mayfly

As a part of the modern state of Israel’s 60th anniversary celebration, an International Bible Quiz has been arranged.  The contest has come under fire from certain quarters because a Messianic Jewish teen is included among the finalists.

Bat-El Levi (great name) is a 16 year-old who won an Israeli national Bible quiz to place among the finalists.  She belongs to a  Messianic congregation.  I understand the controversy, but I would hope that all parties would acknowledge that Bible study and knowledge are desirable, even for those with whom we disagree.

I haven’t posted much lately. End of semester and graduation events, the move to a new house, and coaching baseball have kept me away from the blog. Amid all the happy chaos, I want to briefly note a life milestone for the blog.

Tomorrow (May 7), Mary and I mark twenty years of marriage. We were married in Searcy, Arkansas on a blisteringly hot Saturday afternoon in 1988. Twenty years, six babies, several moves, and a few gray hairs later, I still count that day as blessed.

Henreda Jones was my 9th grade typing teacher at dear old Alamo High.  I ended the year hitting about 65 wpm on an IBM Selectric.

On a Royal manual, I topped out at about 40.  The intervening (almost) 30 years, though, have not been kind to my skills.  I got through college and graduate school typing my own papers, but now I rarely type anything longer than a blog post or the ocasional handout for church classes.

Word processing has made me a lazy typist, but not nearly as much as my transcriptionists have.  I just speak scarcely intelligible murmurs into a dictaphone and out come letters, notes, and even scientific papers!  It’s like magic.

Anyway, test yourself here.  You can even “race” people from around the www.  Don’t try to cut and paste the sample paragraph.  It won’t work.
How fast can you type?

Why, naturally, it is this one.

My site statistics indicate that the little post and links about Victoria Beckham’s Hebrew tattoo is the most-viewed, most-linked page in the blog’s history.  In a bit of meta-irony, that post was commenting on the unseemly popularity the topic held for readers of John Hobbins’ Ancient Hebrew Poetry and Tyler Williams’ Codex Biblical Studies sites.

This revelation has prompted my new career as website consultant.  To increase the traffic (and hence the advertising value) of any website, there should be liberal mention of Victoria Beckham, her alter ego Posh Spice, and plenteous discussion of tattoos.  You are very welcome.  Think nothing of it.  Te nada.

I am coaching the 13 and 14 year-old Little League-Junior League team. Above is the end-result of an online design tool I used to order our uniforms. The real deal ought to be here today, so we can see how the reality matches the virtual.

The following is my baseball coaching philosophy:

1. Baseball is fun.

2. Everybody gets to play, but playing time is based on the Five A’s:

Ability (better players will play more at this stage)
Attitude (it matters how you treat the game, the coach, and your fellow players)
Availability (you gotta show up for games and practices)
Age (14s get some preference over 13s)

Afro (If all else is equal, the kid with the biggest ‘fro starts.)

Oscar Gamble

3. Swing the bat. It’s not that we are disappointed in walks, but we sure don’t look for them. I encourage the umps to have a big strike zone to foster the idea that we’re here to hit the baseball.

4. Run the bases hard. Until we see evidence to the contrary, we’ll assume every catcher’s arm is suspect and we’ll test every outfielder by stretching singles to doubles, doubles to triples.

5. You play defense with your feet. More practice time is spent getting everyone into the right defensive positions on the field for each play than we spend on glovework. Watch any amateur baseball game and note that most errors (and non-plays) are from players not being in the right place, like failing to back up throws, rather than from flubs and bobbles.

6. Pitch location is more important than movement. At this age, too many kids want to throw curves, slurves, sliders, and gyroballs. We’ll throw 80% fastballs and we’ll learn where to put the ball. A good straight change with deceptive delivery is as valuable as an Uncle Charlie. One of my starting pitchers does have a nasty deuce that he can throw as an “out” pitch, but I won’t let him rely on that.

7. Small ball is good ball. Bunts, hit-and-runs, steals, and sacrifices are the keys to a slump-proof, consistent offense. With the center field fence at 335 (at least for home games) not many of my guys are going to go yard anyway.

8. Baseball is fun.

(Photo shamelessly ripped from Andrea’s blog)

Linda and Tom are pictured above with my parents and three groups of three…my three nephews, their three cool wives, and three little ones.

My sister (and first babysitter) Linda celebrated a birthday yesterday.

She is 30…..in Martian years. Happy Birthday!

For almost ten years, our family has lived in a historic old house called “Aquone“.  I never thought I would live in a house with a name and, true to form, I pronounced the name of my own home incorrectly for several years.  (It is pronounced uh-KWAN-ee, which is supposedly a Cherokee word for “resting place”.)  While we have been the owners of the place, we have generally seen ourselves more like caretakers of a local treasure.  It has been a very pleasant place to live and raise our children.  It has been the first and only home for our youngest three.

Samuel Cole Williams

Built by noted jurist, author, and businessman Samuel Cole Williams in 1923-25, the house is on the National Register of Historic Places and is lauded by the Tennessee Historical Commission’s register.  Located in the heart of Johnson City, the grounds are filled with towering oaks and tulip poplars.  I have especially loved Judge Williams’ two-story library where he wrote many of his books.  Judge Williams modeled the home on a colonial house he visited in Maryland and the library was intended as a replica of Sir Walter Scott’s study at Abbotsford House.

Plaque at front gate

It is time for us to move on, but we’d love to find another good caretaker for the place.  If anyone is interested in loving an older home in a beautiful part of the country, just drop me a line.

More on Judge Williams by my friend Frank Williams, Ph. D.

We’re soon on the move to a new home outside Jonesborough, Tennessee.  After nearly a decade in our present house, we’re downsizing a little and moving out of the “city”.  Jonesborough is Tennessee’s oldest town, having been founded in 1779 when the area belonged to North Carolina.  One of the administrative centers of the abortive State of Franklin, Jonesborough served for a time as the home of young Andrew Jackson and his early law practice.

Jonesborough 

I just got back from Science Camp! I was blessed to attend Janie’s Fifth Grade Science Camp as a chaperone / medical resource at Camp Explore. The University of Tennessee conducts three and four day camps for kids at this camp in Greene County.

The camps center on ecology themes and the children conducted experiments on oxygen content of ponds and streams. The also analyzed other components of air and water quality, learned about plant and animal life cycles.

The spent time learning about the geologic history of our reason and they explored a terrific fossil collection.  Janie was allowed to bring a crinoid calyx home with her.  She was excited to give her little sister a gift that was almost 400 million years old.

Classroom units allowed the children to help solve a “crime” using gas chromatography. They built and fired rockets, learned about pH, got to hold snakes and a legless lizard, and saw a bee swarm on the move.

Some activities were learning disguised as fun. They learned about Newton’s laws of motion while paddling canoes on the lake and playing on climbing walls and zip lines; they learned about navigation using a compass course; and they learned about mass and acceleration by firing muzzleloaders and .22 rifles (we are in Tennessee, after all).

I knew Janie was a bright girl, but I was pleasantly surprised to discover she’s also the best shot in her class. Janie put five bullets in the circle from 50 feet!

Jane with black powder rifle

Janie in foreground for prone .22 firing

Janie also learned to use a jigsaw, table saw, belt sander, drill press and a router.

Big fun in an Appalachian Spring. I didn’t miss being at work one bit.

Move over Steve Austin, the real world is catching up with sci-fi. UK researchers have implanted first generation bionic eyes.

Although bionic eyes are not yet at the sophisticated level that Geordi La Forge experienced with the VISOR, these first efforts are nothing short of amazing.