It is another gray Friday, though not so cold. Maybe some takes will make the sun shine.
One
Just read this—had to because as soon as I clicked on it I was reminded that I have read half of my allotted articles for the month. That’s what I do now, I skulk around the internet trying not to click on anything accidentally, fearing to use up the allotted number of free articles on ones I don’t care about. This one turned out to be pretty fascinating though. It’s in Vanity Fair, in case you’re counting too, and it’s about the government crack down on the film industry, including the disappearance of China’s most famous actress, Fan Bingbing. I must confess, it was the charming name that kept me reading. Have been in the habit of skimming articles about Christians in China, so this was an interesting different angle.
Two
Haven’t had time to go down and rub water and wax over the lettering on our interesting basement discovery.
Hope to this weekend. But a little research indicates it was probably directly under the furnace, which would have been an enormous, squat, glory of heat pumping all over the house through enormous pipes. The whole basement was probably given up to it’s round, snaking, fat tubes. And the house would have been toasty warm, all of it, because coal was cheap and plentiful.
The house is still very warm, even with a much more efficient and earth friendly furnace. Except the kitchen, which was remodeled in the 80s with no thought for energy efficiency and temperature.
Three
Speaking of the kitchen, Matt has indulged me in a festival of pegboard.
He hung a big piece on the one open section of wall, and now another one on the other wall and eventually over the window. I don’t have new pictures. I just wanted to say that it’s the best thing ever, and if you don’t know what to do with your kitchen or your life, just hang pegboard everywhere.
Four
Someone commented on my post from whichever day this week that they ‘don’t buy it’ that humility is a good way to happiness. Lots of humble people aren’t happy, therefore, I must be wrong.
I might be, but I would just quibble over the definition of happiness. I didn’t bother to define the way I’m using it, which, of course, is not the way ladders.com or any secular person would. Indeed, on Flipboard this morning, the first article in the Happiness section is about how to make some number of millions of dollars without trying very hard.
Five
Becoming humble isn’t a fun or happy experience, of course. It is desperately unhappy because often it involves true humiliation, and weakness, and having things that you most wanted taken away from you. If you find yourself cast down upon the ash heap by God and you double down and get angry, of course you will be even more unhappy. But if you cling on to God and let all the things that he is methodically taking away from you fall away, you will discover the truest, deepest sort of happiness that can only be found in him. It’s not fun, it’s not pleasant, it’s not earthly temporal happiness. It is the peace that passes any human understanding.
So we’re both right.
Six
I’m having to charge my tiny Bluetooth keyboard that I use with this tiny tablet and so am typing in the old way—painfully, on the screen, shoulders hunched, pain screaming up my left arm. It is making me exceedingly unhappy. I could stand up and go fetch the keyboard which probably has sat there long enough but I’m too lazy. This probably bodes well for the rest of the day.
Seven
Go check out more takes. I’m going to avoid everything important and read more about China.
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