It’s called In-Out, and it’s a windows application that works with a web server to monitor in-out status, just like those in-out boards in offices (the ones everyone forgets to use).

Happy 2007 to all my visitors!

[download]

~Jason

Fiction: If you fall into quicksand, you’ll be sucked under and die.
Fact: You’ll only sink up to your waist.

Fiction: Sitting too close to the TV will ruin your eyes.
Fact: It causes fatigue but no permanent damage.

Fiction: Earth’s rotation causes bathtubs, sinks, and toilets to drain clockwise in the northern hemisphere, counterclockwise in the southern hemisphere.
Fact: They can go either way in either hemisphere. The shape of the basin and the direction of the incoming flow overwhelm the minuscule effect of planetary spin.

Fiction: Benjamin Franklin’s kite was struck by lightning.
Fact: The kite picked up electricity from the air, causing an arc between Franklin’s hand and a key tied to his end of the string.

Fiction: A penny dropped from the top of a skyscraper can kill someone.
Fact: It could never pick up enough velocity to kill, just to bang you up a little.

Fiction: Swimming after you eat will cause cramps and lead to drowning.
Fact: There is a very slight risk of cramps, but only for vigorous swimmers.

Fiction: A drunken teenager can tip over a sleeping cow.
Fact: It would take several semisober people and a paralyzed cow. Anyway, cows sleep lying down.

Fiction: There’s a dark side of the moon.
Fact: The entire lunar surface receives sunlight during the moon’s monthly orbit around Earth.

Fiction: Swallowed chewing gum takes seven years to digest.
Fact: Gum is not digested. It passes through the gastro-intestinal system, usually within 24 hours.

~Jason

Then near the end of the third and final period, the Bulldogs tied it up, making for stressful and exciting competition. Then, when the period was over, it went to a shoot-out.

Back and forth they went, with the fans screaming at the top of their lungs for the dogs, and boo-ing with all their might when the visitors were up. Great drama! Three shots for each team, up and down, back and forth, and still a tie!!

After that was over, it was single shots for each team— and our dogs finally won. We went home sleepy but satisfied. Great game.

Seth did really well to stay awake for the whole thing too! We went with our neighbour John, across the street, because his son Lucas was scheduled to skate around the ice with other Tim Hortons hockey player tykes after the first period.

They were so cute in their little hockey pads and leaning heavy on their sticks. Lots of fun.

~Jason

It’s an interesting series— each of the four messages covers a time when the angels tell various people not to fear. We all know about the shepherds, when they heard “Fear not, for I bring you glad tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people!” But Zacharias, Mary, and Joseph were also told to “Fear Not” when angels appeared to them.

Lane will be exploring the different reasons these people had to fear, and the things we tend to fear, and answer these fears with the Good News of God’s grace.

~Jason

I’m all full of angst right now. You’ll probably laugh, because for the average person, this would be no big deal at best. But I’ve recently found myself in a terrible dilemna— at least it has been frustrating and annoying to me— and I’m hoping someone out there can direct me.

I’ve been using Pocket PCs and palm PCs since the E10 and E11 by Casio years ago. I’ve had about five or six different ones, and the most recent was the Ipaq 6300 series with the camera, cell phone, blue tooth, and wireless integrated. It was given to me by a very wonderful and generous person. The screen had been cracked, so I ordered a new one, and repaired the LCD myself.

I’ve hated this Pocket PC (sorry Gary!!). It’s been the worst of all of them— slow, fickle, and fragile, and gives me unexplained hard resets right when I need it to be there. This morning I noticed the screen was cracked again, with black ink oozing down the left side under the glass. I’m kind of sad because I used it as my portable brain— it’s my cell phone, my Bible, my novel library, my calendar, email, contacts, note taker, voice recorder, and GPS unit rolled into one device.

So it’s time to decide what’s next for me. Do I even want to stay with Pocket PCs, or is it time to just give these ppc jobs to a fancy cell phone? Or to a pad of paper?

