New Power Supply, Too

After writing the post below, it got me thinking about the power supply. It's very likely it is bad and has been the cause of the problems on the computer, or at least contributed to them. I don't want to take any chances frying the new computer parts. I ordered an Enermax 500 watt unit.

Time To Rebuild

My desktop computer has been giving me problems. It all started when my UPS (uninterruptible power supply) died. Uninterruptible, by the way, doesn't seem to be a real word, the spell checker doesn't like it and it's not in the dictionary - dictionary.com anyway, but that's the word they use. Apparently, it suffered a power surge that took it out. It's not a dead battery, it smells burnt and it's completely dead. I just plugged the computer into the wall and it worked, sort of. It kept crashing and I had to slow down the CPU to keep it going. Eventually it just stopped working altogether. That's the second UPS I lost this way and the first time it took out the computer, too. The first was an APS and the last a Belkin.

I've been looking into surge protectors - what a confusing mess. I settled on a Panamax, I hope it works out. Everyone claims to be the best and they trash the rest. I might get another UPS but I will plug it into the surge protector. I wouldn't mind a sacrificial UPS if it saved the computer but they don't offer very good surge protection.

I built this computer not too long after Windows XP came out. It was long before the SP2 update. It has an AMD Athlon 1400 processor, Asus A7V-133 motherboard and 1500 megs of PC133 ram. The only thing I'm keeping is the case (Lian-Li aluminum), probably the power supply and the DVD burner - maybe.

I'm going with an Intel processor this time - E6600 Core 2 Duo. There are so many choices in the PC world it makes choosing the components a chore. I wanted a firewire and an eSata port on the motherboard - I decided on the MSI P35 Platinum. I chose a SAPPHIRE 100166L Radeon X1650XT 256MB 128-bit GDDR3 PCI Express x16 HDCP Video Card - that's a mouth full. I'm not looking for bleeding edge performance, I just want a good system. 2 Gigs Kingston DDR 667 ram - could've went with 800 but it costs twice as much and I don't think it's that much faster. I went with 2 Sata hard drives, 80 gigs for the operating system and programs and 320 gigs for storage - both Western Digital. I have a 320 gig eSata drive for back ups. I'll be sticking with Windows XP for now, can't really afford to upgrade to Vista now anyway and I don't want to waste the money if it doesn't work out.

I enjoy putting these together, I wish I could do it more often. I'll have my fun next week and hopefully everything goes well and I'll have a good, reliable system for years to come.

Walking in Darkness

The substitution of the creature in any form for the Creator, constitutes incapacity to receive the Word of God. If a man shall substitute nature for God, a priest for God, a ceremony for God, then, though the Word of God be speaking to him by a thousand voices, he hears none; though the light of God flash on him from every point of the compass, he walks in the darkness; though all the mystic influences of the Divine immanence are about him; he is unconscious of them. No voice, no virtue, no vision, no victory, a famine of the Word of God, because a man has stayed with something short of God.

It may be even as I attempt to deliver the message there is nothing in it for you. Words, empty words, a meaningless occasion, an opportunity for curiosity. You are in the midst of a great famine, famine for the Word of God; and the reason is that you have compelled the capacity in your life which ought to take hold of God to cling to something short of Him. As Paul puts it in writing to the Romans, you havesubstituted the creature for the Creator, and having fastened your life upon something short of God you have become hardened to the touch of God, unconscious of the fact of God; and though His Word is living and quick and powerful, and sharper than a two-edged sword, it fails to affect you.

The sealing of the Bible always follows idolatry, and the issue of such idolatry is famine, and the result emaciated, emasculated humanity. The thing that has sealed the Word of God to the believer is the believer's unbelief and disobedience and idolatry. If we could rid ourselves of our idols, the famine would be over, and the Word of God would be living to us again.

Wherever a man has lost his capacity for the Word of God, cannot discern it, does not hear it, does not appreciate it, almost ceases - hear me carefully in this apparent contradiction - almost ceases to desire it, wherever that is true, there results in the life of that man, woman, community, a great ceaseless searching restlessness; and I believe that the restlessness of our own age is due to the fact that our age is in the midst of the famine of the Word of God, a famine following upon its idolatry, national, social, and individual.

