Browse: Page 42
By J. Timothy King on December 26, 2008
The following was originally published at Dad-o-matic.
As we approach this holiday season, it seems we have little to be thankful about.
Still topping the news are stories of death and dire.
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Abraham Biggs, a Florida teenager blogs that he will commit suicide and then webcasts a video of the event, live, while viewers on the Internet wonder if it’s a hoax. His family is despondent and livid, and his father “is now calling for more [government] regulation of chatrooms,” even though his use of the term “chatroom” clearly shows he understands neither the technology or the psychology involved.
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Ashley Dupre reveals on national TV the “details” of her involvement with former New York governor Eliot Spitzer, whose political career was destroyed in a scandal of such magnitude that when people talk about the “details,” they still can’t bring themselves to say what really happened.
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Al Qaeda is still in the news, and we’re still apparently terrified by terrorists, meanwhile Palestinian militants fire a rocket at Israel, which lands in an industrial zone in the town of Ashkelon.
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Rights activists are livid that California Proposition 8 passed, and they have stepped up their campaign to have it rejected. Whichever side eventually wins, this will turn out to be a ruthless and bloody fight.
These are just some of the stories I pulled out of the “top stories” at Google News last week.
Meanwhile, the financial markets continue to ride a roller coaster. We aren’t officially in a recession yet, but analysts are predicting one with such certainty that everyone accepts it as a fait accompli. President-elect Obama in a radio address claimed “we are facing an economic crisis of historic proportions,” and he proposed massive, long-term federal hiring, spending, and hand-outs to compensate for the flailing economy. Continue reading “Don’t Underestimate the Objects of Our Thanks”
Posted in Economics, Politics
By J. Timothy King on December 19, 2008
An old friend of the family forwarded a viral email that asks the question “Would you run?” I’ll tell you how I answered it, but first let me reprint the relevant part of the email.
Imagine this happening to you…
One Sunday morning service, a 2,000 member congregation was surprised to see two men enter, both covered from head to toe in black and carrying submachine guns.
One of the men proclaimed, “Anyone willing to take a bullet for Christ, remain where you are!”
Immediately, the choir fled.
The deacons fled.
And most of the congregation fled.
Out of the 2,000, there only remained 20.
The man who had spoken took off his hood. He then looked at the preacher and said, “Okay, Pastor. I got rid of all the hypocrites. Now you may begin your service. Have a nice day!” And the two men turned and walked out.
So, would I have run?
Hell, yeah!
Look, just because some guy in riot gear carrying a gun tells you to stay put so he can shoot you for your faith, that doesn’t mean you have to listen to him! If you have the chance to escape, then you escape, with you friends and family if possible, and you never look back.
Do you think all the Jews who escaped from the Nazis were traitors to their faith? What about all the Christians who helped them escape, at great personal risk? (The penalty for harboring a Jew was summary execution.)
There is no triumph in dying for Christ, if you could choose to live for Him instead.
-TimK
Posted in Christianity, Libertarian, Politics, Religion
By J. Timothy King on December 18, 2008
Posted in Books
By J. Timothy King on December 15, 2008
I think I’m going to be sick. I thought of filing this under “Health – Weight Loss,” as a joke, but even I’m not that cruel. Another recipe just too disgusting not to take a look at. Like a fatal accident on the highway, everyone just has to slow down and take a peek.
From Bacon Today–and I swear I’m not making it up–via Radley Balko:
chicken stuffed in duck, stuffed in a turkey, all wrapped in bacon
Urrmmmmph. Please excuse me while I go dig up an antacid.
-TimK
Posted in Food, Recipes | Tagged bacon, chicken, duck, turkey
By J. Timothy King on December 12, 2008
Seen on Twitter & Facebook, courtesy of Allison Driscoll, a recipe for a woven bacon-cheese roll. This is definitely not kosher, and it may not even be legal in all 50 states.
-TimK
P.S. The subject of this post is blatantly and unabashedly ripped off from a funny Frasier quote, regarding “eggs in a nest”: “Ah, yes, the Crane family specialty. Fried eggs, swimming in fat, served in a delightfully hollowed out piece of white bread. I can almost hear my left ventricle slamming shut as I speak.”