This is where you come in. I hope you can help me! What is the right device for me?

• I don’t care about size.
• I want blue tooth to use it with my GPS, OR it must have integrated GPS
• I want to be able to stick SD cards in it for maps/books/etc to increase memory space.
• I want to be able to read the bible, and/or ebooks on the thing
• I would like it to double as my cell phone
• I would like it to have decent power consumption so it can go at least two days without recharging, even if I’ve been surfing the web or geocaching.
• I would like it to have a decent processor speed so I can run Skype
• I don’t need those silly thumb keyboards at the bottom.
• AFFORDABLE… Ie: USED?

Does such a beast exist? Can you direct me? Any help you can give would be so appreciated. This is one time when I’m desperate for a few comments.

Thanks!
~Jason

Walking in Memphis - Marc Cohn
Bad Day - Daniel Powter
Groovy Kind of Love - Phil Collins
You and Me - Jason Silver
Sometimes When we Touch - Dan Hill
The Way it Is - Bruce Hornsby
I Could Not Ask for More - Edwin McCain
Monica - Jason Silver
Fields of Gold - Sting
How to Save a Life - The Fray
Bye Bye Love - Jason Silver

BREAK

Until the Train Comes - Jason Silver
Can’t Stop Loving You - Phil Collins
Danny Boy
What a Wonderful World - Louis Armstrong
Clocks - Coldplay
Superman - Five for Fighting
Sentimental Journey
End of the Innocence - Don Henley
Bottled Inside - Jason Silver
Your Song - Elton John

BREAK

Chariot’s of Fire - Vangelis
Imagine - John Lennon
Another Day in Paradise - Phil Collins
Let’s Keep Looking - Jason Silver
Drops of Jupiter - Train
I’m Sorry - Jason Silver
I Guess That’s Why They Call it the Blues - Elton John
It’s Over Now - Jason Silver
Desperado - Eagles
Hope Has Taken Me - Jason Silver
Piano Man - Billy Joel
The Freshman - Verve Pipe
King of the Road - Roger Miller
There’s Da Door - Jason Silver

I’ll also try to do some requests, so if you come and want me to play something in particular, just ask.

~Jason

What do you expect from such simple creatures?

• Your last name stays put.
• The garage is all yours.
• Wedding plans take care of themselves.
• Chocolate is just another snack.
• You can be President.
• You can never be pregnant.
• You can wear a white T-shirt to a water park.
• You can wear NO shirt to a water park.
• Car mechanics tell you the truth.
• The world is your urinal.
• You never have to drive to another gas station restroom because this one is just too icky.
• You don’t have to stop and think of which way to turn a nut on a bolt.
• Same work, more pay.
• Wrinkles add character.
• Wedding dress $5000. Tux rental-$100.
• People never stare at your chest when you’re talking to them.
• The occasional well-rendered belch is practically expected.
• New shoes don’t cut, blister, or mangle your feet.
• One mood all the time.
• Phone conversations are over in 30 seconds flat.
• You know stuff about tanks.
• A five-day vacation requires only one suitcase.
• You can open all your own jars.
• You get extra credit for the slightest act of thoughtfulness.
• If someone forgets to invite you, he or she can still be your friend.
• Your underwear is $8.95 for a three-pack.
• Three pairs of shoes are more than enough.
• You almost never have strap problems in public.
• You are unable to see wrinkles in your clothes.
• Everything on your face stays its original color.
• The same hairstyle lasts for years, maybe decades.
• You only have to shave your face and neck.
• You can play with toys all your life.
• Your belly usually hides your big hips.
• One wallet and one pair of shoes one color for all seasons.
• You can wear shorts no matter how your legs look.
• You can “do” your nails with a pocket knife.
• You have freedom of choice concerning growing a mustache..
• You can do Christmas shopping for 25 relatives on December 24 in 25 minutes.

No wonder men are happier. Send this to the women who can handle it and to the men who will enjoy reading it.

