Wabi-Sabi

If you've been following my Twitter updates, you may be wondering what all this talk about a "flash mob" means?

Check out this video of a great flash mob featuring 20,000 people celebrating the opening of Oprah's 24th Season during a Black Eyed Peas concert in Chicago.



Francie Zimmerman of the Doris Duke Foundation mentioned this at last week's national Strengthening Families Summit as an example of how Strengthening Families (and child abuse prevention) efforts are spreading across the country.

On the day of the concert, a relatively small group of dancers taught others the choreography and soon the crowd of 20,000 was able to join in a complicated dance routine with stunning results. Similarly, prevention advocates are sharing information with others in West Virginia and across the country, as we build a national movement to eliminate the abuse and neglect of our nation's children.

Together, we are all part of the flash mob that supports children and families, and "I gotta feelin' it's gonna be a good, good night future."

UPDATE: Here's a link to an article in the Parthenon with photos of the Marshall University Flash Mob with Jamie Oliver that I was part of on Wednesday.
LINK

It's Halloween and you may be scrambling at the last minute to find a costume for a Halloween party this weekend.

Fear not dear readers, Wabi-Sabi is here to help with five unique ideas that I posted a couple of years ago. They are guaranteed to make an impression (although not necessarily a good one) at your party.

1. Take a fabric pen and draw a large "P" on the front of a shirt (or cut a "P" out of paper and pin it to the shirt) then put black make-up around one eye. Voila! You are a "Black-Eyed Pea".


2. Take a Frankenstein mask (or some bolts and green make-up) and attach a wild Einstein-style wig. Spray the wig with green hair paint. Wear a lab coat with pens and a pocket protector. Ta da! You are "Frank-Einstein".


3. Wear all black and attach a large white number "8" to your shirt. When asked what your costume is, say "Reply hazy, try again" and ask them to shake you. After all, you are a "Magic 8 Ball".


4. For a couple, he wears a giant "E". She wears paper clips. Presto chango! You're an "e-male and attachment".


5. Wear a bra on the outside of your shirt. Attach a letter "Z" to the bra. Suddenly, you're a "Z-bra".

Special Bonus Idea:
Dress as Superman, Charlie Brown or other recognizable cartoon character. Attach long strings to the front of your costume with safety pins. Tie little army men to the end of each string. Walk slowly while leaning forward, and when people ask what you are say, a "Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade Balloon!"

Happy Halloween!

P.S. I loved Jim's "Facebook" costume last night on the Office.

What do you think?

I lost a few things including my blog roll in the transition, but I think this design has some potential.

Now who were those bloggers that I liked...

UPDATE:
I think I'm almost done tweaking things. I added a picture and a few links to the title bar. The blog roll is a work in progress, but lists the 10 most recently updated blogs. Click the "view all" to see the entire list. I hope you like it.

Please enjoy this slideshow of pictures and images of the Create WV Conference that was held in Huntington earlier this week. It was a great event that shows we have good reason to be very optimistic about our state's bright future.

Congratulations to Jeff James and his talented team of state and local volunteers who made the conference a great success!



Pictures by Tracy Toler.

The Daily Show with Jon Stewart is at its best when it's skewering the media for its coverage (or lack thereof) of the news. This report tears CNN into shreds for doing an in-depth fact checking of Saturday Night Live's recent Obama Report Card sketch, while failing to fact check their own guests.

It's particularly funny, and troubling, to hear how often CNN and other 24 HOUR / DAY news networks wrap up a story with "We'll have to leave it right there..."

You're on the air for 24 hours a day! How much more time do you need?

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
CNN Leaves It There
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Ron Paul Interview

Dancing at the 2009 Chili Cookoff World Championship

Check out how much fun the competing chili cooks had during the awards ceremony at today's International Chili Society World Championship Cook-Off at WV Power Park in Charleston.



It was a fun day with GREAT chili and lots of fun characters. Now, I'm eager to try my hand at a cook-off to see if my Lavalette United Methodist Church champion chili can compete with some of the major league chili chefs I saw today!

Somehow I missed this post, No Socialism Here, by my friend el Cabrero over at the Goat Rope earlier this week, but it's so good I want to repost most of it here.

In his post, he shares the following email that's been popping up in email boxes recently...

This morning I was awakened by my alarm clock powered by socialist electricity generated by the public power monopoly regulated by the US Department of Energy. I then took a shower in the socialist clean water provided by the municipal water utility. After that, I turned on the socialist radio to one of the FCC regulated channels to hear what the socialist National Weather Service of the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration determined the weather was going to be like using socialist satellites designed, built, and launched by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. I watched this while eating my breakfast of socialist US Department of Agriculture inspected food and taking the socialist drugs which have been determined to be safe by the Food and Drug Administration.

At the appropriate time, as kept accurate by the socialist National Institute of Standards and Technology and the US Naval Observatory, I got into my socialist National Highway Traffic Safety Administration approved automobile and set out to work on the socialist roads build by the socialist local, state, and federal departments of transportation, potentially stopping to purchase additional fuel of a quality level determined by the socialist Environmental Protection Agency, using socialist legal tender issued by the Federal Reserve Bank. On the way I deposited mail to be sent out via the socialist US Postal Service and dropped the kids off at the socialist public school.

