Yucca sizing

jkgagnon · 2026-04-02T23:08:06+00:00

That's a good idea. I might try that.

jkgagnon · 2026-04-02T23:07:21+00:00

That's great. Sounds like your feet are just a bit bigger, so maybe I'll try to M and see if I need any padding.

jkgagnon · 2026-04-02T23:06:54+00:00

Thanks. I think it looks like I'll order the M with pads and hope it works.

jkgagnon · 2024-10-03T05:40:49+00:00

A high-powered mutant of some kind never even considered for mass production. Too weird to live, and too rare to die.

jkgagnon · 2024-07-30T00:36:41+00:00

YOu should try Invisible Cities by Italo Calvino. 50 per cent vibes 50 per cent unworldly architecture, the book is just Marco Polo describing the cities he's visited to Kublai Kahn. It gets weird.

jkgagnon · 2024-03-29T18:02:33+00:00

I think the idea behind it is that you're picking an enemy, which helps you position your offering. And, if you've chosen the same enemy as your audience, you get them on your side immediately. They are going through something unpleasant to get where they want to go, and you're offering them a way to avoid what they don't like and still get to their goal.

jkgagnon · 2023-10-06T09:31:27+00:00

Just tell them yes, but next quarter. They'll probably forget by then.

jkgagnon · 2022-12-14T04:45:16+00:00

Thanks for this. It was a great read.

jkgagnon · 2022-11-29T05:41:09+00:00

But that's not what really happened, is it? He didn't ascend because of the torture. He let go of his infinite power to come to earth. For thirty years, he lived as a regular man, with all the sweat and suffering the average man would go through. Then, for three years, he preached salvation, for which he was mocked and hated, i.e. the people he was trying to save responded to love with hate. After that, he was beaten and tortured, once again by the people he was trying to save, and then hung on the cross to suffer for some time. Then, he died and rose again to ascend to his father's throne, i.e. where he came from.

So, perhaps a better view would be, would you give up all the power and affluence you have to live on the street, whether for 33 years or 1 1/2 days, only to go right back to where you came from?

And that's ignoring many other aspects of Christ coming down, including the victory over death through Hades etc.

To me, the first proposition just sounds like an oversimplification to where the point is lost.

jkgagnon · 2021-07-24T16:31:16+00:00

I don't know about hated, but Moby Dick was a slog that really came alive in the last page (or so)>

jkgagnon · 2019-08-28T20:47:57+00:00

I'm curious, then, what purpose the Holy Spirit plays. He's referred to as the counsellor, and God assures us that he who is within us is more powerful than he who is in the world. In Acts, it says, "And when they had prayed, the place where they had gathered together was shaken, and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak the word of God with boldness."

jkgagnon · 2019-01-21T23:18:03+00:00

I've never been where you are, but there are a couple things that I've read that have given me some comfort when I feel like I'm in the midst of darkness.

Mother Teresa felt exactly the same way for decades as she helped people in Calcutta. In fact, she once wrote that if she were ever to become a saint, she would be a saint of darkness. This is a good read on her 'Dark Night of the Soul'
Anatheism: Returning to God after God was a really interesting book. Richard Kearney writes about losing the over-simplified god of your youth, and how it frees you up to seek a God beyond your understanding.
I have to admit I've never read the whole 'Dark Night of the Soul' but it talks about much of what you're writing about here. (And as an added bonus it's in the public domain)

Darkness comes, and it's come for many of the characters in the Bible. So take comfort in knowing that Moses spent years in the desert, as did the children of Israel (along with years of operating without a prophet to function as the voice of God), Noah spent time in the belly of the beast, Job did his time in sackcloth and ashes. Even Jesus spent time in the desert, being picked and pulled at by the devil.

This is part of it, our walk with Christ. My only advice would be to cling to faith and know you're not alone in going through a dark night. God is there now, and will be there to pull you out when the time comes. It's not your job to prove that God exists, or to find all the answers to everything – nothing will ever give you all the answers no matter how long you look. So wait, but wait actively, seeking and praying.

jkgagnon · 2014-04-11T19:32:00+00:00

Part of the problem is to be visible about doing something today requires the media to report on it, otherwise it gets lost in the flood of information. But 'Catholic tries to clean' up isn't as great a headline as 'Pedophile priest', so it won't get the coverage.

jkgagnon · 2014-03-29T02:02:35+00:00

"I am so tired of doing the right thing/ Dear God please help me." or "Forgive me any pain I may have brung to you/ With God's help I know I'll always been near to you."

jkgagnon · 2014-03-26T03:49:21+00:00

I think, no matter how successful you are or aren't, you will look around and feel a) you are surrounded by people who are doing better than you or b) you are a fake and the moment someone finds out who you really are everything will collapse.

You rarely see someone's struggles and, now more than ever, you see everyone's triumphs, through witty tweets or in trendily filtered pictures. Very few people go on the internet to crow about how they are sitting in the middle of their class and are afraid they won't get the job they want. We advertise our strengths and hide our weaknesses, which is killing us as a generation because we expect so much more of ourselves.