But, is there such restlessness? Think with me for a moment. I maintain there is an ignorant restlessness. By that I mean a restlessness that does not understand itself in any measure, and I believe that that ignorant restlessness which is unconscious of the meaning of its own fruitless search is that of nothing less than a search for the Word of God. Men do not know it. They would not so name it; but every attempt to satisfy the life without God is in the last analysis an attempt to find the Word of God. I suppose the old illustration, the most familiar perhaps, the most sublime in Scripture, is the natural one that comes to the mind at this moment. Paul's great word to the Ephesians, "Be not drunken with wine, wherein is riot, but be filled with the Spirit." What did the apostle mean? Why link these two things together? Because they are bound together, because in the underlying meaning of the attempt to get some kind of satisfaction out of wine is the cry of the soul after God. And all the restlessness of this ignorant age is the panting of the human heart after the Word of God. There are men and women running from north to south - from north to east, to be true to the figure of my text - from sea to sea, from land to land, in ceaseless, roving restlessness. What do they want? Ask them and they tell you, some new sensation, some new thing, some new thrill. What do they really want? They want the Word of God, they want God himself, communicating to them through the Word that they may find the sustenance of their spiritual life. Oh, the restlessness of the worldling, as understood from the upper spaces, is the panting of the heart, in ignorance, after God. In such ignorant restlessness God is not recognized, and no sin admitted. God is not talked of. It is a little out of date to talk of God among such people. They dismiss the Word. Religion is taboo! God is not named, and sin is never mentioned. There is a great famine in the land.

A partial text of the sermon "Famine of the Word of God" by G. Campbell Morgan from his book, The Westminster Pulpit.

Hog Wild

I never knew a pig could get so big. That thing is a monster.

Where is the Love?

Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love (1 John 4:8).

Here we come face to face with that tremendous declaration of the Scriptures: "God is love." It means that at the root all God does is love. No matter how difficult it may appear to us, the fountain from which all God's activity stems is this kind of self-giving love. Even His judgments, His condemnations, arrive from love. Judgment is not something separate from love. If you convince me that a holy, loving God cannot judge a sinful person, then you will also convince me that He cannot love a sinful person. Inherent in the quality of love is an antagonism toward anything that opposes the object of love. Also, inherent in it is the quality of judgment. God is a purifying fire, consuming and burning away the dross in order that He might preserve the gold. That, incidentally, is how the book of Hebrews describes Him. "Our God is a consuming fire" (Hebrews 12:29). Love is not always easy to live with because of that very quality, yet it is the most wonderful thing in the world because of its warmth and its all-embracing inclusiveness that takes in all kinds and all conditions, without looking for merit on the part of the object loved. That is the love of God.

I don't like the words "sin" or "sinners" because most people just turn off when they hear those and don't understand what they mean - just some religious mumbo jumbo. Sin is nothing more than lawbreaking.

(1John 3:4) Everyone practicing sin also practices lawlessness, and sin is lawlessness.

God did not arbitrarily create the laws of the universe. The law of gravity, for instance, could not behave in any other manner without tearing apart the universe. The same goes for every other law this creation must abide by. They are what they are because that is what they must be in order to create the orderly universe we so often take for granted.

Now, the physical laws we can pretty much figure out on our own - we got that part down (well, most of us), but there are spiritual laws that govern humanity that we cannot figure out on our own, they must be revealed by the Creator. We cannot naturally see the spiritual. The breaking of them we feel, we see it all around us. Many of us strive to heal the sickness but have no clue as to the cause.

Lawbreaking should not be tolerated by a loving society, to tolerate or excuse it is not love. Love can be tough at times, but it is always looking to the betterment of the individual and the society.


Quote above taken from the May 25th Daily Devotion by Ray Stedman.
© 2007 by Elaine Stedman -- From the book The Power of His Presence: a year of devotions from the writings of Ray Stedman; compiled by Mark Mitchell. Devotion pages, excerpts, or quotes may be used as long as the copyright notice includes the book title and author along with a reference or a hyperlink to the Official Ray C. Stedman Library web site at http://www.RayStedman.org.

Rewarding Lawbreaking

Please, can my sister become an illegal immigrant?

Here I have to ask for lenience for my poor sister. You see, although the natural law informs my own ideas of right and wrong, I generally obey the positive law, even when it's wrong. To live creatively and productively, I require safety and stability. I fear my sister shares the same aversion to living on the edge. In any event, whatever deep-seated defect obeying the law signifies – she has it. Most people who immigrate legally have it; those who do so illegally don't. Bully for them.

