ani ruhama

“Once every hundred years, the planets come into alignment….“  And so it begins again.  In honor of this momentous occasion, all rise and clickee on the linkee.

HP’s website suggests how to Use your camera’s timer to take interesting photos.  Earlier today, the page included a brilliant idea:

“Utilize your timer for an experimental aerial photo. Set the timer and press the trigger. Watch closely as the timer ticks down. Right before it’s about to fire, toss the camera in the air.  Your camera will take a photo while airborne. Try this several times and you’ll end up with a photo unlike all the rest.”

As Engadget so aptly added: “Yeah, and a busted cam.”  Shortly after that comment, this intelligent suggestion mysteriously disappeared from HP’s website (so I’ve preserved it here for posterity’s sake).

Despite the craziness and sheer exhaustion of the past week, I’m now feeling more energized than I have in months. Perhaps life’s insanity finally forced me to not just sleep, but really rest. My mood isn’t particularly buoyant, my motivation isn’t unusually high, but all in all, things are good. I’m not tempted to take an extended nap the moment I get off work, I’m focused and alert, and thankfully finding a strange sort of peace in the midst of turmoil.

And I’m taking advantage of this energy, while it lasts, to get some tasks done I’ve been postponing too long. I’m dangling a carrot over my head as a reward when I finish: my latest stack of books acquired from the library. This week it’s an assortment of early Christian writings including the Apostolic Fathers and the Apocryphal Gospels, along with a couple books on the early history of the church (one written from the perspective of the West, one from the East). Good reading.

Google, following its longstanding tradition of giving us fun and occasionally useful toys like Google Moon and Google Suggest, has now announced GOOG 411, a free 411 service available anywhere in the United States by calling 1-800-GOOG-411.  To hear a demo call, check out Download Squad’s article.  Or better yet, try it yourself–it’s free.

I’m completely exhausted physically, emotionally, spiritually…but it was good, strange, beautiful, Pascha or Easter depending on your tradition. I think those 25ish hours I spent at church since Thursday have taken their toll…funny thing.

And now I come home and sink into my bed and try to fall asleep with thoughts fighting for prominence in my head. Fellowship and loneliness. Disconnected, coming home. Fear, peace, confusion, reconciling head and heart isn’t easy on the best of days, and trying to vocalize the jumble in midst of it all, near impossible.

My heartfelt thanks and love to those who’ve lent a listening ear, friendly word, or simply a comforting presence along the way. You remind me it’s much about the journey as the destination, vastly reassuring when I don’t know what road I’m on, let alone where it’ll lead.

Some days I almost believe. Others I just want to run away from it all. Don’t put any bets on me, whatever outcome you choose you’re liable to lose.  (I really didn’t mean for that to rhyme.)

But one thing is sure: Indeed, Christ is risen.

After the Apple Store was “down” for around an hour this morning, it’s back up with some beautiful news: Apple has released the 8-Core Mac Pro with two Quad-Core Intel Xeon processors. To upgrade from the standard 2.66 GHz quad-core machine to this new shiny 3.0 GHz 8-core will cost you a mere $1498…pocket change, right?

Now I just need to find a comfy chair, a fluffy pillow, settle down and wait patiently for Leopard.

-Incredible spiffiness for your Facebook-addicted Mac: FacebookSync.  Just released, thus buggy, but it works.  Pulls all your contacts into Address Book, including info like email, cell number, birthday, and screenname.  I’d recommend running it about 10 times, though, as for some reason it currently can’t pull in all your contacts in one go.  Keep an eye on it…I’m excited for future releases.

-A wonderfully useful Quicksilver reference guide in the form of wallpaper, thrown together by my buddy Klein.

-Thunderstorms.  Massive thunderstorms with lots of thunder and even more lightning…haven’t seen a real storm for months and months.

-Hummus.  Mmm.

-Bacon.  Sigh…

-And friends.  Friends are wonderful things.