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Transcendent Thinking from a Biblical Perspective

One of the major flaws of transcendentalism was the rejection of organized religion in favor of the spiritual aspects that are inherent in mankind. Actually there were many flaws with transcendentalism. There is not a flaw with transcendent thinking, however.

I have this idea that I have been wanting to dive into for the past few weeks. I want to explore it and see if I can come up with a suitable cohesive theory. The idea is simple: that life is meant to be viewed in terms of the eternal rather than the temporal. The eternal life is where all of humanity is headed...so why get caught up in the never ending malaise of everydayness?

I am going to spend some time with this...and I have already received a bit of feedback on the external concept already. I do not intend on becoming one of those people who are so eternally minded that they cannot even enjoy life. We are meant to enjoy life in God, yet at the same time we cannot think about God without thinking of His eternal qualities and the gift of eternal life which he offers. Thus, even our enjoyment of what good is left after the fall of man is based upon presuppositions of eternality.

More to come on this subject when I get the time to research it. I fully plan on diving into this topic headfirst next semester, after I get away from institution for a while. This will involve much research, but it is something that I want to do just because I can do it.

Any comments?

Teeth Cleaning and Good Service

So I went to the dentist today to get my semi-annual teeth cleaning that I have somehow put off for 2 years. Well, a kind looking lady proceeded to wreak havoc upon my mouth with the above tool, and then she told me that I have a cavity. So, basically I have to go back in and let her wreak more havoc upon my mouth, which I'm sure she will enjoy.

I looked into a hosting solution for my future website, that being TCM Hosting Solutions, which came at recommendation. I went through with most of the registration process and then decided that I needed to wait a while to develop a bit of content before I go ahead with a purchase. One of the service techs from the company actually called me to see if there had been a problem with the method of payment I had chosen. The dude left his cell phone number w/ me to reach him back on. It's good to know that the company that I will be hosting with has that kind of relationship with their customers. Oh, and they're local. Seems ideal for a small-time blog oriented site such as mine. Regardless, I am still working on finishing up this semester of grad school before I make any move toward content design. 3 papers and 2 presentations stand in my way.

On another note, I submitted a conference paper proposal to the Tennessee Philological Association meeting, which will be held at Austin Peay State University. Hopefully I will get in. That'd be different.

Renovation

A new blog design and happiness are both soon to follow.

But ask yourself this vital question: which comes first?

1,000 fps slow-mo racing

I never knew that tires can "wad up" like that and not 'SPLODE! all over the place.

this never happens to me

I won tickets off of Lightning 100 today to see guitar virtuoso Tommy Emmanuel play at the Belcourt theatre on tuesday. I'm excited, supposedly he's really good and now I'm on the guest list for the show!

Pick-ups

Picked up the new Frank Black cd "Fast Man Raider Man" today at Tower on the way back from the public library. So far, so good. I really enjoy Frank's ability to migrate from rock to country rock so seemlessly. Not too many musicians could do that and still get everyone to take them seriously. As with every Frank Black album, however, it takes time to grow on you before you start to notice the amazing songwriting skills put forth on each song. He's probably one of the best songwriters in America right now, so seeing him on his upcoming solo tour might not be such a bad idea if you are into that sort of thing.

At the library, I borrowed Michael Savage - The Political Zoo and let me tell you, it's a riot! Check out this passage:

"Still, what most people remember of Alec [Baldwin], the political blowhard, is his claim that he would leave the country should George W. win the 2000 election.

Bon voyage moron.

Now Baldwin denies he ever made the claim.

Sorry, Alec. Such stale acting may have cut it in Pearl Harbor but not while Savage holds the keys to the cages. Alec Bald-faced-lie had his original statement caught on tape and verified by people within earshot. People like his own wife." - p.12-13

Gotta love the frankness of Mr. Savage. You owe it to yourself to at least get this book from the library.

Messed up knees and the blues, Thom Yorke in a tank.

