Love's Notes

Return of the Novice Blogger

2010-01-09T18:23:00.000-06:00

Wow, it's been nearly five years since I started this blog, and almost three since I last wrote in it. Since then I've been greatly distracted, or else I haven't had much to say. Last spring I put together a website for my book. One thing that went along with it was a blog, and I wrote some things in it, some of them being repeats of my adventure series in this blog. More recently there was a redesign of the website, and a new blog went along with it. I thought I was going to do away with this one and the second one, but I think I might keep all three, which is probably kind of stupid for a guy who hardly ever blogs. Maybe I'll do better, though. We'll see.

Penguin Backlash?

2007-07-27T21:30:00.000-05:00

Since March of the Penguins came out, many movies and books featuring penguins have followed it. I've felt the possibility of overdoing it, which isn't good for me, because my book is also primarily about penguins. I haven't done a great job of promoting it, and as a result it isn't very well known, even though people who've read it seem to to like it a lot. If I was a great marketing guy, I would have jumped on the penguin bandwagon when March of the Penguins and Happy Feet came out. I still hope my book will catch on, but I'm afraid people are on the verge of being tired of penguins, and my book will be looked upon as "another stupid penguin book" trying to cash in on the popularity of penguins, even though my book was published before all these other things. Whatever the case, penguins are still swell people, and it's not their fault.

A Response to Carter's New Book

2007-01-11T22:53:00.000-06:00

Hats off to the 14 members of an advisory board at the Jimmy Carter Center who resigned this week. The former president’s new book comparing the apartheid of South Africa to Israel’s treatment of the so-called Palestinians is ridiculous. Because of it, the advisors said they couldn’t associate themselves with Mr. Carter’s work any more. It’s good to see someone making a stand for the truth.

Israel and the Church

2007-01-10T22:45:00.000-06:00

The center of world events in our time is the Middle East. Events happening there have affected the stability of the rest of the world. We can’t afford to ignore it, but what can we do?
God told Abraham, “I will bless those who bless you and curse those who curse you.” That is a promise that is passed down to the heirs of Abraham, those who are descended from his son Isaac. Those people are the Jews, and their homeland is Israel. The Church and what is called Christianity in general have been at best complacent toward Israel throughout history, often much worse. It’s time for those of us who call ourselves Christians to speak up in support of the Jews and the nation of Israel, and even to confess the sins of complacency and the terrible persecutions that have been done in the name of Christianity.
Some are afraid to favor Israel because they fear their enemies who have the tendency to blow up people they disagree with. Some think that by backing their enemies and pressuring Israel to give up land, peace will come to the region. The demands to give up more land won’t cease until Israel is no longer there. The radical followers of Islam have said plainly that their goal is the annihilation of Israel. The supposed peace process is a sham. It’s time for us to see it for what it is and stand up for what is right and true. Israel isn’t perfect, but they are only fighting for their lives. They only go on the offensive when something needs to be dealt with in the interest of their national security, but anything like that gets portrayed as “Israeli aggression.”
So the question remains for Christians: Do we believe what the Bible says, or are we just playing church? Will we stand up on Israel’s side or remain complacent, or even side with those who want to destroy Israel?

Spontaneous Generation

2005-08-11T22:19:00.000-05:00

I remember in my school days learning about the Dark Ages—those days when people were stupid and believed in things like spontaneous generation. The idea was that if you left garbage like old rags and food lying around in a box , after a while mice would form there. This was taught with a condescending air, of course. We were supposed to think, "How foolish people were then and how far we’ve come in our knowledge of science."
I wonder if scientists in future generations will look back at ours and think, “How stupid those people were in those days. They believed life could form out of nothing and become increasingly complex on its own, given enough time. They multiplied the time it took whenever they felt they needed more time for the whole process to work out in accordance with their beliefs.”
I guess I have to ask, “Does anybody really believe this? Is there some reason they keep promoting it as the truth? Is it that they don’t like the alternative?”

