Life has not let up.  Still as tense and anxiety-prone as ever.  There’s been plenty of manna in the wilderness, for which we are thankful, but none yet with a promise of a regular weekly cycle.

So naturally, my procrastination tools have increased.  (Actually not really procrastination, because there’s not much to put off.)  I’ve been diving into social media much more than before.  I know some people think I’m an “early adopter” (what a self-flattering term!) because I blog and recommend LinkedIn.com etc.  But the truth is that I never IMed willingly in my life before this year.  And I have yet to text on my phone more than ten times in my life (mainly because I never know what it costs–I only “adopt” stuff that is free, early or late).

One of the things I did lately that I thought was insane at the time was revive my Facebook account (because one of those is like your immortal soul: it can sleep but never die).  I pretty much despise Facebook and all its works–except I don’t.  Among all the useless stuff I found that the IM works great and also some apps are not lame.  Like filesharing.  Awesome.

But that’s not the real thing on Facebook.  The real thing is that a bunch of old friends are finding Facebook and thus reconnecting with me.  And that is the key to Facebook’s value, I think.  It is an viral network of all your friends, family, and acquaintances (and sometimes their friends).  As juvenile as it is, it works because people participate.  (Participate by joining.  Most of the “apps” are useless and I disable them, except for the important ones.  Like the Buffy fan club: you will all receive my invitation soon.)

My favorite Reformed Theology blogs are:

• Wedgewords
• Calvin and calvinism
• Leithart
• Biblical Horizons
• Blog and Mablog
• Corrigenda Denu

Some of these are more than theology blogs.  Some have a lot more of the personal and others are simply too wide-ranging to be really classified as theology blogs.

Sometimes you renew acquaintances with people via the web and they are distant memories.  Other times you do it and, despite the distance, you realize that they have always been near to you and you’ve suppressed thoughts just to keep going through life.  And then you want to introduce them to all your children (who have never met them) because you realize they are part of who you are and that your children are missing a big chunk of you.  So you end up summoning your kids to your laptop and showing them pictures that mean nothing to them….  I used to assume that children knew parents best of all, but now I wonder how that could be possible, since they weren’t around us when we were growing up.

Yesterday I did yard work and then joined Jennifer in painting our “mud room.”  We painted it white and then laid down adhesive tile on the plywood floor.  It was an adventure filled with many more twists and turns, despite the simple description.  I got all the tile laid down that would fit without being cut.  I got some of the cutting done, but not all before retiring for the evening (“cutting” = regular perforations with an exacto knife and then breaking on dotted line: does not look as nice as hoped.  This morning Jennifer offered her sewing scissors which work much better.  She’ll have to have them sharpened now.)  I did a bit this morning and then made a stupid measuring mistake and decided to have a coffee break before continuing with the last few cuts and placements.  Thus, the time for this blog entry.  The room looks bright and cheery now, though my eyeballs are somehow naturally drawn to every mistake I made.  Jennfer tells me to remember how the room used to look.  But that’s the point: back then I could say that the room had nothing to do with my efforts.  Now it does.  But that is stupid and slothful and I’m glad Jennifer got us started on the project.  The proverbs say that laziness is rationalized by fear.  I think perfectionism (fear of not doing it exactly right) qualifies.  Perfectionism = sloth.  So now: back to work.