I understand that by privileging illegals, the Bush-Kennedy-McCain troika intends to cleverly weed out, in the Darwinian sense, people of probity. This is a smart tactic with a proven track record, as individuals with no qualms about breaking one set of laws are less prone to observing the law in general. To wit, statistics place illegal immigrants in the high-crime bracket. I worry that this is a standard my sister cannot live up to.

I'm A Winner!

I enter a lot of sweepstakes and I've won quite a few things, haven't hit a big one yet, though. I won a Rachel Ray t-shirt last month and yesterday I received a Dog the Bounty Hunter t-shirt and DVD from A&E. Thanks A&E!

When Will We Get It?

During the Cold War, two things came to be known and generally recognized in the Middle East concerning the two rival superpowers. If you did anything to annoy the Russians, punishment would be swift and dire. If you said or did anything against the Americans, not only would there be no punishment; there might even be some possibility of reward, as the usual anxious procession of diplomats and politicians, journalists and scholars and miscellaneous others came with their usual pleading inquiries: "What have we done to offend you? What can we do to put it right?"

A few examples may suffice. During the troubles in Lebanon in the 1970s and '80s, there were many attacks on American installations and individuals--notably the attack on the Marine barracks in Beirut in 1983, followed by a prompt withdrawal, and a whole series of kidnappings of Americans, both official and private, as well as of Europeans. There was only one attack on Soviet citizens, when one diplomat was killed and several others kidnapped. The Soviet response through their local agents was swift, and directed against the family of the leader of the kidnappers. The kidnapped Russians were promptly released, and after that there were no attacks on Soviet citizens or installations throughout the period of the Lebanese troubles.

These different responses evoked different treatment. While American policies, institutions and individuals were subject to unremitting criticism and sometimes deadly attack, the Soviets were immune. Their retention of the vast, largely Muslim colonial empire accumulated by the czars in Asia passed unnoticed, as did their propaganda and sometimes action against Muslim beliefs and institutions.

Continue Reading Was Osama Right?

Global BS

Global warming debunked

A combination of misinterpreted and misguided science, media hype, and political spin had created the current hysteria and it was time to put a stop to it.

"It is time to attack the myth of global warming," he said.

Water vapour was responsible for 95 per cent of the greenhouse effect, an effect which was vital to keep the world warm, he explained.

"If we didn't have the greenhouse effect the planet would be at minus 18 deg C but because we do have the greenhouse effect it is plus 15 deg C, all the time."

The other greenhouse gases: carbon dioxide, methane, nitrogen dioxide, and various others including CFCs, contributed only five per cent of the effect, carbon dioxide being by far the greatest contributor at 3.6 per cent.

However, carbon dioxide as a result of man's activities was only 3.2 per cent of that, hence only 0.12 per cent of the greenhouse gases in total. Human-related methane, nitrogen dioxide and CFCs etc made similarly minuscule contributions to the effect: 0.066, 0.047 and 0.046 per cent respectively.

"That ought to be the end of the argument, there and then," he said.

"We couldn't do it (change the climate) even if we wanted to because water vapour dominates."

You know global warming is a scam because it fit's exactly into the lefts social engineering schemes, that's about all you need to know.

Hey, there's nothing wrong with reducing your footprint; and keeping the air, oceans and land as clean and beautiful as possible is a wonderful thing. We should do more of it. Just don't try to package your social engineering crap in environmentalism and expect me to fall for it. And stop throwing cigarette butts and trash on the ground.

Socialized Radio

Radio Free Congress by Fred Thompson

I had planned on talking a bit today about Venezuela. The president there doesn’t like the way his media is covering him, so he’s doing away with the free press. He’s established rules on what he thinks is fair, and he’s denying licenses to television and radio stations that don’t play by government rules.

I can’t criticize him now, though. After all, how would it seem for me to complain about another country, when our own congressional leadership is trying to put the same sort of rules in place here? To do so, they’re pulling the Fairness Doctrine out of the dustbin of history.

Restaurant Forced To Change Ambiguous Bathroom Signs

McGuire's Irish Pub is one of my favorite restaurants, it's in Destin, Fl. If you're ever in the area, check it out, the food is great and the beer is made on premises.

I can't say I'm surprised to see this happened, but I am disappointed. The first time I went into the bathroom I was told to read the sign carefully, obviously some people have no sense of humor. What a surprise.