~Jason

It’s across the street from the GO Station, so easy to find… Here’s the address:

137 John Street South,
Hamilton, ON
L8N 2C3,
L8N 2C3
Cost: Free

The phone number at the Lionshead - 905-522-7090

Hope you can come!

~Jason

There are few personal confessions more likely to alienate many Americans than to admit to smoking. Singles ads are filled with people who will never even go on a first date with someone who smokes. I strongly suspect that more women would date a millionaire who earned his money disreputably than a millionaire who smoked.

Drinkers are far more highly regarded than smokers, as are playboys, gamblers, lawyers, politicians and almost anyone else except child molesters.

So I have no doubt that some readers who until now have held me in esteem will lose respect for me when they learn that not only do I smoke cigars and a pipe, but I love doing so, have no interest in stopping and have been happy to pass this pleasure on to my older son. In fact, we regularly have some of our best talks while we enjoy our cigars.

For the record, I never smoke cigarettes, which I happen to dislike the smell of, and which I acknowledge to be dangerous. But what I write here largely applies to cigarette smokers as well. In fact, I find anti-smoking zealots far more dangerous to society than cigarette smokers, and would much sooner date a cigarette smoker than one of the zealots.

[…]

Yes, I am warned by doctors that I am more liable to contract mouth or lip cancer, but while physicians may see such diseases, in 40 years of smoking I have never met or heard of one person with either cancer.

Indeed, I am quite convinced that my one-a-day cigar or pipe may well have had a positive impact on my health given how much relaxation it induces. Stress kills far more people than cigars or pipes do.

It is a sign of the times that the latest James Bond film has prohibited 007 from smoking a cigar. One of the most benign practices a person can engage in was banned, but our macho hero can be shown drinking alcohol and bedding women (and without any mention of condoms!), not to mention killing people and engaging in behaviors infinitely more dangerous than cigar smoking.

We live in the Age of Stupidity. This new age has been induced by widespread college education and widespread secularism—Psalms is entirely accurate: “Wisdom begins with fear of the Lord”—which explains, for example, why only well-educated secularists came to believe that there were no innate nonphysical differences between men and women.

Nearly 100 years ago, before widespread college education and before widespread secularism, when America tried to prohibit a vice, it chose alcohol, not tobacco. It knew that there were immoral consequences to alcohol consumption—most child abuse, most spousal abuse, about half of violent crimes and most rapes are accompanied by alcohol. Nobody has ever raped because smoking a cigarette or a cigar numbed his conscience. And no one fears smoking drivers; we rightly fear drinking drivers.

Both in my hometown and on the road, I find great joy in visiting cigar stores and schmoozing with the owners and with the guys smoking there. In fact, cigar stores may be the last place men can get together without women. 

[…]

You might enjoy the whole article. 

~Jason

Christmas is coming, and we’re getting excited. It’s such a fun holiday. I’m in charge of the boys Christmas gifts each year, because Joanne’s no fun. I like buying toys— I’m just a big kid.

Grandma and Grandpa Silver are coming to visit for Grandparents Day at our church on December 17th. Grandma and Grandpa Sawatzky are coming after the baby is born in January.

What a fun time of year!

~Jason

Ghost Tracks are early tracks that will represent the framework for the song so that other musicians can build on it. I simply played piano for the songs, singing a basic vocal line and laying down the chords. Next the bass player, drummer, guitarists, and other musicians will play their parts, and then I will re-record the piano and vocal lines.

I’m pretty excited about a few of the songs. The plan is to record eighteen songs, and pick the top 12 for the album.

If you want to stay in touch with news and happenings for my music, be sure to sign up for the newsletter at groups.google.com/group/jasonsilver. Or you can add my RSS feed to your news reader to read my blog without visiting my site.

