Three out of four people make up 75% of the world's population.

I finished that soldering job. They now have a solid copper line from the pressure relief valve of the water heater to the point where it exits through the garage wall. The home inspector will come back, see the change over from the flexible copper line that was there when he flagged it, and he'll be happy. The new home owners, on the other hand won't, at least not when it comes time to replace their water heater. Whereas before this the flex line could just be unscrewed from the water heater, the new one installed and the line replaced, now they'll have to cut open this solid line and re-do it. Oh well. Not my problem.

Pam leaves here at 6:00 a.m. tomorrow morning for a trip to Grand Rapids to visit her mom and our friends. (I'm not sure that sentence sounded so good.) She doesn't get back until the 4th. This extended absence means several things.

• All the sports I can watch, whenever I want to watch it.
• Dinners with Mrs. Swanson.
• The stereo cranked up to stupid levels - when there isn't any sports on. Or when I can watch the game with the sound muted and listen to the stereo. And read a magazine. Or play on the computer.
• Way too quiet, even with the TV, the stereo and the laptop.

We just watched Knight Rider. Was it this stupid in it's first incarnation? David Hasselhof is a caricature of himself, but either our standards were a lot lower then or NBC's are now.

I have NO idea how they should solve the current economic crisis. Bernanke & Paulson are two really smart guys, and Paulson in particular seems to have both the impressive resume' and a lack of any partisan interest here. Other really smart guys, like Warren Buffet, seem to think the proposed plan, at least in it's basic form, is the way to go. On the other hand, some major and credible voices are saying the plan has significant weaknesses that need to be fixed or the solution will be worse than the problem.
Maybe I should be more exercised about this than I am. If the experts are to be believed we could potentially be headed for economic collapse. But I'm just not feeling the panic. Why?
Maybe it's because we make a mortgage payment and a very small car payment for a few more months and pay cash for everything else. So the possibility that the credit markets will freeze up doesn't seem like it would have much impact on our life. OK, it might be a problem when I go to buy that Cooper S, but I guess I can drive Stealth Reliabity for awhile longer.
Or is it because I don't worry about either of us losing our jobs? Pam works at a hospital and people are going to keep getting sick regardless of the economy. I derive some income from the church, but Pathway is in God's hands. And when it comes to Capital Property Maintenance I'm pretty much minimally employed anyway.
Or maybe it's because our retirement fund isn't in much jeapordy. Our combined retirement savings will cover dinner for two at Burger King, but we can Super Size it. So if things do go in the tank we'll get it regular size.
Naw. I think it's really because we're in God's hands, too (see "Pathway" above). We've served some small churches and lived pretty close to the edge. There were weeks when our family ate because God's people left groceries on our front porch. There were stretches when I was between ministries and without a paycheck. But God was always faithful to see us through, sometimes in pretty creative ways. I'm not saying we wouldn't feel the stress if the economy collapsed. We're probably in the class of Americans particularly vulnerable, and it wouldn't take much to push any of us in that group over the financial edge. But God is omnipresent, which means he's at the bottom, too. He'll catch us.
Easy stuff to say at this point. The real proof is when everything breaks, the most dire predictions come true and there's no reason for any optimism. Can't say that I want that to happen just so I can live out my profession of faith, but if it does, remind me of what I've said; hold me accountable to walk the talk.