Beautiful Things

Recently, I was talking about sports, and I realized that moving to Iowa City has helped me with my rage. While in Iowa City, you can't easily root for the Cyclones or against the Hawkeyes. These are things I learned to do from a very young age. So, I've mellowed out when it comes to these teams to avoid strife. This has even spread to professional sports. I can watch my teams play without getting very excited or angry--and with how well my teams (the Dallas Cowboys and the Colorado Avalanche, if you were curious) did this year, that's a good thing. I once broke my TV remote in half during a game. I can't remember which team it was--but I think it was the Cowboys--or if it was because the refs were "cheating" them or because they were just playing horribly. And if you think the team doing well calms me down, it doesn't. Once, while my baseball team (the Chicago White Sox) was destroying the other team--something like 9-0 in the 3rd--and one of the outfielders dropped a fly ball, I shouted at him. My teams were never allowed to lose. They had to blow out their opponents every time--at least the ones they were supposed to beat, I was semi-realistic.

This, and everything else that God has done in my life have made "Beautiful Things" by Gungor really hit home.

(Side note: I bought this album because of the song "The Earth is Yours", and I like two of the other songs better--so far--"People of God" and of course, "Beautiful Things")

Now for something completely different. Now I know this isn't very timely anymore, but all the people who bought gold, worrying that the global economy would crash are idiots. (Sorry if any of you are in this group) Gold is not going to hold its value if the global economy crashes. All it is is a shiny rock that is malleable and ductile. It's also ridiculously heavy and soft--pure gold can be molded by hand. Gold's value will not come back for a while. The things that will hold their value in the beginning are necessary goods and services. For example, milk, bread, fuel, shelter, medicine and water would become a few of the things with actual value. We would be reduced to a barter system for a while--or to a society where you only have what you can get by lying, cheating, or stealing--and luxuries like gold would not gain any value until other things had stabilized. So the lesson here is, if you really believe paper money will go the way of the Dodo, then sell off all you gold and jewels, and stock up on fuel and water--or buy some cattle.

Sorry about all that, that rant comes back sometimes.