Review of Fly Like a Penguin

2005-08-03T21:17:00.000-05:00

I recently discovered a review of my book at bookideas.com. Many thanks to John Hoh for a nice review. http://bookideas.com/reviews/index.cfm?fuseaction=displayReview&id=2595

Some thoughts on reading

2005-07-22T11:32:00.000-05:00

I like reading. It’s one of my favorite things to do. I have a long list of books I want to read, but I wonder when I’ll ever get a chance to do so, and I’m sure many other books will be added to the list.
I have two categories of authors—classical and contemporary. Classical authors are all dead. Contemporary authors are for the most part still alive.
Most of my reading over the past five or 10 years has been classical books. I tend to go on binges of favorite authors. It started with Jules Verne. Around the World in Eighty Days has always been one of my favorite books. For a while I had to read everything he wrote. He wrote great stories, although sometimes he tended to describe things too much, especially in Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea. Then a friend gave me some books by George MacDonald. I had to read everything he wrote. I think this year I completed reading all of his fiction. A few years ago I read Oliver Twist by Charles Dickens. I wondered why I hadn’t read more by him. So I began my quest to read all of his stuff. I still have a long way to go, mainly because his books tend to be long, and he wrote so many. I’ve read about seven of them. C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien are also among my favorites. Other authors are on my list of books to read.

Until recently my contemporary authors included Frank Peretti. If anyone would have told me about an author who was as good as Peretti, I would have thought, “Yeah, right.” Now I’m rethinking this attitude. Actually I wonder if it’s a good thing to have favorites, especially if it doesn’t allow others into my circle. A few years ago, I opened the door to try someone new. It began with Randy Alcorn, and that was good. Then more recently Ted Dekker. He’s had books out for a while now, but I hadn’t heard of him until about a half year ago, and now he’s my latest binge. The first I read was his Circle Trilogy, which was like reading C.S. Lewis’s space trilogy for the first time when I was enthralled with the imagination of a new world and a great story. Recently I read Robert Whitlow’s The List, and that was good.
The point of all this is that I’m learning and growing. All these writers have something to offer, both in the realm of imagination and enjoyment of a good story and in learning about how I fit in the plan of God. These people aren’t in competition. They complement each other, even though I might like one writer’s style above another, and some stories are just more interesting to me. Other readers might like other authors more, and that’s okay. For me, I just want to enjoy what I read, whoever it is, and try to learn from it.
I think I will have a series of blogs about some of the authors I’ve read, and this is somewhat of an introduction.

Infinity Past

2005-07-11T22:46:00.000-05:00

I’ve never heard scientists deal with the concept of the infinite past. They just deal with what to us are very big and pretty much incomprehensible numbers, like 10 billion years ago, or whatever time they feel they need for the formation of the earth and evolution to happen. I’ve never heard them question, “What was before that?” What was before the events leading to the Big Bang, or whatever the current fad theory might be?
Is it perhaps the case that an infinite past is impossible? It is impossible for us to comprehend it. Everything we know relates to time. Everything has a beginning. What happens if you follow the flow of events backward? How can you ever come to a beginning of all things? Then you would have to wonder, what was before that?
The only logical thing is that time is a created thing. There is a realm outside of time, one we can’t comprehend in this life. I’m not sure if we can even in the next, but I suspect so. God isn’t subject to time. He created it. He lives outside it, but can step into it if he wants. He created the universe and all life at the time he chose, which isn’t as long ago as the scientists insist we believe. If he is God, he can do what he wants, and the evidence for what the Bible said about it is much stronger than what the evolutionists have convinced the world to believe.

