No need for a spoiler alert...I know how to keep my mouth shut

So, I just finished the fourth installment of Harry Potter today. All I have to say is, "Wow! Didn't see that coming." Perhaps this J.K. Rowling character knows a thing or two about this writing business. Anyway, book number five coming up. But first I think I shall indulge myself with a brief dissertation on the correlation between Quantum Physics and Divine Action. Oh top-down, bottom-up causation, how I love thee.

My shmi-pod brings all the boys to the yard...

Ok, so for my twenty-fifth birthday some very wonderful people purchased me my very first iPod. Kinda sounds like the sort of thing Fisherprice might make. Anyway, receiving this present as a collaborated effort between my parents and Holly, along with all the other prizes she got me (the soundtrack to Wicked, some original recordings of MLK, a gift card to the local Apple store so I could buy a protective case for the shmi-pod, and so on) helped make this birthday, arguably, the best ever. And then after all the prizes and a little Chuck Shaw in the prayer garden we headed back to her house for what I thought would be a night full of cheese, crackers and West Wing. Instead, the was a whole surprise party awaiting me on her back patio. Wow. Anyway, I say all of this in order to kill some time while I download some podcasts (some from the NY Times, The Economist and of course ABC's This Week with my number one political man-crush, and Michael Bluth look-a-like, George Stephanopoulos--though, admittedly, he is still a close second behind Brad Pitt; there is just something about that chiseled jaw structure). Aren't these weekly-updated little bits of news, etc the greatest thing in the world (yes, of course, not as great as the salvific atonement our Lord Jesus Christ apportioned for all of humanity upon the cross at Calvary and then by raising from the dead three short days later, but then again I thought that might be a given by now--it has been our sub-context for nearly two millennia). Well, it looks as though i am finished downloading. Hope you all have a great day. Bye Bye.

Like looking in a mirror...

Today I spent the afternoon in good ole Fullerton, California hanging out with my nephew Samuel Richard Dunn. Cute little guy. No Crocs, and yet Holly seems to think highly of him (it's nice that my girlfriend's appreciation of my one and only nephew is not conditional like that). The thing with Sam is that he is a spitting image of me when I was one year old. Biologically it makes sense, because he is the son of my twin sister Jessie, nevertheless, it is kinda weird thinking it is like a little me running around the house calling everything in sight "dadda." His blue eyes, his thin, blond hair, his intrigue for shoe laces...all the same. Concerning those shoe laces, he happened to exhibit the greatest length of attention span his parents have ever seen today whilst playing with my shoes. What they didn't notice was the spell I cast over him--uncleus captivatum--that made him stop playing with his Thomas the Train toy--stupid push train--and pay some attention to yours truly.


Anyway, a pretty cool day in all, even though as I write this I am wallowing in my own sweat--it's really hot here in at my parents house.


Well, I hope everyone has a great day. Here's to making this a thoroughly commented blog posting.