burndive: hacking my mind

Wednesday, August 16, 2006

Sympathy Pains?

No, I haven't fallen off the face of the earth.

I'm still planning on posting those notes, I just haven't gotten around to typing them up quite yet. They're still where I left them on Saturday, right next to my laptop. I was home all day Monday, and I didn't even touch my laptop, not even to check my e-mail. Yes, something was wrong with me. Very wrong.

Sunday night I was swing dancing. I had a Lindy lesson at 8:00, and then a billion high-schoolers arrived at 9:00 and stood around the edges of the dance floor, effectively halving its square footage for those of us who come there to actually dance. I was there until about 12:15. It was hot, and I don't say that because of all the underage girls. Well, I'm sure they contribute, but only by virtue of their exothermic metabolisms. Anyway, from what I heard there was a line outside the door from pretty early on, which means that the room was filled to maximum capacity with moving bodies. It's not a very well ventilated room. Did I mention it was really hot?

They have this racket at the dance hall, wherein you aren't allowed to bring your own water, and if they see a bottle there that they didn't sell you, they take it. Also, the girls' bathroom has stalls, but the guys doesn't: it's single-occupancy, not that I think that's unfair: it's just that guys don't have ready access to a sink. It's difficult to stay hydrated when your only source of water is a 500mL bottle, and you almost always have to wait in a line to get it refilled (though I must say, Seattle tap water isn't half bad).

So anyway, as I said, something was wrong with me. I'm still not exactly sure what, but I have some theories.

I got home around 12:45, hit the shower, and went to bed. I noticed that my heels were a bit swollen, but hey, I had been dancing for four hours straight: not exactly bizarre. They would be fine in the morning. Even though there are no dancing teenagers in my room, it's still a hot night: just too hot for my blanket, but still to cool for a body that's trying to cool itself off from being mostly covered in a blanket. The next hour or so is spent in some weird dream wherein parts of my body are scorching hot, while the others are freezing cold, and my mind makes up some crazy conspiracy theory that only makes sense on the other side of the REM cycle. But it did make sense: I remember that much.

3:00AM: I am awakened by pain. Gradually, mind you: at least the awakening part. My mind has a funny way of incorporating repetitive sensory stimuli into my dreams: you know, like alarm clocks, etc.; anything but sunlight, and we get lots of that here in Seattle. Somewhere in my abdomen some organ is screaming out in the most inarticulate way, yet very much to the point. Gradually, my brain engages and I come to the realization that what I am feeling right now could be bad. Very bad. My brother almost died after he unknowingly ruptured his spleen not long after he got married. What is this? Maybe it comes from watching too many episodes of House, M.D. in the past month (okay, it was all of them). Ever the pattern-finder, even in sleep, my mind comes up with a possible answer: dehydration. I get up and get glass of water. Then I get another. Sitting up helps with the pain, but only a little. The only thing I can do now is wait for my body to absorb the water and get it to that especially noisy organ. Is it my liver? Kidneys? I minored in physics, not anatomy. If this doesn't work in half an hour, I'm going to the emergency room.

It works, I go to sleep, and I wake up. Early. It's 8:00 (that's early for me). This is odd. I'm not in pain: this is good. I roll over and go back to sleep. I wake up at my usual time after hitting the snooze at least once, and get up. My hands are puffy. My fingers are swollen like sausages. I stand up, and am immediately treated a sensation that the balls and heels of my feet are each one big blister: not the painful about-to-pop kind: the squishy, deep kind that take a few days to reach the surface after that ill-advised game of basketball in the wrong pair of shoes. The skin on my arms and legs is also splotchy. "Well great," I think, "there goes the last vestige of my California tan." Kidding. It's long gone.

Great: first cramps, now I'm retaining water.

To top it all off, my knees hurt when I use them. Not only can I not comfortably step on my own feet, I can't bend my legs either without pain. I hobble over to the bathroom and brush my teeth. Rinsing my mouth with cold water I discover another surprise about this morning: my teeth have become hyper-sensitive, so, you guessed it: cold water = pain. I call my doctor's office, and ask for an appointment. On the way I call my boss and let him know where I'm going, and that I might not be coming in for the day, and I stop by a grocery store to pick up a bottle of water, which in my haste I had neglected to bring with me: non-refrigerated of course.

I hobble in and out of the store, trying as hard as I can not to look like an 80-year-old arthritic who lost his cane after someone took it and beat his fingers with it so bad he can barely get his club card out to save 25 cents on the water. Why does everyone need a database on all their customers' spending habits? Did you hear about AOL accidentally having a bunch of their users search histories posted online? Now Google is making moves to unify the Blogger login with the already-combined Gmail and search engine logins. Before they bought Lucky, Albertsons swore they would never use club cards. Google's motto is, "Don't be evil." I hear Amazon has no such qualms, though. But I digress.

It still hurts to have the marginally cool water touch my teeth, but I master the technique of pouring it down my tongue into the back of my throat and swallowing it. Well, "master" might be too strong of a word. After my appointment, I went home and slept until 2, then I lay on the couch for the rest of the day.

I'm doing much better. Monday was bad, but the symptoms are going away. I went to work today (Tuesday) just fine. My hands still feel puffy, especially when I make a fist. My heels still have that stepping-on-a-blister feeling around the edges, and I'm still getting pain in my knees when I go to sit down or stand up, but that too is going away. They took some blood and urine samples, and apparently there's a virus of some kind going around.

Anyway, suffice to say that I did not make it to Softball on Monday night.

Hopefully my knees will stop hurting by Wednesday night and I can go dancing again.

Wednesday, August 02, 2006

Coming to a Blog Near You

Maybe if I post this here I'll actually do it.