Today was one of the longest work days in the world. Things are running very very slow right now because of the summer, so that means lots of time trying to find things to do to stay busy. I hate trying to find things to do to stay busy. To top it all off, and I'm not complaining just stating the facts, my knee feels like an 80 year old man's knee. I decided to play basketball after church last night for about an hour and a half, and now I have pain to deal with. I'm not THAT old to start deteriorating. Nevertheless, the day at work was mostly spent listening to Frank Black's assorted music (more on this to come in the future) and then me limping around trying to get things done that really didn't need to be done.

I rented a movie called Mirrormask tonight on the way home and will probably end up watching it tonight. It's the brainchild of Neil Gaiman of Sandman fame and Dave McKean, whom I am not familiar with at all. The movie is released under Jim Henson studios, so I expect something along the lines of Labyrinth, minus the disgusting codpiece of David Bowie (please, please not again!). The tagline is "Enter A World Where Dreams Are Real," and dreams are something that Gaiman is no stranger to. I'll be sure to write about what I thought about the movie, as if anyone actually cares about my opinion, or even worse, as if I am pretentious enough to imagine that anyone actually reads this blog AND also cares about my opinion.

While I'm feeling bloggy, I think that living life from song lyric to song lyric is a problem. Sure, songs are meant to be interpretive, but are they meant to be guidelines and applications for living life? Songs are expressions of a songwriter's experiences, how they see things, how they view life. That's great, and that's beautiful. It's a form of creation on small scale, another aspect of man that is God-given. Taking these writings and living life by them is not only shallow, it's wrong. Trying to find out who you are as a human being in today's world is hard enough as it is, but when you let music drive your life your identity gets caught up in a myriad of other people's experiences.

Finally, here's a music video with lyrics you should like, but not live by.

Dancing flowerpot puppets

A bit of web browsing turned up this gem, discovered on Frying Bear.

World cup streaming and parkour!

View the World Cup on Random // Slant!



Ok, whatever.

Today I have a story. I made a delivery with my co-worker to a certain hospital in Nashville. It was a routiene bed delivery except for the fact that it was almost 4 when we left my place of work and we quit at 5 every day. So, we were a little pushed for time and were trying to make it as quick as possible. We found the room and delivered the bed, but could not put it in the room due to an airborne disease which was present in the room. No big deal, right? WRONG! We have to get paperwork signed saying that, hey, we dropped off this equipment and these are the correct item numbers on the equpiment. Anyone can sign, as long as we have a signature. Well, apparently noone likes to take responsibility for these types of things in hospitals, so we eventually got directed to this evil, evil man who was sitting behind a desk. My coworker said "We just need you to sign."

The man replied, "Oh, so we need YOU to sign?"

"No, we just need you or someone to sign it" said my coworker.

"So who do I sign as? Anyone?"

"Just sign your name."

"Oh so I just sign "Your Name" as my name?" smiled the secretary.

"No....."

"Ok, let's see here.......YOUR.....NAME," said the man as he wrote his signature at the bottom of the picture.

As we were leaving, I overheard him saying "Heh. That gets em every time!"

WHAT!!!!!! What the heck? He is just an evil man. I contemplated going back and grabbing a handful of his candy which was next to a box marked "candy fund" but I figured that would be out of line.

Well....anyway, I learned a bit today about "parkour" today too. It's a very interesting sport, almost a martial art, which is gaining popularity in countries such as France, Russia and Germany. The art is also called "free-running" by some. In short, people train themselves to excellent physical fitness and then take off running across cityscapes. The results are nothing short of amazing and are akin to the movements of the superhero Spiderman at times. Wall kicks, rolls, building jumps, diving through small holes...and all of this is only the beginning. The creators of the sport are Sébastien Foucan and David Belle, who have been participating in the self-called "philosophy" of parkour for almost 10 years. Making the news recently, the French-made movie District B-13 features amazing stunts by various parkour participants, including David Belle himself. Check out the following video and be amazed, be VERY amazed.