"Never lend your car to anyone to whom you have given birth." - Erma Bombeck

Today I sold those Best Buy gift cards on PlasticJungle.com and it all went smoothly. I entered the card numbers and the PIN from each card on their site and they immediately credited my PayPal account. From there I transferred the funds to my checking account. I got $215 for $250 worth of cards. It's money that was "free" so I'm OK with the $35 discount. The other option was to spend the cards' value at Best Buy for things we don't need and wouldn't otherwise buy.

I also booked my flights to the Pastor's Conference in Grand Rapids next month. The best price, by a significant margin, was with Frontier Airlines. If the flights go anything like my experience with their web site I should get my affairs in order before leaving.
I checked online for reviews of Frontier and that did nothing to encourage optimism.

Spent some time working on my sermon.
I think there must be no organization or institution so capable of great things and so guilty of corruption as the church. It epitomizes the contrast between God's intent and man's perversion. Haters on Christianity are fond of going on about the Crusades, the Salem witch trials and the like. But it is also true that Christianity has built more hospitals and schools, done more to lift the status of the poor, women and children, and helped cultures through teaching things like good hygiene and agricultural practices than any government or NGO in history.

That said, the real work of the church in the world is the spread of the gospel. That's something the critics will never understand; their world view requires them to believe all roads lead to heaven or its equivalent. Acts 4:11 says otherwise. What amazes me is how the gospel gets carried out into the world. It may happen through a family of five in the remote mountains of Papua New Guinea or through a 5-year old singing Sunday School songs at his kindergarten.

Fun stuff, the church. For all its flaws it's still the locus of God's work in the world.

Yesterday I worked out in the yard for a bit. Pam was out running errands. When I came in I discovered that Jack had puked in my chair.
I don't know whether to feel complimented or upset.

I miss riding a motorcycle. I'd love to have my 1980 Yamaha back. Note the hp rating and the top speed. The linked page doesn't list it, but it also had 95 ft. lbs. of torque. It was a relatively heavy bike (630 lbs.) but the power to weight ration meant lots of grins. Should never have sold it.
A bicycle just doesn't provide the same thrill.