No More Matts

I think I'm cursed. Or have a serious dating condition. It's always a Matt. The first boy I ever asked out for a preference dance- Matt. My first love ( and first heartbreak)- Matt. Two guys who have told me " I just want to be friends"- Matt. The worst player I've ever known- Matt. Now, I'm fairly sure (ok, only 87%) that there are great Matts out there. Just for someone else. Like my roommate- her boyfriend is named Matt and he's the best thing for her since macaroni. But last night's blind date Matt takes the cake. Ever heard the term 'Marvin ManyHands"? Yeah. This boy had more hands than a giant squid. Without too much detail, I'll just say that afterwards I went out to vent to a friend ( who laughed hysterically), came home and scrubbed almost all my top layer of skin off, and used half a bottle of Scope. And I have a cut and several bruises from escaping him. So, should I swear off all men named Matt altogether? Or be extra careful? Whatever the meaning behind all this, I can never name one of my children Matt. Darn. Not an actual picture of this creep, but an accurate representation.

TT: Azolla Fern and Lipstick

It's Tidbit Thursday again, so here you go:

• The Azolla fern is the plant that floats on top if the rice patties in Japan and Korea. Underneath the leaves of this beautiful fern, the cyanobacteria called Anabaena flourishes. Because of the amazing ability of this bacteria to fix nitrogen (that means covert pure nitrogen to ammonia), the rice farmers are now able to harvest 3 crops a year! Way to go bacteria!!
• The average woman today uses 6 pounds of lipstick in a year. And you thought the no one still wore lipstick.
• Mark Knopfler, the lead guitarist of Dire Straits, is the guitarist for the music of Princess Bride. Bet you didn't see that one coming.
• One year, 1969, during the draft for the Vietnam war the "mixing pot" for the draft wasn't well mixed and therefore the majority of November and December birthdays were drafted.
• The city of Jericho is the lowest point on Earth not covered by water. Does that add some significance to the story of Jericho?
• In "The Rime of the Ancient Mariner" by Coleridge, which can be construed as a Christ allegory, the lines about him seeing the water snakes and blessing them is reminiscent of Moses and the staff. One has only to look at the snake, believe, and be healed. Interesting.
• 1/3 of the four gospels focuses exclusively on the last week of Christ's mortal life.
• The words "fear not" appear 75x in the New Testament. What do you think they're trying to tell us?
• Each king in a deck of playing cards represents a great king from history:Spades - King David, Hearts - Charlemagne, Clubs - Alexander the Great, Diamonds - Julius Caesar.
• And speaking of Caesar... After Julius Caesar, "Caesar" became the official title of the emperor of Rome similar to the "Pharaoh" of Egypt. Caesar translates into other languages including "Kaiser" in German and "Czar" in Russian. Thanks Julius!

Have a great week! Knowledge is out there!

That Annoying Little Voice

You know what I'm talking about.

There is always that one person (okay, sometimes two people) in a class that make you cringe every time they start to talk. Whether it's answering a questions, voicing an opinion, or just talking to their neighbor- their voice makes you irritated and makes you want to have Teretts just so you can interrupt. I normally figure out that person fairly quickly and sit as far away as possible. That way I can't hear them quite clearly or see them, at least partially. The reason for my seemingly horrible reaction varies from class to class, person to person. Sometimes they ask questions about something the professor just explained while they were not paying attention. Others assume they know more than others, even the professor. Still others comment five or six times in a high piercing (brown-nosing) tone. And even more (yes, there are this many) that throw in their comments about random ideas at the most inappropriate times.

But what do you do when that little voice is in your head?

It's sitting in the front row and talking before you even call on it. It's shouting out the most ridiculous ideas and confusing all the others. That pesky little voice gives me a headache. It is saying garbage like "You don't belong here or with these people.", " You are never going to make a difference", and " You aren' t all that great anyway." Stupid little voice.

Sure we all have doubts, but we are giving in if we always let them have the floor. Take away their talking stick and put them in the corner. Let someone else have the floor- a voice that believes in you and where you want to go. Maybe a little bit of faith and hope. When the world says "Give up", Hope whispers "Try one more time." And at the point where hope would otherwise become hopelessness, it becomes faith.

Look out world, Faith is taking the floor.

Tidbit Thursday

I need a Tidbit Thursday- I'm just learning so many various things, that individually may not do a post justice, but that I want to share. So here's my first round of Tidbit Thursday!

• In the Romantic Era, Wordsworth, Coleridge, and Blake were pretty much unknown to the literary community and considered themselves junior collegues to poets such as Mary Robinson and Charlotte Smith.
• There are four kinds of fossils: casts, compression, impression, and permineralizations (petrified).
  
• The word "religion" in Latin means a strict binding or connection to something.
• Christ was already a God in the pre-mortal realm. (Found in Jesus the Christ by James E. Talmage)
• The great battle of Lepanto in 1571- the great victory celebrated all over Europe as a triumph over the Ottomans- barely caused a ripple in the Ottoman Empire. Despite the losses they had more of a naval fleet than any European nation and they quickly replaced their losses. They were so wealthy in fact that they could have replaced their losses with "silver anchors, silken rigging, and satin sails" as the Grand Vizier at the time (Lewis's What Went Wrong, pg 11)
• Florence Nightengale once said: "The . . . foundation of theology is to ascertain the character of God. It is by the aid of statistics that law in the social sphere can be ascertained and codified, and . . . aspects of the character of God thereby revealed. The study of statistics is therefore a religious experience." Interesting.

More to come next week : )