Posted in Food, Recipes | Tagged bacon
By J. Timothy King on December 8, 2008
I finally got around to installing the new OpenOffice 3.0 on my MacBook Pro. The big feature I’ve been waiting for, of course, is that OpenOffice 3 now uses the native Mac GUI. Prior versions only used X11, and Apple’s X11 server kinda sucks. So using OpenOffice 2.4 is a less than optimal experience.
The first thing I did upon installing OpenOffice 3 is to open up my current manuscript. Now, when I write, I use a formatted document, as though I were typing words directly onto the laid-out book pages. This saves time in layout, because the book comes already laid out correctly. (However, I use style sheets, so that I can make changes to the layout, if need be, cheaply and efficiently.)
So the first thing I noticed is that the formatting of my book was all screwed up. Continue reading “OpenOffice 3.0 on My Mac– Now Reverting to 2.4”
Posted in Technology | Tagged OpenOffice |
By J. Timothy King on December 5, 2008
This has been simmering on the back burner for a while. I’ve put together a digital, open-ebook (OEB) version of The Conscience of Abe’s Turn. I have tested it, of course, using the Mobipocket Reader for Windows, but I can’t test it with handheld ebook readers that support this format, because I don’t personally have access to them.
In particular, I need to test with the major handheld devices that Mobipocket Reader supports:
- Palm OS
- Blackberry
- PocketPC
- Symbian
If you have one of these devices and you’d like to read (or at least to flip through) a free copy of The Conscience of Abe’s Turn (Season 1, Volume 1), please comment here or email me, and I’ll have a download link sent to you.
I’d also love it if someone could test with the Amazon Kindle. As I understand it, you simply have to upload the file to the Kindle using a USB cable, but I don’t know anything about the process. In particular, I’m a little unclear as to whether the ebook must have DRM in it. (My ebooks are not DRM-crippled, because DRM causes more problems than it solves, and it doesn’t even stop copying.)
-TimK
Posted in Books, Novels, Stories |
By J. Timothy King on December 4, 2008
During this holiday season, if you are thankful for a book you’ve read, or if there’s an author you want to do something special for, here’s a simple, free gift you can give them. It will only take a few minutes of your time, and the author will really appreciate it, more than anything else you could give them.
Here what it is: Write a simple, one-paragraph review–good or bad–of one of their books, and post it on a free site. I’ll show you how to write such a review easily and quickly. This kind of review is great for posting on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, GoodReads, Google Books, and other similar sites. You can even turn it into a quick blog post, with a little bit of enhancement. The review does not need to go into detail as to what the book is about, because that information is already on the pages where you’ll be posting your review.
Here’s how to write one: Continue reading “A Free Gift You Can Give to Authors: How to Write a Book Review (for a Fiction Book)”
Posted in Books | Tagged book review, critics, reviewers |
By J. Timothy King on November 28, 2008
It’s become a tradition in our family. My father did it when I was little, and now I try to keep the tradition going each year that I can. We put up a Christmas star.
The Christmas star is a large star that stretches across the ceiling. It starts with five anchors on the walls, close to the ceiling, in the direction of the five corners of the star. Then we put up a scaffolding made out of string or nylon wire, in the shape of a 5-pointed star. On this scaffolding, we hang streamers, twinkle lights, light rope, or anything else that will make the star visible.
For the past few years, my parents have kept the nylon-wire scaffolding up year-round in their place, making it easy to put up the Christmas star each holiday. This year, we used gold garland streamers to form the star. I’ll try to get a photo of it. For now, here’s a shot of the Christmas star from 2000 (which I just happened to have handy on my hard drive). It’s the first I engineered, and so it’s a little misshapen; the latest construction technique makes for a much more regular star. But this will at least give you an idea of what I’m talking about.
-TimK
P.S. From the above photo, can you tell where the TV is in the room.
Posted in About Tim King
By J. Timothy King on November 27, 2008
I can’t go into the details (although I hope to be able to tell you the whole story someday). It has to do with my brother and his job. Basically, he ended up sleeping with bed bugs, and now he’s looking forward to a visit from the exterminator.
That story prompted my dad to dig out this amusing little ditty that he wrote in 1965.
Ode to a Bedbug
Dear little bug that swims within a death-entangling flood,
In my abode you found no sin in feasting on my blood,
And now you rest forever, you who rested in my bed;
You once your satisfaction found, and now, I mine: you’re dead.
-TimK
Posted in Humor, Poetry, Writing |