If I get lost, I can use my socialist GPS navigation technology developed by the United States Department of Defense and made available to the public in 1996 by President Bill Clinton who issued a policy directive declaring socialist GPS to be a dual-use military/civilian system to be managed as a national socialist asset.

After spending another day not being maimed or killed at work thanks to the socialist workplace regulations imposed by the Department of Labor and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, enjoying another two meals which again do not kill me because of the socialist USDA, I drove my socialist
NHTSA car back home, on the socialist DOT roads, to my house which did not burn down in my absence because of the socialist state and local building codes and socialist fire marshal's inspection, and which had not been plundered of it's valuables thanks to the socialist local police department.

I then got on my computer and used the socialist internet which was developed by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Administration and browse the socialist World Wide Web using my graphical web browser, both made possible by Al Gore's socialist High Performance Computing and Communication Act of 1991. I then post on freerepublic.com and Fox news forums about how SOCIALISM in medicine is BAD because the government can't do anything right.

By the way, what do people think Medicare and Medicaid are?

It's an instant classic!

By the way, I'm still wondering where the outrage is over socialist public bathrooms.

Members of Glenn Beck's army demonstrate just how clueless they are.

I'm so saddened to learn that the Lion of the Senate, Ted Kennedy has lost his battle with brain cancer.

We must renew our efforts to fulfill his legacy and ensure that health care is a right for all Americans and not a privilege.

In honor of his lifetime of service on behalf of the nation that he loved so much, I think it is appropriate to share his historic speech that he made one year ago on August 25, 2008 at last year's Democratic National Convention in Denver. It was an honor and privilege to be there in person.



Rest in peace Senator. You will be greatly missed.

My darling Carol,

As we celebrate twelve loving years of marriage today, I wanted to share some of my favorite special memories of our lives together over the past 12 years and the 2 years before we were married.

Here are just a few of the fun and special moments that come to mind that I wanted to share with you. I love you very much and eagerly look forward to building a lifetime of even more fun times and memories in the years ahead.

Love Always,
Jim

Some of my favorite memories together...

• Chatting online on AOL and talking on the phone in the wee hours of the morning when we met online.

• Getting your picture in the mail at my old apartment in Charleston and being blown away.

• The first time we held hands while walking at the festival in Lima.

• Seeing “The Net” as our first movie.

• Cooking you dinner for the first time (and almost making you sick in the process).

• Driving though the cornfields across Ohio as we were visiting each other and falling in love.

• Watching you courageously discern your call to ministry and leave a comfortable life to follow God’s call.

• Getting to know Stimpy and going from her hissing at me to her being my fat cat buddy in Dunbar.

• Rooting for Michigan and learning how despicable Ohio State is.

• My joy when you accepted my proposal of marriage.

• My breath being taken away as you walked down the aisle and became my wife.

• Our first dance as husband and wife and the fun intros for the wedding party at the reception.

• Our honeymoon cruise with fun in the sun, exploring the rain forest, finding bargains, seeing the sights of the Caribbean, snorkeling and spending some time on a certain special beach in Santo Domingo.

• Watching you grow as a minister and becoming a strong worship leader, preacher, and caring pastor.

• Finding out you were pregnant!

• Walking in the cold and snow on Christmas eve trying to see if Jake was going to be born early.

• Hearing Jake’s heartbeat for the first time and feeling him kick.

• Holding your hand when Jake was born and again when Jonah joined our family a few years later.

• Watching the anesthesiologist put you to sleep for “just a bit” after you did so great delivering Jake.

• Handing Jake to you and hearing him say “mum, mum, mum…” for his first words on his first day!

• Your patience, care and love while I was going through a rough time when Time Out closed.

• Helping me find a new great job with TEAM for WV Children.

• Our first trip to Disney World with Jake and seeing the magic in his eyes when Mickey waved at him.

• Our initial joy followed by sadness at the loss of a new life when we endured a miscarriage together.

• Finding out you were pregnant again with Jonah!

• Our trip to San Diego doing everything we could during a magical vacation – even singing “Great Balls of Fire” at the piano like Goose and Maverick.

• How much you were a trooper while we waited in line forever at Chicago O'Hare Airport and got stuck in Chicago for 2 days.

• Giving birth to Jonah and nurturing his great energy, joy and enthusiasm.

• Staying faithful and loving me even when things have seemed rocky.

• Making each of our three houses into a home.

• Going on vacations and your always accommodating my desire to explore and find adventures along the way.

• Building sand castles with Jonah on the beach.

• Helping me see when I was blind in each of my eyes.

• Nursing me back to health and being by my side as I’ve endured a host of medical challenges in the past couple of years.

• Teaching Jake & Jonah and me about unconditional love through your words and actions.

Happy Anniversary! I love you very much!