Rob Bell and my foggy brain (not neccessarily related)

This morning this computer is functioning a lot like my brain - foggy, slow and stuck in "delay" mode. I'm sure you recognize the situation; it goes like this:

A: I begin to type the thought that's running around in my head.
B: I glance down at the cursor and there's nothing happening.
C: About two seconds later - after I start re-typing the phrase - the original letters begin to appear on the screen.
D. I stop typing and wait, watching characters appear all by themselves, in little spurts of activity, as if by magic.
E. I launch into the sentence again, backspacing enough - I hope - to obliterate the mistake I made when I started over in the first place.
E. The result looks something like this. "This morningthecomputthis mornining a lotlikecomputeris functioalo ng thecomp uterisfunctiot like my..."

Great. Sum total of coherent thoughts = zero.

I read some research a couple of weeks back that predicted - sometime in the next ten years - a computer capable of approaching the computing power of the human brain....

...Well I've got news for those folks over at M.I.T. or wherever. They reached my processing threshold around twenty-five years ago when the early "Tandy" boasted a mean 64K and could play two-person "pong" without freezing over!

BUT SERIOUSLY, FOLKS:
But, seriously, it's been a foggy morning for my brain because Scout (the wondrous labradoodle) was sick all night and that meant close to ZERO sleep for me.

In spite of the fog, my mind has been overstimulated and active today, in large part in response to the Rob Bell "Drops Like Stars" lecture we attended last night.

I commented to a friend this morning that it's refreshing to attend an event - particularly a Christian event - where the central appeal is the presentation of fresh and challenging ideas... rather than a glitzy "Praise Show" used as dressing to spice up loud, politically charged sermons short on substance.

Don't get me wrong; I play acoustic guitar in a praise band, and I seriously love contemporary worship music. But Rob Bell's two hours involved 120 minutes of ideas and intelligent analysis.

Now I'm used to engaging ideas and world-shaping vision at my home church every Sunday - but Rob Bell's approach is almost unprecedented on the big public stages in a high-profile religious landscape still dominated by televangelists and professional hucksters.

More later, when I've had a chance to further digest the evening's content.

Meanwhile - and I'm serious - please pray for Scout (the labradoodle) she is miserable.

- DEREK