As sort of a preview of coming attractions, this last Sunday I gave a sermon on how the Christian fulfills the Law in Christ (or more precisely, has the power to do so), taking up the first five commandments. I've been asked to organize my notes on the subject, and also do a sequel (on the other five) so I hope to get that together at some point in the near future, and when I do I will post it.

There. You have my word.

Another Fun Theological Discussion

...only this time with way more verses thrown in. This is so fun!

Antonio and I got into a little bit of an argument, although I'm not exactly sure that we disagree on anything of substance. In fact, in the end I find it rather refreshing, albeit a reminder that I too can be guilty of misjudging what someone else is trying to say and launch into some lengthy diatribe with embarrassing results.

Case in point: my last post: in which I lambasted a guy for being more subtle than I thought he should be. I don't regret it, though: it was a good discussion.

I also don't regret being lambasted by Antonio: that was an even better discussion. They say you don't really know someone until you fight them. I think Antonio and I could be great friends.

If you're interested, please read these two posts and their attached comments (on the Unashamed of Grace blog).

Friday, July 28, 2006

Ah, Slashdot, The Modern Mars Hill

I recently started a rather interesting, totally off-topic, subthread in the comments of a Slashdot story. It's still developing, and there's more, but here is one branch of the discussion. Please feel welcome to check out the whole thing.

burndive: Sorry, but I feel the compulsion to pick apart your sig.

Human being (n.): A genetically human, genetically distinct, functioning organism.

So since clones aren't genetically distinct, they only constitute a single being? What about identical twins? What about conjoined twins?

"Functioning" could be interpreted to mean absolutely anything. Does it exclude a fetus who is dependent on its mother? What if it's still breast feeding? What if it still lives in its parents' basement? What about humans that aren't "functioning" properly, are they no longer beings?

If I spliced a pig gene into someone's DNA, they're not a "human being"?

Honestly, it's pointless to try to "define" personhood in any way that does not directly involve God.

Shadowin: Honestly, it's pointless to try to "define" personhood in any way that does not directly involve God.

Care to back up that assertion?

burndive: Certainly, though I thought it was obvious.

I interpreted the sig to which I was responding to be an argument against abortion as follows:
(1) A human being can be defined as "A genetically human, genetically distinct, functioning organism."
(2) A fetus is human (assuming we're concerned with the abortion of human offspring)
(3) A fetus is genetically distinct from its mother
(4) A fetus, if it is alive, is a functioning organism
(5) From 1, 2, 3 & 4: A fetus, as a human being, is in the same class as every other human being, i.e., "person".

The problem with this argument is that it is totally useless, and will not modify our treatment of fetuses unless we also believe that:
(0) Humans are distinct from all other forms of life.

Notice that for this argument to work the value of human life must be intrinsic, that is, it must not rest on a set of criteria based on intelligence, capability, complexity or beauty, since a fetus has none of these things above other animals. Also, "potential" is meaninless without reference to God. If humans evolved from other creatures without God's input, then there is no real difference between Albert Einstien's fetus and a microbe, because they have the same potential, it's just that one of them happens to be closer at the moment. Besides, potential for what? For those other things that we "happen" to value.

The only thing that can possibly make human beings of an *intrinsically* (not emergently) different quality is that if simply by being human they posess something that all other forms of life do not, and never can posess without it being added to them externally. Enter God.

Please be reminded: this discussion is not at all about his existence or character. It is about the usefulness of the classification of "human beings" as an intrinsically higher order than the rest of the animals. God is the only entity that could make this so. If he does not exist, or if he did not do this, then there is no difference between aborting a fetus and swatting a fly. If he did do this, then the former is murder because it is doing damage to the image of God.

Does that serve to calrify?

Friday, July 21, 2006

Shallowbrook Pictures - Highlights

Here are some pictures from Shallowbrook and Altoona. They're all still available on my server from the previous post, but this gives me a chance to pick some out and comment.

One of the most articulate almost-four-year-olds that I have ever known. I really enjoy children who can carry on a conversation and you don't have to talk down to them, but they're still a kid, and therefore fascinated by everything in the universe.

Troy and Michael. Troy decided to pick up a stick and hit things... including Michael. Fun was had by all.

Jen and Paige

Katie and Caitlin

Drew and Bethany

Caleb. OOC.

Seth, visually disavowing responsibility for whatever mayhem happens to be going on at the moment.

Liz and her pearly-whites

Jeffrey getting his due comeuppence. They who have cloggable ears should not hit with water noodles. Ye be warned.

Tim floating

Max. Smiling. With teeth. Contain your enthusiasm, ladies.

Lisa, Amy, and Bonnie. Our eternal thanks for spoiling us rotten with home-cooked meals all week.

Stephainie. I haven't ever read Les-Mis. Apparently it's good, but is it good enough to justify the thickness? Good books can be thick (see LOTR trilogy) if they're good enough.

A frog that Seth caught. Ah, memories...

Sid and Tom.

Troy scarfing a banana.

Mateo and Gerald

Sleep deprivation: Colleen, Bethany, Jenny

Those eyes: they're so... PIERCING!!!! They can see into my soul!
(My apologies, Abby. Blue is definitely one of your colors.)

Davy. Thanks for the shirt.

Tim and Kim

Seth and Tim looking pleasant

Steve and Vernon

Me Sid lecturing on the book of Hebrews.

~~Seth~~ Al trying to fit boxes into the boxes that they contain, or something.

Tom's idea of a joke. You had to be there.

The ladies...

...being dignified and lady-like, as always

Caleb. Ait't he cute?

Jeremy and Ally

Al. This shot just seems to typify him somehow. It's as if he's continually amused by his circumstances (in this case, the fact that he's standing on a chair), even though he knows very well how he got there.