Just a Good Commentary

Guns, the devil and God

You see, in today's America the self-reliant, responsible, independent-minded man or woman who carries a gun – the kind of person who is aware, thinks for himself, is skeptical of government, the press and all of society's "experts" – the person not content to be a victim, but willing to take charge of a situation, "get involved," even fight back and stand up for what is right – in other words, a true American – is threatening to society's elitists, experts and politicians who are addicted to power.

Cower, Cringe, and Hide

Time for the sun to set on the Culture of Sheep

“Why am I being punished?” I asked.

“Because you fought back,” I was told.

I was stunned and disgusted in the same instant. Though I did not realize it in these terms, it was my first memory that I and the other students were being conditioned to be victims - to accept the idiotic culture of sheep. If attacked, submit and hope for the best. This concept is unnatural to humans; it certainly goes against the grain of my instincts.

Just how this cower, cringe and hide in the face of danger concept ever caught on is beyond me. I reject that early conditioning the liberal public schools tried to thrust upon me. Ever since that injustice the anti-self defense culture, the culture of sheep, has left me with a bad taste in my mouth. Their philosophy is not only unjust, it is down right stupid and deadly.

The Always Inciteful Insightful

Ann Coulter: C'EST SI BON

Apparently, even the French prefer Western civilization to clitorectomy-performing, car-burning savages.

The Democratic Party is now officially the only organization on Earth that does not take the threat of Islamic fascism seriously. Between the Democrats and the media, America has gone from its usual position as the world's last hope to radical Islam's last hope.

Amazing ... But true?

Bullet in woman's head for 64 years

The shape of the bullet in the x-ray makes me wonder. It looks like a bullet, and that's the problem. Don't bullets deform and break apart on impact? Perhaps there are bullets that don't, I don't know. That's a question for the experts.

How To Destroy The Earth

Destroying the Earth is harder than you may have been led to believe.

You've seen the action movies where the bad guy threatens to destroy the Earth. You've heard people on the news claiming that the next nuclear war or cutting down rainforests or persisting in releasing hideous quantities of pollution into the atmosphere threatens to end the world.

Fools.

The Earth is built to last. It is a 4,550,000,000-year-old, 5,973,600,000,000,000,000,000-tonne ball of iron. It has taken more devastating asteroid hits in its lifetime than you've had hot dinners, and lo, it still orbits merrily. So my first piece of advice to you, dear would-be Earth-destroyer, is: do NOT think this will be easy.

This is not a guide for wusses whose aim is merely to wipe out humanity. I (Sam Hughes) can in no way guarantee the complete extinction of the human race via any of these methods, real or imaginary. Humanity is wily and resourceful, and many of the methods outlined below will take many years to even become available, let alone implement, by which time mankind may well have spread to other planets; indeed, other star systems. If total human genocide is your ultimate goal, you are reading the wrong document. There are far more efficient ways of doing this, many which are available and feasible RIGHT NOW. Nor is this a guide for those wanting to annihilate everything from single-celled life upwards, render Earth uninhabitable or simply conquer it. These are trivial goals in comparison.

This is a guide for those who do not want the Earth to be there anymore.

This Might Be Important To Know

Listening to an iPod could stop your heart

Ipods can cause pacemakers to malfunction by making them go too fast, too slow or even stop altogether, according to a study.

Researchers found that iPods could make pacemakers malfunction by interfering with the electromagnetic equipment monitoring the heart rate.

Well, of course, you have to have a pacemaker. Will over reaction cause a backlash against iPods by those with pacemakers? And if an iPod can do it, any electronic device should do it, too. There's nothing special about the electronics in an iPod.

She added: "On rare occasions, some electrical gadgets can potentially interfere with pacemakers, so it is sensible to keep these devices directly away from pacemakers.

"If you have a pacemaker and are sitting next to someone with an MP3 player it is extremely unlikely that it will interfere with your pacemaker."

I Did Not Know That!

" Surprisingly, it is very hard to pin down the age of a star," Anna Frebel, the lead author of a paper on the results, said in a statement.

Yes, I'm shocked.

