Me Meez

How fun is this? Like I could ever krump in real life.

Bachman here!

My grandfather retired from the Air Force at the highest non-commissioned rank and then began a history of complicated hobbies: art collection, baking, needlepoint, genealogy, computer-virus quarantining, hypochondria, etc. Pa (as my sister and I call him) has a wonderful mind, but it comes with a terrific talent for recalling specific details that may or may not be correct. (My mother, therefore, is her father's daughter.)

This is where our story begins.

My Aunt Vicki, who is her father's keeper, took Pa to a new doctor Friday. As they discussed his medical history, the doctor asked if Pa had experienced any significant weight changes over the past few years.

"Oh, gad, yes," he said. "Few years ago, lost 140 pounds."

Vicki showed her astonishment with wide eyes, so Pa reconsidered his number: "100. 80? Don't you remember, you all said I looked gaunt." He stroked his cheeks to demonstrate the location of the gauntness but submitted to Vicki's revision of the number.

Egad! do we love Pa.

Witches on Foot

Kudos to Wikipedia's co-founder for supporting the ax Middlebury just sharpened against the famous user-edited encyclopedia as a source for academic papers and exams.

I mean, I love Wikipedia as much as the next gal, because it's easy to use and indeed informative, but it's not an appropriate academic source. Middlebury Russian prof Beyer says it perfectly in this New York Times article: “I guess I am not terribly impressed by anyone citing an encyclopedia as a reference point, but I am not against using it as a starting point.” Starting point? That presumes students have have multiple points in their research. We live in a world where first-year college students know how to share music and stalk friends on MySpace but not discern whether or not some site they find is accurate or reliable. They must be taught such information fluency.

Countless examples abound in my own experience alone, witless frosh struggling with MLA documentation and grimacing when I tell them it would be a lot easier to cite their sources if they used books rather than AOL personal homepages. Real books, like from the library, that building on campus with the computers on the first floor.

But rather than complain about first-year dopes, I'd like to tell a borrowed story. Arthur Jackson once text-messaged me in the middle of a class he was taking because the prof, Dr. Lake, had just interrupted a woman making a class presentation. He wanted her to explain the source she had mentioned: "What's Wikipedia?" he asked. "Witches on foot?"

Fashionista

Arthur, don't be alarmed if we're late to your place for the Oscars: it might take a little while to finish my Botox neck lift, but I want to look my best, so it's worth it.

White-Out

Thanks to Shannon Stevens for introducing me to Heather Jamison's blog, and thanks to Heather for telling this story about becoming absorbed into their surrounding culture so that the locals presume they just belong. How does a family of white Americans dissolve themselves on a backdrop of black Kenyans for a ministry of love and learning? Let's learn and do it too, white Baptists worshiping in a black neighborhood (as I wrote before).

Surely we at Springs of Grace will also need to take a clue from SOG Tulsa, where their largely white church sweats (literally) long hours (but they like that) to establish real relationships with their neighbors. Hopefully, Lin won't mind my posting this photo of her and Chrissy, a Tulsa girl who joined us for a sports camp at her apartment complex two summers ago. It's precious ministry, walking so near the sun (my oh my, it's HOT there) just to love some kids. Let's carry more strangers on our backs.