For today’s installment, I’d like to direct you to one of the most sobering websites I’ve seen in a long time … Dear God. It’s chock-full of letters that people have written to Him … heartfelt declarations and messy questions, brutal challenges and saturated pleadings.

Be warned … these are real people, grown-ups with gritty stories and graphic imagery. But if you’re a mature adult, I’d say that it’s worth spending some time there, browsing the categories and peeking into the hearts of some beautiful people. Who knows … maybe you’ll even find yourself submitting a letter!

It was cool to find this random post about my marathon experience on the web today.

If you think the latest blast of winter weather here in America is cold, you should check out this Denver Post article by one of my fellow volunteer teachers in Hunan last year, Zach Reff:

Huang Zhi Ping was tired of being cold. His head buzzed, his ears stung, and his hands were too numb to take notes. So he took out a lighter and did what any other frozen 11-year-old would do: He lit a fire inside of his school desk. As his teacher, I suppose I should have been angry with him, but actually, lighting a fire seemed like a pretty good idea to me.

Welcome to winter in Hunan, China.

[continued]

I just read a very insightful New York Times article that looks at evangelicals in an entirely new light.

The article touches on some of the deep prejudices that exist towards people of faith … most of which are completely understandable, given some of the ridiculous stances and statements the church and its spokesmen have made in the last century. It also exposes some of the unique and surprising things that are being done in the name of Christ.

Scorning people for their faith is intrinsically repugnant, and in this case it also betrays a profound misunderstanding of how far evangelicals have moved over the last decade. Today, conservative Christian churches do superb work on poverty, AIDS, sex trafficking, climate change, prison abuses, malaria and genocide in Darfur.

If you have a minute, it’s worth a read!

I was planning to post a new challenge this morning to get you guys more involved in the Facebook Giving Challenge. I’ve even got some gift cards that I was going to give away as prizes … we all like getting stuff, right?

After reading the following message from Amy Eldridge, the director of Love Without Boundaries, however, I felt that that the best thing I could do today would be to pass her message on to you. I don’t want to cheapen it with gimmicks or distract us from the whole point. So here it is … do with it as you will!

My message is a bit long today but I hope you will read it to the end. We have just 24 hours left in the Giving Challenge contest on Facebook. 24 hours to try and stay in the lead. And we can’t do it without you.

As I type this, I am staring at the photos of 12 babies who are hurting because they were born with heart disease. Their eyes truly haunt me, first because they are orphaned and as a mother it is hard to accept that any child has to be sick without a mom or dad to comfort them….but second because I know that without surgery, the pictures I have of these children might be their last. Do you know how small a baby’s heart is? And how fragile an orphan’s life is when that tiny heart has a defect? These pictures are of children who are blue, children who are tired, children who NEED OUR HELP.

I also have on my desk the photos of children whose hearts we have healed. They stare out at me with pink cheeks and smiles, and in many…with their new adoptive families. THIS is what it is all about. Saving lives, giving a second chance, and allowing a child to find their family and know complete love.

In the next 24 hours we have a chance to give the GIFT OF LIFE to 10 more children in need. The charity with the most unique $10 donors at 12 noon PST on February 1st will win $50,000. Heart surgery in China averages just $5000 per child, so with that prize….ten children can have a second chance at life.

I am not going to ask you today to find 10 more donors, or even 5 more donors to help us. I am asking you to find just ONE person in your life that hasn’t donated and to ask that person to please help you save a life. For just $10. If all of us do this, we could have over a thousand new donors in just one day.

How often do we spend $10 on things that last just a moment?

$10 for two fancy coffees, $10 for a movie and popcorn, $10 for a dinner out. How about for today, for the next 24 hours, we all find $10 for something that will last a LIFETIME. $10 to save a baby’s life and allow a priceless child (who is orphaned and totally innocent) to get a second chance at finding a family to love them.

Find just one friend in the next 24 hours, and encourage them to join our cause and donate. $10 for the life of a child. Of all the money you have spent this week….this might be the most important.