For He Does Not Bear the Sword for Nothing

God's Strange Servants

You really need to read this all the way through but here are a few excerpts from the text:

I think we Americans are slowly learning that not every body of people in the world can handle democracy. There was a time when, naively, we thought democracy was the best (and only enlightened) form of government, and all we had to do was go around the world and set up democracies and people would begin to function properly. Democracy would solve all their problems. Now, after many painful experiences, we know better than that. We know there are times and places where democracy just won't work. It can't work; people aren't ready for it. They can't handle that kind of liberty, that kind of responsibility. Therefore God doesn't give it to them. The government they have is better suited for their purposes than the one we have. We are slowly catching on to that.

You see, God is neither a Republican nor a Democrat. He is not a Socialist, or a Marxist, or even an American! The biblical picture is that God not only sends us good men sometimes, by his grace, to lead us and heal us, but also he sends us bad men at times, to punish us. And we deserve them. Therefore, when Hitlers, Stalins, and other ruthless individuals come to the throne of power, God has put them there because that is what that people needed at that particular time in history. This is the biblical position with regard to government, and it is rather startling.

I thank God for the enlightened soul, a few decades ago, that set in line a motion that added to our pledge of allegiance the words "under God." That reflects biblical truth. This nation exists as a nation under God. What that is saying, of course, is that nations are to recognize that they have limited power. They are agents of God, but they are not God.

From whence come wars and conflicts among you?

Do they not arise out of your own passions? --James 4:1,2

That's a tremendously helpful verse because it bridges an individual's world of his own personal life and the social world, extending even to communities, and beyond, to states and nations in the world. The claim of that verse is simply that conflict and strife with neighbors, friends, relatives or nations arises out of human passions---anger and feelings of attack or injustice. The same forces produce world conflicts as well. Wars and strife between individuals or nations spring from the same source. It always appears to be naive for various groups to suggest that we eliminate strife on the social level when the very people who seek to do so haven't succeeded in eliminating conflicts in their own lives. People who mount protests and demonstrations to eliminate war oftentimes have terrible conflicts in their own homes! They haven't solved the problem there, even.

Taken from TEN PROPOSITIONS CONCERNING WAR by Ray C. Stedman

Disorders & Acronyms

Some common human disorders:

ADHD: Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder
APD: Auditory Processing Disorder, also referred to as CAPD or Central Auditory Processing Disorder
ASD: Autistic Spectrum Disorder
BD/ED: Behavior Disordered / Emotionally Disturbed
CD: Conduct Disorder
MDO: Major Depressive Disorder
MPD: Multiple Personality Disorder
OCD: Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder
ODD: Oppositional-Defiant Disorder
PDD: Pervasive Developmental Disorder
PTSD: Post Traumatic Stress Disorder
SAD: Seasonal Affective Disorder
SED: Severe Emotional Disorder
SED: Severely Emotionally Disturbed

Bees even have a disorder:

CDD: colony collapse disorder

Some little known disorders:

NOSD: Not Otherwise Specified Disorder
TEACCHD: Treatment and Education of Autistic and Related Communication Disorders Disorder
ADMSD: Acronym doesn't make sense disorder
INADODD: Inability to name a disease anything other than a disorder disorder
EDAD: Every disorder must have an acronym disorder
RPAD: Really pushing it acronym disorder
BAD: Bad acronym disorder
RBAD: Really bad acronym disorder
NEAD: Not even an acronym disorder

That's Justice

Eight Arrested In Honda Theft Ring

"It keeps them off the street. They can't steal any cars for at least another 21 days," Bartlett said.

I like the old west way, steal a man's horse, you get hung. Should work the same way for cars.

Stupid Turkey

As I was writing the previous post there was a turkey in the driveway walking around my car. I should have known what he was doing. A few days ago I was driving past my neighbors house and saw a turkey pecking her car. I picked up the kids and when I was coming back home it was still there. She was outside, so I told her and she chased it off.

I just went to pick up the kids again and when getting back in the car from the other side noticed the entire side of the car is scratched. That turkey must have been going to town on my car for a while. Why on that side and not on the side I could see from the window?

I like having the turkeys around, I enjoy watching them, and they have never done anything like this before, that's why I didn't chase it away. It looks like it's just this one turkey. A rogue turkey. If he keeps this up I might have to arrange a little accident - just kidding. I'll just let James loose on him, he'll chase him a way.

Do You Believe ...

in global warming?

Once a person becomes a believer of global warming, "you never have to defend this belief except to claim that you are supported by all scientists -- except for a handful of corrupted heretics," Lindzen added.

In Al Gore they trust.