Adventure Series--The taking of Seattle

2005-06-27T23:29:00.000-05:00

This is a continuation of my last post, although a different adventure:
Later that summer we had a new canoe adventure, this time with Dave and another Bob, Bob M. Between Bremerton and Seattle is Blake Island which is a state park and is only accessible by boat. Our plan was to spend a night there, continue on to Seattle, head back to the west, spend the second night on Bainbridge Island at Fay Bainbridge State Park, and then go all the way around the north end of Bainbridge Island and back home to Bremerton.
After a late start we headed for Echo Passage, which is actually a part of Rich Passage. We passed the lighthouse at the entrance to the passage and Namu’s inlet. This is the point that a ferry from Bremerton to Seattle disappears from sight from someone viewing from my home in Bremerton.
We arrived at Blake Island as the light was beginning to fade. Landing on the north eastern side of the island, we set up camp. It appeared that we were the only ones there so we proceeded to joke around and make lots of noise. Finally we climbed into our sleeping bags and fell asleep.
The next morning we woke up at the crack of dawn and prepared for our departure on the next stage of our journey. As we looked around us we wondered how all those other people got there. Then we loaded up our canoe and snuck away.
Seattle didn’t look very far away as we slowly paddled in its direction. But it took a long time before it actually looked closer. We gradually crept up on Point Defiance Park on the southern shores of Elliot Bay, which is the harbour of Seattle. Landing on the sandy beach, we got out, stretched, and surveyed the territory. Downtown Seattle was still a pretty long canoe ride away, and going there would make it hard to complete our planned two day adventure.
We opted to cross directly from where we were to the north side of Elliot Bay and from there continue to Bainbridge Island. This was probably the second stupidest thing we ever did. Out in the middle of the Bay we were 3 dummies in a canoe in the territory of tug boats with big waves, ocean liners with big waves and ferry boats with big waves. And all of them were a lot bigger than canoes. But we were intrepid adventurers. We were terrified.
A few hours later we landed on the north shore of the bay which seemed to be a neglected part of the city. There were a few shacks on the beach that looked like they could fall apart, but I think people lived in them. We disembarked briefly to give our buns a rest and stretch our legs, but then it was straight across Puget Sound to Fay Bainbridge State Park. This was another gruelling ride that took longer than it looked like it should.
The water was beginning to get a little rough and night was upon us as we approached the park. We took on some water as we landed, and some of our sleeping bags got wet. We got a fire going to cook a meal and to dry out the bags. Dave’s bag got too close to the fire and got a little burned. At this point I believe we may have been getting tired of our adventure, although great adventurers hate to admit to such a thing, and especially that they might want to sleep in their comfortable beds at home. Whatever the reasoning, we got back in the canoe and headed north along the eastern shore of Bainbridge Island. I think it was about 10:00 pm.
I don’t think we realized how far it was around the northern end of the island. If we had, we probably would have slept in our wet sleeping bags. This turned out to be the stupidest thing we ever did.
At the northern end of the island, we paddled along in a fairly narrow passage with calm water. If we shined a flashlight into the water, little fish would jump against the boat. This was the last enjoyable part of the trip. As we rounded the last point to where we could see our side of Puget Sound (which should have been a very welcome sight) the water became rough. It wasn’t just mildly rough. It was very rough, the kind of rough a small boat shouldn’t be in, especially a canoe. We felt we had no choice but to continue toward home and our warm beds. I was the in the stern of the ship as the steersman, Dave was in the bow as the scout, and Bob sat on a box in the middle of the boat. Our plan was for me to steer us directly across to the other side, but the storm wouldn’t let me go that way. The waves carried us along more in the direction of home, so we ended up angling our way to the other side. We wanted to take the shortest route to get to safety on the opposite shore, but we ended up being carried more in the direction we needed to go towards home.
The ordeal of crossing Elliot Bay doesn’t compare with this one of being carried by huge waves in the dark of night, well past our bed time, in a narrow canoe with three 18 year old guys, great adventurers who wanted to go home. We wondered if we would get a chance to see home again. Panic tried to set in, but didn’t get a chance. We were too busy fighting the waves.
Probably a half hour or hour later we reached the other side and continued paddling with the current toward home, passing Illahee State Park, and then all the familiar landmarks closer to my house.
We were plenty sore and tired as we reached the end of our adventure at about 4 a.m. Dave said as we pulled the canoe out of the water, “The next time we decide to do something like this, let’s just torture ourselves instead.”