~Jason

~Jason

In 2004, New York Times columnist David Brooks wrote that if evangelicals chose a pope, they would likely select John Stott. Stott, 85, has been at the heart of evangelical renewal in the U.K. His books and biblical sermons have transfixed millions throughout the world. He has been involved in many important world councils and dialogues, not least as chair of the committees that drafted the Lausanne Covenant (1974) and the Manila Manifesto (1989)—two defining statements for evangelicals. For more than 35 years, he has devoted three months of every year to traveling the globe, with a particular emphasis on churches in the majority world. He is ideally suited to comment on evangelicals’ past, present, and future. ct senior writer Tim Stafford interviewed him at his home in London.

As you see it, what is evangelicalism, and why does it matter?

An evangelical is a plain, ordinary Christian. We stand in the mainstream of historic, orthodox, biblical Christianity. So we can recite the Apostles Creed and the Nicene Creed without crossing our fingers. We believe in God the Father and in Jesus Christ and in the Holy Spirit.

Having said that, there are two particular things we like to emphasize: the concern for authority on the one hand and salvation on the other.

For evangelical people, our authority is the God who has spoken supremely in Jesus Christ. And that is equally true of redemption or salvation. God has acted in and through Jesus Christ for the salvation of sinners.

I think it’s necessary for evangelicals to add that what God has said in Christ and in the biblical witness to Christ, and what God has done in and through Christ, are both, to use the Greek word, hapax—meaning once and for all. There is a finality about God’s word in Christ, and there is a finality about God’s work in Christ. To imagine that we could add a word to his word, or add a work to his work, is extremely derogatory to the unique glory of our Lord Jesus Christ.

You didn’t mention the Bible, which would surprise some people.

I did, actually, but you didn’t notice it. I said Christ and the biblical witness to Christ. But the really distinctive emphasis is on Christ. I want to shift conviction from a book, if you like, to a person. As Jesus himself said, the Scriptures bear witness to me. Their main function is to witness to Christ.

Part of your implication is that evangelicals are not to be a negatively inspired people. Our real focus ought to be the glory of Christ.

I believe that very strongly. We believe in the authority of the Bible because Christ has endorsed its authority. He stands between the two testaments. As we look back to the Old Testament, he has endorsed it. As we look forward to the New Testament, we accept it because of the apostolic witness to Christ. He deliberately chose and appointed and prepared the apostles, in order that they might have their unique apostolic witness to him. I like to see Christ in the middle, endorsing the old, preparing for the new. Although the question of the New Testament canon is complicated, in general we are able to say that canonicity is apostolicity.

How has the position of evangelicals changed during your years of ministry?

I look back—it’s been 61 years since I was ordained—and when I was ordained in the Church of England, evangelicals in the Church of England were a despised and rejected minority. The bishops lost no opportunity to ridicule us. Over the intervening 60 years, I’ve seen the evangelical movement in England grow in size, in maturity, certainly in scholarship, and therefore I think in influence and impact. We went from a ghetto to being on the ascendancy, which is a very dangerous place to be.

Can you comment on the dangers?

Pride is the ever-present danger that faces all of us. In many ways, it is good for us to be despised and rejected. I think of Jesus’ words, “Woe unto you when all men speak well of you.”

Going back to the hapax, it’s a very humbling concept. The essence of evangelicalism is very humbling. You have William Temple saying, “The only thing of my very own which I contribute to redemption is the sin from which I need to be redeemed.”

We have also seen an immense growth of the church worldwide, largely along evangelical lines. What do you see as its significance?

This enormous growth is a fulfillment of God’s promise to Abraham in Genesis 12:1-4. God promised Abraham not only to bless him, not only to bless his family or his posterity, but through his posterity to bless all the families of the earth. Whenever we look at a multiethnic congregation, we are seeing a fulfillment of that amazing promise of God. A promise made by God to Abraham 4,000 years ago is being fulfilled right before our very eyes today.

You know this growing church probably as well as any Westerner does. I wonder how you evaluate it.