Thank you EVERYONE for keeping LWB in the running for the top prize. We love our supporters and give thanks everyday for the amazing generosity, compassion, and kindness you show to those who live as orphans each and every day. We truly are a family, bound together by the belief that every child born on this earth matters.

Here’s the link! Let’s do it for the kids.

Amy

Alright, now’s the time to step up.

If you don’t already have a facebook account, just create one. Then go to the LWB page, join the cause, and donate $10. That’s all!

Not only is the $50,000 monthlong contest neck-and-neck, but LWB is also currently in third place in today’s contest. If they get twelve more $10 donors today, they’ll get an additional $1,000 to help the orphans of China!

So what are you waiting for? You’re not seriously going to walk away from this, are you? Clickity click!

I need $10 from you on Tuesday. It could save lives.

Here’s the deal. Facebook is holding a contest to see which non-profit organization can get the most $10 donors this month. If Love Without Boundaries (the organization I work with in Loudi) wins, it will receive $50,000 to use for emergency surgeries for orphans in China. That’s a whole lotta cash!

Believe it or not, almost a thousand people have already donated to LWB this month … and it’s now in second place, 60 donors behind the current leader. I have more visitors than that to this website every day … so if you and a few of your friends will commit to donate on Tuesday, we can close that gap and win $50,000 for these precious and hurting children.

Here’s how:

If you don’t already have a facebook account, just create one. Then, on Tuesday morning before noon, go to the LWB page, join the cause, and donate $10.

It’s that easy.

If you’re seriously considering closing this window without doing anything, I ask you to reconsider. The sacrifice is so small but the payoff is huge … the race is so close that your choice is actually really meaningful, potentially mobilizing a network of physicians and caregivers to step in and rescue these kids who are desperately in need of surgery. Suck it up and give, dude.

I’d also love it if you’d spread the word through your blog or facebook account … let people know how far their $10 can go to change a life. Last year you helped to raise $5,000 for these orphans … now’s the time to add on another zero (and a whole lot more hope).

Let’s do this!

I don’t usually go for top ten lists, but this one of personal growth lessons from children just makes me happy.

1. Tomorrow’s Gonna Be a New Day.
2. Sometimes it’s Better to Make Up Your Own Rules
3. Don’t Be Afraid to Show Your Enthusiasm.
4. Feel your emotions fully.
5. Walk On Walls Whenever Your Have The Chance
6. Sometimes you have to do it alone (even if there’s someone right there who could help you).
7. Know When to Ask For Help.
8. Don’t be attached to what you painted yesterday (or 2-seconds ago).
9. Singing Makes Everything Better.
10. Dance like no one’s watching (even when you’ve made sure that everyone is!)

Number five is fantastic. But number eight seems to be the one that I’m dealing with a lot lately … I’ve been going through tons of boxes full of old memories and things that I’ve made and trying to decide whether or not to keep things. I’m really starting to think that the author’s reasoning is right … holding onto old creativity ends up stifling new creativity.

That’s also the reasoning behind one of my biggest gripes with the idea of copyright … I feel like true artists shouldn’t need to rely on a system that glorifies old handiwork and discourages innovation and reinvention. Doesn’t it just turn them into tools?

So … how do you move a pool table?

Ok … don’t ask me why, but I was wondering the other day what would happen to the human body if it was exposed to the vacuum of outer space. You know, without a space suit and all that jazz.

Now, I’m not a big fan of NASA and all of their wasteful shenanigans … but according to this website, it actually happened once in one of their tests:

At NASA’s Manned Spacecraft Center (now renamed Johnson Space Center), we had a test subject accidentally exposed to a near vacuum (less than 1 psi) in an incident involving a leaking space suit in a vacuum chamber back in ‘65. He remained conscious for about 14 seconds, which is about the time it takes for oxygen-deprived blood to go from the lungs to the brain.

