Not Thinking of Myself Today!

Scott Fillmer is giving away a free computer.  Check out the entry for his contest here on his blog.  So I decided to enter one of my favorite organizations into the contest to win this free computer.  The organization is Alabama Rural Ministries and here is what they are all about.

Our Mission

We believe Christ’s love must be expressed in action to people in need. ARM is a hands on ministry, responding to people through Christian love with an emphasis in housing repair and children’s ministry.

Alabama Rural Ministry coordinates home repair efforts and children’s day camps in rural parts of Alabama. We are interdenominational but are connected to the United Methodist Church. All denominations are welcome to come and serve!

“For the service that you give is not only supplying the needs of everyone but is an expression of many thanks to God.” 2 Corinthians 9:11-12

ARM has focused its efforts in sharing God’s love in two primary areas:

Home Repair - The ARM staff assists teams coming to do home repair by purchasing materials, introducing teams to their families, and serving as technical assistants. Typical ARM projects include repairing and/or replacing roofs, ceilings, floors and walls. We also build steps and wheelchair ramps for elderly or disabled individuals. We match our projects with the skills of our volunteers, maximizing the services we are able to provide. Our service extends to plumbing and electrical work when our volunteers are able to do such work. If you are involved in a group with any of these skills, please consider a trip to ARM to help the elderly and disabled families of rural Alabama.

Day Camps - Teams working with the day camp work with the ARM day camp staff to plan Bible studies, songs, recreation activities and much more! Day camps are run similarly to Vacation Bible Schools and other day camp programs. Our volunteers are able to enhance the children’s experiences through interaction, whether it be fellowship, playing games, going on field trips, or presenting Bible stories and devotions. The children of the Sonshine Day Camp are truly remarkable in their ability to show love to so many volunteers that come in and out of their lives each summer. We invite anyone with a love for children to join us for this amazing experience this summer.

Volunteer teams come from all over the country to do either home repair and/or work with day camps for area children. At select sites, groups may choose to do both types of ministries at the same time!

I hope ARM wins this computer.  I’m sure it would get put to good use there.

Tags: Alabama Rural Ministries

Celebration Dinner Broadcast

This weekend is a big one for Cornerstone.  We have our annual celebration dinner.  This is a time we look back over the year and see where we have been.  It is also a time to plan for the next year.  We are going to broadcast this event live on Mogulus.  On Sunday Nov. 2 at 5:30pm Central time you should see something in the player below.  Join us!  Or you can go here to Mogulus to see a bigger version with the chat screen enabled to the right of the player.

“REMOVED THE PLAYER GO HERE TO SEE IT”

Gumstix Computers

I have been checking out these very small expandable computers for a long time now and trying to figure out a cool application for them.

The only thing I can come up with so far that interests me is a network device.  The network device would plug into someones home network and act as a internet content filter.  That means it would scan and block out any unwanted web sites/links/images/emails and such on your home network as you use the internet.  There are even some add on boards that could make it a WiFi hotspot.  So the options in this are really rich.

Can you think of anything that a really small computer would be useful for?

Tags: content filter, gumstix

Big Bang test

Scientists are still trying to figure out how the earth was created.

Tests clear way for “Big Bang” experiment

Hey I have some inside information that might help out. In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. (Gen 1:1) This is the very first line in the bible.

Tags: Big Bang, Creation, Earth, God

Online Life Streams.

I have a couple of new tools that add to the online life streaming I have been playing with lately.  The first one is drop.io.  It’s a cool application that lets you drop different kinds of inputs into your “drop” or life stream.  Here are some of the ways you can input data into your stream, for full details check out their site:

1. Files -  this can be any kind of file you want.  There is a html uploader on the site to add them to your drop.
2. Links - allows you to share bookmarks with others that subscribe to your drop
3. Notes - a short note or you can embed media in a note like youtube videos
4. Email - you get a drop.io email address that you can send stuff too
5. Voicemail - you get a number you can call and leave voice messages in your drop
6. Fax - does anyone still fax stuff?

The other life stream updater I have been playing with is Jott.  Jack told me about this one.  It’s a handy way to update your life stream if you don’t like to type.  You call into a jott phone number and jott asks you where to send your message.  You give it a destination like “me” and start recording your message.  Jott then takes and translates your voice message into text and sends you an email with the message in it.  You can send messages to places like email addresses, twitter, wordpress, and some others.  Jott does other things also I would like to encourage you to check it out.

One of the main reasons I was looking at both of these is because they both update your twitter feed.  It seems to me like Twitter is becoming more of a life streaming platform.  I have this little web of links where multiple sources of information flow in and out of twitter.

My blog -> feeds updates to twitter

drop.io -> feeds updates to twitter

jott.com -> feeds updates to twitter

sms texting -> feeds updates to twitter

Any of the above updates to my twitter sends status updates to Facebook.  Cool stuff.

WordPress for iPhone

Ok now I’m getting the iPhone envy.  Just kidding still cool stuff though.

WordPress application for the iPhone

Blog Neglect

Yes I have negelected my blog this week.  I have been pretty busy gearing up for a big promotion release tomorrow at work.  There is going to be a massive flood of users all at once logging into our web portal to check their scores to see if they got promoted or not.  A co-worker of mine and myself have been tunning the systems and planning for the sudden surge of users tomorrow morning at 8 am.  It is going to be so much fun.  This will be our first promotion release on our new WebSphere servers.  The good news is after tomorrow morning it’s over.