The answer is “growth without depth.” None of us wants to dispute the extraordinary growth of the church. But it has been largely numerical and statistical growth. And there has not been sufficient growth in discipleship that is comparable to the growth in numbers.

How can the Western church, which surely has problems of its own, fruitfully interact with the non-Western? Right now many churches are sending mission teams all over the world.

I certainly want to be positive about short-term mission trips, and I think on the whole they are a good thing. They do give Westerners an awfully good opportunity to taste Southern Christianity and to be challenged by it, especially by its exuberant vitality. But I think the leaders of such mission trips would be wise to warn their members that this is only a very limited experience of cross-cultural mission.

True mission that is based on the example of Jesus involves entering another world, the world of another culture. Incarnational cross-cultural mission is and can be very costly. I want to say, please realize that if God calls you to be a cross-cultural missionary, it will take you 10 years to learn the language and to learn the culture in such a way that you are accepted more or less as a national.

So there’s really no replacing the long-term missionary.

I think not, except of course for indigenous Christians.

What about what some call the greatest mission field, which is our own secularizing or secularized culture? What do we need to do to reach this increasingly pagan society?

I think we need to say to one another that it’s not so secular as it looks. I believe that these so-called secular people are engaged in a quest for at least three things. The first is transcendence. It’s interesting in a so-called secular culture how many people are looking for something beyond. I find that a great challenge to the quality of our Christian worship. Does it offer people what they are instinctively looking for, which is transcendence, the reality of God?

The second is significance. Almost everybody is looking for his or her own personal identity. Who am I, where do I come from, where am I going to, what is it all about? That is a challenge to the quality of our Christian teaching. We need to teach people who they are. They don’t know who they are. We do. They are human beings made in the image of God, although that image has been defaced.

And third is their quest for community. Everywhere, people are looking for community, for relationships of love. This is a challenge to our fellowship. I’m very fond of 1 John 4:12: “No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God abides in us, and his love is perfected in us.” The invisibility of God is a great problem to people. The question is how has God solved the problem of his own invisibility? First, Christ has made the invisible God visible. That’s John’s Gospel 1:18: “No one has ever seen God; the only God, who is at the Father’s side, he has made him known.”

People say that’s wonderful, but it was 2,000 years ago. So in 1 John 4:12, he begins with exactly the same formula, nobody has ever seen God. But here John goes on, “If we love one another, God abides in us.” The same invisible God who once made himself visible in Jesus now makes himself visible in the Christian community, if we love one another. And all the verbal proclamation of the gospel is of little value unless it is made by a community of love.

These three things about our humanity are on our side in our evangelism, because people are looking for the very things we have to offer them.

And therefore you’re not despairing of the West.

I’m not despairing. But I believe that evangelism is specially through the local church, through the community, rather than through the individual. That the church should be an alternative society, a visible sign of the kingdom. And the tragedy is that our local churches often don’t seem to manifest community.

Do you want to talk about preaching?

I never tire of doing that. I’m an impenitent believer in the importance of preaching. Of course, that’s biblical preaching.

Biblical preaching has fallen on hard times in many places. What do you say to a pastor who is desperately trying to hold his congregation’s attention and really doesn’t have the confidence that enables one to just preach from a biblical text?

It’s the same issue across the globe. Churches live, grow, and flourish by the Word of God. And they languish and even perish without it.

So the Langham Partnership International (see “Legacy of a Global Leader,” has three basic convictions. Conviction one is that God wants his church to grow. One of the verses that expresses this best is Colossians 1:28-29, in which Paul says we proclaim Christ, warning everybody and teaching everybody in all wisdom, in order that we may present everybody mature in Christ. There’s a plain call to maturity, to grow up out of babyhood.

Second, they grow by the Word of God. I suppose you could concede that there are other ways by which the church grows, but if you take the New Testament as a whole, it’s the Word of God that matures the people of God.