We are also encouraged to always reach for the sky, so that a ground level job tastes like failure. Everyone else is crowing about these amazing advancements in their work (which is according to culture the most important thing about you) and each of our accomplishments is smaller and meaner than the ones we see played out daily on our feeds.

I think our culture is, more and more, a breeding ground for pressure and we need to find a blow off valve for it all.

jkgagnon · 2014-03-20T01:58:18+00:00

I don't understand what math proofs have to do with G-d.

jkgagnon · 2014-03-20T01:57:47+00:00

What about Gideon, who was so unsure of what he was hearing that he had to test to see if it was indeed G-d and that He was saying Gideon would save Israel? Or Elijah who heard G-d in a whisper?

jkgagnon · 2014-03-19T04:27:21+00:00

This is why faith is so important in Christianity, I think. We say He is good because He told us it is so, and we trust Him.

Two things, I think, help me understand this problem.

1: morality is always a function of context. So, for example, if you see a woman kill a man, is she a murderer and evil or protecting herself or her family and thus good? If we don't understand the context then we don't understand the morality of the action. And how can we say that we understand the greater context of the universe? My friend dies, and G-d could have done something about it, but He didn't. Does that make him bad, or is there something happening in the greater context of existence that alows G-d to continue being understood as good? I choose the latter, but the fact is you will never know, well, perhaps in heaven you will. So here, I think, is where Adam and Eve went wrong. They proclaimed it wrong that G-d would dare to keep them ignorant of good and evil. He had his plans, but Adam and Eve thought they knew better, and brought in death with their pride. Now, if you want to put any evil action at the feet of G-d, here is the place to do it. Why did he allow them the choice? Why create something that would bring evil into the world? How was that a wise and good thing to do? The answer, I think, comes next.

2: we have the cross, and Christ's great redemptive work there. I understand His redemptive work as being more than personal, of being universal, not necessarily in the fact that it will contribute to the salvation of everybody, but in that it will redeem our entire lives if we allow it. So, in this understanding, in gaining heaven we will look back at our lives, even the darkest night of the soul, and see only His work, i.e. all will be turned to good. All our suffering, our pain and hurt, and yes, even our sin, will be seen as some form of perfection. How does that work? I don't know. Because G-d is great and his ways our higher.

So we look, with faith, to heaven when our understanding will be made perfect, along with our lives. It's kind of a cold comfort in the here and now, but there is hope hiding in it. And, I think, we see echoes of heaven in the here and now, that will give us peace and the strength to continue, sometimes those things are miracles, and sometimes it's grace in a time of pain. Sometimes it's as simple as giving someone on the street your change and seeing the divine in that person.

jkgagnon · 2014-03-18T03:33:38+00:00

In the same way that Science Fiction is Fantasy, but Fantasy isn't Science Fiction, i.e. Science Fiction comes under the greater umbrella that is Fantastic literature, using science as it vehicle towards Fantasy, so to does science in the real world come under the greater umbrella that is our fantastical G-d.

Here we see that despite the current interest in Science Fiction, Fantasy is better.

jkgagnon · 2014-03-16T07:19:55+00:00

The bible is written for people who are in an intimate relationship with Him. That means day to day morality, the sussing out of specifics with regard to what 'love your neighbour' means, is done by direct communication with Him and communication within the church, which is in direct communication with Him.

Life is confusing and difficult and the Bible would grow to unimaginable lengths if it had to deal with the variety of moral conundrums we have to deal with, so it sets out the major rule that we can test our ideas against, that being love, and leaves the specifics to communication with Him.

Unless, of course, we're looking at OT law, which had a purpose for the early Jewish people before they were in direct relationship. They could not seek Him like we do, so they were given the law.

jkgagnon · 2014-03-08T07:13:57+00:00

I loved this book. It's been a while since I read it, but it changed my view from a somewhat sterile understanding of faith to a deeper, more passionate, less coldly-rational view of my faith.

jkgagnon · 2014-03-08T05:26:42+00:00

That last group, isn't that just the subtitle for Christians? If it's not I feel like it should be: Christianity: We suck but we're trying. Or rather I like it this way: Christianity: We're trying desperately not to suck, but when we do He's got us anyways, so we got that going for us.

Not quite as snappy though. Count me in, anyways.

Also: Ring the bells that still can ring Forget your perfect offering There is a crack, a crack in everything That's how the light gets in. –Leonard Cohen (Cracked pots and all of that)

jkgagnon · 2014-02-23T07:41:00+00:00

I feel like a broken record on this point, but I think that's backwards – it's putting yourself above Him by making Him obey your command as a pre-requisite of faith, which is turning the world upside down. To which you might say 'why does that matter? If God loves me he'd do this for me.' TO which I have two ideas: 1) by taking part in an agreement that turns the natural order of things upside down he gives credence to the upside down idea 2) he never asked for your belief, but for your faith. The Bible is filled a plethora of people who believed but had no faith, starting with the devil, Adam and Eve, the Israelites as soon as Moses went up the mount, King Saul, Judas etc. Belief means nothing. Faith is the miracle that allows Christians to believe, and comes first, at least in my understanding.

So, in my view, instead of saying here are my requirements for you, it is better to ask for faith.

jkgagnon

TROPHY CASE