The Lion, The Witch, And The Wardrobe is one of those books that nearly every child has read. The story is exciting and moves along at a good pace. The characters are colorful, not too shallow and not too deep. And besides, all kids love talking animals. Adults like the book because of the deeper message. Christians see an explicit allegory that compares with the central Christian teaching of Christ. Others appreciate the right vs. wrong message and the act of self-sacrifice and love that it used to conquer the wrongs. It seems that this book can't go wrong.

At one point in American history baseball was called the official American Pasttime. Since then the sports enthusiasts' focus has moved on to other, more exciting sports such as football (American) and basketball. To a fan, baseball has never really been about the game played on the field. Certainly that's part of it, but the real draw has been the players and the managers and the ballfields and the history. Talk to any ball fan for more than a couple minutes and they'll start telling you all kinds of statistics about their favorite players and teams. Keep talking to them and you'll soon start to hear all the legends. This is what Fever Pitch is about.

This book had red flags all over it. That's probably why it sat on my bookshelf for a couple years before I mustered the courage to read it. The first red flag was the author. While being an actor doesn't preclude one from being able to write a book, there's is a good chance that the publishing house is willing to promote poor quality in the hopes that people will buy it because of the name. Secondly, I bought it for $1 at a dollar store. Books aren't sold at the dollar store for no reason. Thirdly, the title suggests a series ("The Abductors") but in almost 10 years book two hasn't been written. Despite the warnings I read the book. It was pretty bad but it could have been a lot worse.

Nothing Is Sound is Switchfoot's newest release following their phenomenal Beautiful Letdown release. Expectations for this release were high -- maybe a bit too high. While generally a good, solid album Nothing Is Sound doesn't compare to the brilliance from Letdown. On a whole the CD is a bit of an introspective downer. Most of the songs sound muted and melancholy while the lyrics tend to make us look inward and face our own failures and shortcomings. Not exactly inspiring stuff. This CD is honest. Clearly these songs are heartfelt expressions of the feelings from the songwriters. The liner notes indicate that most of the songs were written while the band was touring for Letdown. Those long, quiet miles of riding on a cross-country tour bus or staying in lonely hotel rooms seems to color all of the songs and provoke deep reflection. While The Beautiful Letdown inspired us to look out, wake up, and live life, Nothing Is Sound asks us to settle down, inspect ourselves, and wait for healing.

Bringer Of Storms is the second book in The Binding Of The Blade series.  The first book was Beyond The Summerland. The first book ended rather abruptly with a significant twist of events that left most readers more than a little stunned.  It was expected that the second book would pick up where the first left off but it didn't.  Instead Storms skips ahead 17 years and we enter the world the way it is after 17 years of dealing with the problems introduced at the end of Summerland.  In some ways this works well for the book but it also clearly makes it a "second book" in a series. This book could never be read as a stand alone story. 

 

Ear, nose, and throat doctors categorize tonsil size as 1 through 4. Size 1 is the smallest and size 4 is the largest. Size 4 tonsils are so large that they are touching each other or very close to it. At three years old our youngest son managed to have size 4 tonsils. The overly large tonsils generally led to difficulties with eating and drinking and were also more suceptible to infection. Our ENT doctor recommended that we have his tonsils removed. So that's what we did.

North of Phoenix by about 15 miles and just to the east of I-17 are a couple peaks that stand out from the desert floor. The more rugged peak is called Gavilan Peak and the taller but gentler is called Daisy Mountain. On Labor Day we decided to hike to the top of Daisy Mountain. We were not aware of any trails so it was cross country all the way up which turned out to be just as strenuous as I thought it would be. Even though the slopes look gentle and smooth from a distance, in reality prickly bushes and cacti crowed together and the angle is much steeper that it appears. The view from the top, however, is worth all the effort.

It finally happened. We finally found a scorpion in our yard. Well, actually, in our swimming pool. Apparently it had fallen into our pool and drowned. I found it stuck in the bottom of the pool vacuum. So let me see. About a year ago I was bit by a Brown Recluse. About half a year ago we found a rattle snake in our neighbor's driveway. And now we find the scorpion. I guess the other dangerous Arizona creatures we have left to find are Tarantulas, Black Widows, and Gila Monsters. If we stick to our schedule we should run into something else in another 6 months or so.

I took a few pictures of the guy I pulled out of my pool. You can see a couple of them here.