The suit probably did not reach a hard vacuum, and we began re-pressurizing the chamber within 15 seconds. The subject regained consciousness at around 15,000 feet equivalent altitude. The subject later reported that he could feel and hear the air leaking out, and his last conscious memory was of the water on his tongue beginning to boil.

Yikes! I think I’ll keep my day job …

This makes me happy.

[via ze]

Over the past couple of weeks, you may have noticed the link on the right of my website to a new photo contest called Capture Cincinnati. It’s actually pretty cool … my photos have been in heavy rotation there, even getting featured on the main page!

At this point, there are only three days left in the contest … and I just realized that I might actually want to take this thing seriously. If my photos end up in one of the top spots, you see, they’ll get published in a coffee table book … and I can even win some sweet prizes (like a $100 Target gift card or a brand new digital SLR camera). After all the time, money, and energy that I’ve poured into photography, it’d be nice to get something tangible!

If you’re feeling particularly interested, you can browse (and vote for) my other 32 photos. And feel free to pass this along to your friends and fam … the more votes these photos get in the next three days, the more likely I am to walk away with something worthwhile.

Thanks a lot!

Note: Voting for this contest has ended. Thanks!

I’ve long felt that the “www.” in web addresses is unneccessary and redundant. Originally, it specified that an address was on a webserver (i.e. not an email or ftp server) … but we already use “http://” to do essentially the same thing. Why not drop those four extra characters that keep cluttering up our addresses? Simplicity is king, and users deserve usability!

Luckily, it’s easy to politely and silently redirect users to the bare domain name (like mine does … http://www.webel.net automatically takes you to http://webel.net). Here’s how, thanks to No-www:

All you need to do is create or modify a file called .htaccess located in the root directory of your site and add the following [three] lines, changing the red text to match your domain.

RewriteEngine On
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^www\.domain\.com$ [NC]
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ http://domain.com/$1 [R=301,L]

If you happen to link to webeldotnet, please take a moment and make sure that there’s no “www.” on your link. That little change would really help me to clean a lot of clutter up with search engines and directories. Thanks!

Check this out … it’s the Top Ten Letterman Top Ten Lists. In my opinion, it’s a pretty funny idea that should’ve been done a long time ago.

My favorite? Hands down, it’s the Top Ten Ways the U.S. Would Be Different If Evel Knievel Were President:

10. Nation’s interstate system would include regularly spaced jump ramps.
9. Giant flame decals added to side of Air Force One.
8. More fatalities at annual Easter egg hunt.
7. Court packed with judges favoring 270 mph speed limit.
6. Secretary of state would wear special suit to greet diplomats while on fire.
5. Son Robbie Knievel would be screwing up S&L industry.
4. While jumpsuit de rigeur at state dinners.
3. Quayle would still be Vice-President — but his kids would take him seriously.
2. Americans closer to dream of seeing guy jump over his own face on Mt. Rush more.
1. More babies named Evel.

Congratulations to Marissa Shoji, my student, locker neighbor, and runner back in Cincinnati, for her run in this year’s Scripps National Spelling Bee.

She not only dominated the local and regional competitions … she also made it onto ESPN, where she got past the first five rounds and finished 16th in the entire nation!

Check out Marissa’s words in the national semifinals:

1. Multiple Choice Test:
   1. icicle
   2. hawthorn
   3. bizarre
   4. colossus
   5. tarantula
   6. ciao
   7. malocclusion
   8. succorance
   9. demur
   10. solmizate
   11. mien
   12. Ananias
   13. takt
   14. halobiont
   15. peirastic
   16. retablo
   17. Tetrazzini
   18. haricot
   19. syssarcosis
   20. vernier
   21. quale
   22. noesis
   23. scytale
   24. ylem
   25. Bewusstseinslage
2. particular
3. inertia
4. circumbendibus
5. butyraldehyde
6. beurre

Wow … it just hurts my head to look at those. The word that got her, “beurre”, is french for “butter” (I guess they ran out of English words). All I can say is … absolute brilliance.

Congratulations, Marissa!