Which brings me to the third conviction, that the Word of God comes to the people of God mainly, though not exclusively, through preaching. I often envisage on a Sunday morning the amazing spectacle of the people of God converging on their places of worship all over the world. They’re going to medieval cathedrals, to house churches, to the open air. They know that in the course of the worship service there will be a sermon, and it should be a biblical sermon, so that through the Word of God they may grow.

When I enter the pulpit with the Bible in my hands and in my heart, my blood begins to flow and my eyes to sparkle for the sheer glory of having God’s Word to expound. We need to emphasize the glory, the privilege, of sharing God’s truth with people.

Where do we evangelicals need to go? We’ve been through quite a trip in the last 50 years.

My immediate answer is that we need to go beyond evangelism. Evangelism is supposed to be evangelicals’ specialty. Now, I am totally committed to world evangelization. But we must look beyond evangelism to the transforming power of the gospel, both in individuals and in society.

With regard to individuals, I’m noting in different expressions of the evangelical faith an absence of that quest for holiness that marked our forebears, who founded the Keswick movement, for example, and the quest for what they sometimes called scriptural holiness or practical holiness. Somehow holiness has a rather sanctimonious feel to it. People don’t like to be described as holy. But the holiness of the New Testament is Christlikeness. I wish that the whole evangelical movement could consciously set before us the desire to grow in Christlikeness such as is described in Galatians 5:22-23.

Regarding social transformation, I’ve reflected a great deal on the salt and light metaphors, the models that Jesus himself chose in Matthew 5 in the Sermon on the Mount. “You are the salt of the earth; you are the light of the world.” It seems to me that those models must be said to contain at least three things.

First, that Christians are radically different from non-Christians, or if they are not, they ought to be. Jesus sets over against each other two communities. On the one hand there is the world, and on the other hand there is you, who are the dark world’s light. Jesus implied that we are as different as light from darkness and salt from decay.

Second, Christians must permeate non-Christian society. Salt does no good if it stays in the saltshaker. Light does no good if you hide it under a bed or bucket. It has to permeate the darkness. So both metaphors call us not just to be different, but to permeate society.

The third, the more controversial implication, is that the salt and light metaphors indicate that Christians can change non-Christian society. The models must mean that, because both salt and light are effective commodities. They change the environments in which they are placed. Salt hinders bacterial decay. Light dispels darkness. This is not to resurrect the social gospel. We cannot perfect society. But we can improve it.

My hope is that in the future, evangelical leaders will ensure that their social agenda includes such vital but controversial topics as halting climate change, eradicating poverty, abolishing armories of mass destruction, responding adequately to the AIDS pandemic, and asserting the human rights of women and children in all cultures. I hope our agenda does not remain too narrow.

Copyright © 2006 Christianity Today. Click for reprint information.

Actually, it’s been more like three weeks, I guess. It didn’t help that I had to go in for “minor” surgery last Friday. Minor is in quotes for a reason. I won’t go into it, but let’s just say four kids is enough. I’m getting well aquainted with the spots on the ceiling.

Today is my first day back at work, and things are going okay.

In other news, we forgot to vote Monday. I’m really a voting kind of guy, and I completely forgot this time! I probably would have voted for DiIanni too, but our 2 votes wouldn’t have helped him win this time around.

The winning guy actually has a MySpace page, and he added me as a friend. That was weird to be the friend of a mayor on MySpace. He never messaged me back though, so it was kind of a useless endeavor.

Well, I should get back to work. Say a little prayer for my health.

~Jason

It’s the whole subject of friendship. There aren’t a lot of people I’d consider a “best friend.” There are lots of aquaintances, many of whom I really like, and with whom I’d love to spend more time. Maybe it’s a guy thing, but I struggle in building serious friendships with other men.

Ian Perry, Joanne and I chatted for hours about all kinds of neat subjects yesterday. We talked about worship leading, about the differences between western and eastern culture; about relationships with others at church. We talked about God, about faith, about great movies, Chinese characters, and lots of other stuff.