Adventure Series--a Night in a Canoe

2005-06-24T00:14:00.000-05:00

Shortly after our high school graduation, my friends, Dave and Bob J., and I decided to see what it would be like to stay out all night in a canoe. I lived on the waterfront and we had a canoe, so it could be done. We shoved off from the shore and headed for the other side of the bay. Our side is Bremerton. The other side is the other side, where foreigners from South Kitsap County live. I’m not sure how far it is across, maybe a mile. Being on the other side was like being in a different country, one that could be seen from your own, but one you wouldn’t want to live in. But it could be visited by boat, and explored and conquered for the motherland. That was our first mission of the night, to cross over and stake claim to this wild and unconquered territory.
Once that was accomplished we once again set sail, following the coast of our new domain until we came to a narrow passage. At this place is a little inlet, once made famous by Namu the killer whale who was kept there for a time.
Farther along we made the discovery of Echo Passage, a place where if you yelled anything on a very calm night at say, 1:00 in the morning, the very same thing would be yelled back at you. We were very proud of this discovery, and amazingly made it past this place with no attacks by the sleeping natives. Who knows how many of their curses we fell under.
Now on the other side of this passage is an island, Bainbridge Island. Of course, this too had to be conquered, which was done with no loss of life and no resistance from the natives. From there we headed back more in the direction of home. To continue as we were would lead us to Seattle, and we didn’t feel we had the time or the manpower to lay siege there. That had to be left for another adventure.
We followed the coast of the island for a while and then headed back to our side of the bay, but a mile or two down the beach where there is a park, Illahee State Park. On our way there I saw a fireball meteor. I could actually see fire coming off it as it fell toward the earth.
We landed and began our exploration as an army troop seeking out the enemy, one like you might see in the movies. We were in character, and Bob J. assumed command under the name of Monroe. He led us well, but all discipline broke down when Dave, who probably had a name like Kilroy, called him “Marilyn.”
By this time we were getting pretty tired. We slowly paddled our trusty craft back home as the sun came up over Bainbridge Island. Mount Rainier glowed orange as it towered over the trees on the far side of the bay. We landed back at the home base around 5:00. The other two headed for their homes and I went to bed.

The Adventure Series--Introduction

2005-05-10T23:40:00.000-05:00

I’ve lived a fairly quiet life so far, but I have some stories to tell about adventures that I’ve experienced. They’re not like Indiana Jones or anything else worthy of a book or movie, but they were fun times for me and my friends. Almost all of my adventures took place with my friend Dave. Usually others were along at different times. The others included Bob J., Bob M., Bob (Arch 2) M., Jorg, John M., Cousin Barb, and Barb’s husband, Joe.
It almost seems Dave was essential for having an adventure. He liked challenges, liked the outdoors, and had the ability to make any situation funny. Most of our adventures were in the mountains of Washington state. We took up mountain climbing in our college days and continued with it until I moved east about 5 years after college. Dave still spends a lot of time in the mountains.
Dave and I took a mountaineering class taught by people who were experienced in all the facets of the sport—rope management, rock climbing, glacier traversing along with dealing with crevasses, finding routes and everything else that goes along with it, much of which I can’t remember now. The class included a number of climbs in the Olympic and Cascade mountains. We were able to practice using ropes and ice axes, and we learned techniques of rock climbing. We also had practice with maps and compass.
That summer after completing our course, we were ready to begin climbing on our own. These were the days before it became extremely popular. We could choose a climb, and there wouldn’t be many others on the mountain. We eventually became known to ourselves as the World’s Worst Mountaineers, or WWM for short. We probably weren’t really that bad, but we had some outings that gave rise to that title.
Some of our other adventures involved canoeing. I think that’s what I’ll write about first, because they happened first.
The Adventure series will begin with my next blog.

Review of Frank Peretti's Monster

2005-04-30T23:05:00.000-05:00

This is Peretti’s first full-length adult novel in six years. I recently read all his other novels for the second time (This Present Darkness and Piercing the Darkness for the fourth time). To me this is his best since the Darkness books. He once again combines an interesting and exciting story with an important message. In this case he shines a little light on the monopoly of evolutionary teaching. The situation in this story is probably exaggerated in that the teachers of evolution are made to look like bad guys, engaging in intentional cover-ups and deception. There could very well be that sort of thing going on, but most evolutionists are probably just going along with the flow, with what they’ve been taught, never really questioning that perhaps the whole system is terribly flawed. Nevertheless, I’m glad to see Peretti dealing with it, because he can do it in a way to get people thinking.
There is a lot more to the story that makes it very enjoyable to read. The main characters are not super-people or even super-Christians. They are just ordinary people with faults and doubts. The circumstances they encounter cause them to re-evaluate themselves, and as a result are able to grow. The action kept me involved in the book all the way to the end.
I recommend this book for the story as well as the thoughts behind it.

The Novice Blogger

2005-04-28T23:28:00.000-05:00

This is my first blog. I'm hoping to do this reasonably often, but my time is limited. My access to a computer is limited because I have kids that like to do homework and IM on the computer. Well, I guess they like to IM anyway.
One thing I want to do is review books I read. I don't usually read books that are currently popular, but my first review will actually be a new book. I make an exception for Frank Peretti. I just finished reading Monster. Soon I will put a review of it in my blog. I may also review books I read a while ago, because I liked them.
Besides book reviews I would like to talk about things I remember, interesting things that have happened to me. Some of these thoughts may be from the distant past.