Woke up this morning and checked my friends' Tweets... It led me to this and I'm glad it did.  I check Deadly Viper often and have read this before but I'm glad it was the first thing I read this morning.

This is me... and I'm thankful.

The People of the Second Chance is a community of individuals who advocate radical grace and second chances. We champion lost causes and think that a second chance is a human right.

1. People of the Second Chance are individuals who are fast to forgive. In a culture that believes in revenge and payback, we rebel with grace.

2. People of the Second Chance receive second chances in their own life. When we have experienced personal, professional, or relational failure, we refuse to be defined by our mistakes. We learn, we grow, and we have the courage to move on.

3. People of the Second Chance serve in places where people need second chances. We advocate for the vulnerable and fight for equality for the poor, the prisoner, and the voiceless.

These three values can be simply summed up by:
Give, Receive & Be the Second Chance.

"This past weekend Adidas opened its massive new Beijing outpost. In celebration, a special exhibition of Dorophy Tang was mounted. Tang, based in Hong Kong and China, mixed Adidas heritage, footballing visuals and French furniture forms into her display. Unmitigated joy comes through the smiling, chubby little kids that figure in each work. Nice reminder of what the sporting life should be like."

via High Snobiety

So, this is the longest I've ever gone without blogging since starting DanisLinus back in October of last year.  It's been a mixture of busyness and really just not much motivation to spend the time blogging.  I haven't even kept up with most of the sites I check on a daily basis where I get a lot of my content.  I'm not going to make any recommitments to blogging daily.  I've done that before and well... Let's just say, DanisLinus is still here and life is good.  And, I hope you'll still stick around even in the midst of inconsistency. 

An update:  Life is good... better than good.  Family is stronger than it's ever been and I'm loving what I'm doing.  We absolutely love our church .  Ben is the coolest kid on the planet.  Clem needs grooming.  And, we're really just enjoying connecting with each other and Christ in a very genuine and authentic way. 

So... thanks again for stopping by  and I promise... well... you get it.

Money... we all have some (well at least those of us who read blogs through expensive pieces of silcon hardware).  Most of us want more money (I know I do).  A lot of us have more than we think (including me).  And, a few in our world actually have more than some countries' entire GDP (not even close).  But what is this thing called money?  The latest issue of Colors opens with the sentence, "Money is an illusion, a psychological relationship between an object and a value that has been given to it..."  If you can look past the fact that Colors is one big advertisement for The Benetton Family (who own and operate numerous clothing brands including United Colors of Benetton and Killer Loop), you'll find some facinating editorial.

The theme of Issue #73 is as follows:  Benetton analyzed paper money in one of their laboratories and found traces of certain substances, the most common being: cocaine, oil, blood, soil, sweat, feces and so on. They then conducted a bit of research and documented different locations/cultures where these substances are being used as a subsitute for monetary currency. For example: in Colombia you can pay your medical bills with cocaine, while in Iraq there exists a thriving black market for blood.

Hit the jump and after the clickthrough, you'll find a page that looks like the image below.  It's interactive and as you click on each "stain" you'll download a PDF based on each particular substance.

Money can be a lot of things but what is it to you?  I've heard Kong Hee say that your money is neither good nor evil.  Money simply takes on the character of the owner.  So, if you are a drug dealer, then your money is drug money.  If you are stingy then, your money is stingy money.  If you are generous, then your money is generous and blesses others.  So, what kind of money do you have?

We always tell people "think big"... "dream big"... "the sky's the limit"... "the world is your oyster"... Well, in this case, canvas.  With the help of express shipping company DHL, Erik Nordenankar has created the "Biggest Drawing in the World " measuring 40,076,592 meters x 4,009,153 meters.  Using a GPS unit packed in a "Pelican" hardcase as his pencil, Erik shipped the case with specific cooridnates enabling the world to become the paper.  55 days later, when the case arrived back home, Erik downloaded the GPS information and the single "stroke" of 110,664 kilometers generated a simple self-portrait. 

Check out the video below and then hit the jump for more pics and another behind the scenes.

Oh, did I mention that Derry, Northern Ireland was one of the stops when we were there?  If you look closely, you can actually see us waving at the plane.

I'm posting this simply for your enjoyment.... so enjoy!

PeeWee Herman's giant foil ball doesn't have anything on this.  For one thing, it's PeeWee Herman.  I mean, he's cool enough...  I don't know.  The other thing is that for play, Lego bricks beat aluminum foil hands down 6 days out of the week and twice on Sunday.  Flickr's Chasingfun proves my theory correct with a giant Lego ball.  It rolled about 15 yards down 19th Street in San Francisco before they stopped it.  Check it by clicking to enlarge...

In a time when "connecting" with people across continents is as easy clicking a little red button beside a screenname, Paul St. George is offering a more "analog" method of encountering others. 

On Thursday, "an optical device called a "telectroscope" was placed at the Fulton Ferry Landing in Brooklyn and another one on the Thames River in London" enabling counterparts on the two continents to interact without the benefit of video conferencing or cable tv.  The exhibition continues through June 15.

"Spectators stepped up to the machine on both sides of the Atlantic and waved and wrote greetings to each other in real time on wipe-off message boards.  They told knock-knock jokes, asked about the weather and found time for a few shout-outs to Queen Elizabeth and the Manchester United soccer team."

Publicists will say only that it uses fiberoptic communication.  St. George is sticking with his own version.  Weaving a tale that begins with finding plans in his grandmother's attic, he sticks to his story that he discovered a secret tunnel under the Atlantic Ocean from New York to London which his great-grandfather began over a century ago.

Click the photos below to enlarge and check out the official website for more information and to read about this incredible "discovery."

via FoxNEWS and NYTimes

 

Knit graffiti... yarn bombing... cotton tagging...  All of these apply to the newest form of street art that hit Houston, TX and is spreading.  Knitta, a self-proclaimed yarn vandal "makes the world more beautiful", not by using aerosol but rather dressing up lampposts, street signs, trees and other objects with colorful knitting.  Weird... quirky... unique... whatever word you use to describe it, it's like putting a flower in a gun barrel instead of throwing rocks or screaming.  It's probably more of an anti-establisment statement than a lot of graffiti we find out there.  

Reblog from the Levite Chronicles ... 

I picked up a book that was close at hand this morning. The author, John Ortberg, wrote about talking with a friend, looking for spiritual direction. After describing telling the friend what was happening in his life, John writes,

What did I need to do, I asked him, to be spiritually healthy?

Long pause.

“You must ruthlessly eliminate hurry from your life,” he said at last.

As I was thinking about that response, I laid the book down and began to laugh at the cover of the book. According to the sticker, I could get the life I’ve always wanted for 30% off.

I wish that was true. I would rather not have to think about 100% effort, 100% attention, 100% devotion. I would love to have the life I’ve always wanted at a discount. But I think it doesn’t happen that way.

The challenge for me, for today, is that I have had three separate prompts this morning about slowing down. And just like getting things done takes 110% effort, the process of slowing down takes 100% effort. It takes ruthless elimination. And that’s hard on a day that I have to spend out of the office, with a meeting in the evening, and a project for Hope. And I know that I should give you an amazon link to the book, which would come by adding it to my store.

But you can find it yourself if you want.

Because I need to eliminate something today.

Happy Monday

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