just as I am", sad, happy, depressed, grumpy.

With that being said, there is a bit that you don't/can't get at the pub. For the most part, I think church people are more willing to help, maybe it's that they are more willing to "go deep" I don't know. Some people are willing to "go deep" no matter what. I'm not really sure, but I gotta tell you, the reasons outlined above, for me, are pretty big.

Hard tellin not know'in.

Thoughts?

BS

What is wrong with us(?)...

Thanks to my fruity sister-head, I'm posting a link to this article from Time.com. It's an article about how the rich buy indulgences for their sin of porking the environment (See article here) Can you tell I'm a little upset about this? There are two reasons for todays rant. First, the aforementioned article and second, something that happened to a friend of mine recently.

This friend of mine works for a group that strives to be environmentally conscious and help people here in the U.S. and around the world. Recently someone went to work for this company that used to work for a Christian organization that does all sorts of good for people here in America and around the world, I'm not sure where they stand on the environment, but that's secondary. The discussion inside the new company where my friend works, was about the new guy and how he seems like he is going to be a good addition to the team, someone mentions that the previous organization they worked for was "Christian" suddenly the question becomes, why would a christian want to work for an organization that helps people in the US and around world AND cares about the environment? ARE YOU KIDDING ME???!!!! If Christians, myself included, have not and are not at the forefront of taking care of other people and this planet (of which we are supposed to be stewards. We've done an awful job of being who we are supposed to be. Obviously we've done too little to show what is important and we are spending too much time shooting at each other for things we have or haven't done. People should be turning to organizations that are taking care of people and the environment and, only after the fact, finding out that they are a group of people that follow Christ.

Alright, I guess I'll stop ranting now. Thanks for listening. :-)

Batch updates at large companies…

Why is it that my clients, most of them relatively small to mid-size manufacturers are interested in and willing to put the money into real time updating of websites and databases, but the "big guys" aren't. I have had occasion lately to notice that some of the larger companies don't update their databases but once a day. Let's take for example, Blockbuster. You return a Blockbuster Online movie to the store, when does it show up as returned, sometime the next day (hint: after their batch upload is run!) that's not too bad and it's understandable. However, What about the shipping out of movies, sometimes I'll get an e-mail saying that my next movie was shipped and boom it's in my mailbox the same day. Do you think that this has to do with the efficiency of the postal service? I think not, I think it's batch updating again. Why, oh why, doesn't Blockbuster have online fulfillment centers? The lack thereof makes no sense to me, but nobody asked, so I guess they don't really care what I say, huh?

BS