Then this morning we pulled out the guitars, and played worship songs til our fingers bled. We talked about post modernism, I showed him an awesome magazine I just bought called Salvo, and that sparked a whole new set of conversations. We did a few rounds of Mario Cart with Seth. A great day.

Almost as long as we’ve been married, I’ve complained to Joanne about my lack of close friends. I’m not blaming it on anyone else, either. All the men I know— myself included— are so busy with family and work, and our own personal projects.

Thanks, Ian, for being my friend. I value our relationship very much.

~Jason

My grandfather, Earl Abrams, introduced me to locomotives, to working steam engines, and to Lionel train sets at a young age. That likely had a big part in my interest. Plus, I like the notion of playing God to a whole world: designing mountains and streams for tiny, adoring, plastic people. Twisted.

But real model railroading is time consuming. And real model railroading is expensive! And all the gear takes up so much room! Joanne complains every time we pull up house and move: “Tell me again why we lug these boxes of track, trains, and trestles from house to house, city to city, and country to country?”

I smile and mention how the kids will love it someday. Someday is taking too long to get to station.

So I can be spotted at times, trolleying the Internet in search of an alternate option to the basement empire; an option in the form of software. I haven’t had a lot of luck, because there are a lot of variables at play in creating a viable alternative.

• The program has to be cheap.
• It has to allow customization and creativity - I want to model my own world.
• It shouldn’t be too time consuming to get a train running around the virtual track
• Kids should be able to enjoy it with me
• It should allow multiplayer interaction

That last point is the real zinger. There are lots of programs out there that let you run trains on a track. Many are overly customizable. I’ve got a couple of versions of Railroad Tycoon, and it’s great for simulated train economics. Microsoft has an expensive program called “Train Simulator” (creative title, eh?) There’s another cool game called Trainz. These cost money. I found a free one today called BVE. It’s very cool with amazing graphics. There’s another program called TrainPlayer which lets you run toy trains around on your own track plans, or the track plans made famous by model railroader gurus. Fun for a while. Again, way too expensive.

Bewilderingly, none of these make use of a multiplayer environment. Why would anyone even want multiplayer? Lots of reasons.

Model train layouts are way more compelling when there are people doing it together. Every person comes with a different skill: wiring, modelling, painting, kit-bashing, computer programming, painting or air-brushing; decals, historical accuracy, mechanics, design, sculpting, making tiny trees, tiny rocks, or tiny people. Painting backdrops. You name it, whatever your skill, there’s likely a place for it in model railroading.

And running the trains around the layout can take more than one person to keep them from colliding. You’ve got the dispatcher, the engineers, the guy working the yard, the gal reading the schedule, the guy bringing the cookies and coffee. It’s a team sport.

And some people are into modules. With modules, each person designs their own little diorama, then brings it to the clubhouse. Each module connects to the one next to it. You can bring as many modules as you want, making a huge empire for which each person is king of a four foot long section. Everyone runs their favourite locomotive and train through the whole thing… across the prairie diorama, under the mountains diorama, right out to the coastal diorama. It’s kind of like sharing!

Wouldn’t that be a great concept for a virtual train program? What if I could design my own module; say a city set in 1950’s East Hamilton, and connect it over the Internet to my friends module set in 1950’s Rochester or another friend in 1950’s Toronto? We could send traffic back and forth between our modules, and the modules of others in our ‘virtual club.’ Picking up passengers, grabbing mail, delivering grain, whatever.

I did finally find a program that flirts with this idea. It’s called Freight Yard Manager, and it allows you to take a satelite photograph of a freight yard, run trains on it, and send them off with loads for adjacent cities. I haven’t downloaded it yet, but it sounds like it has potential. It also sounds complicated.

I hope some game developer out there will catch the vision for multiplayer train simulators. Until then, I’ll keep dreaming of a model layout in the basement.

~Jason

Let’s all be thankful for the great sacrifice made for our freedom. Our soldiers are still making sacrifices as heros of freedom and peace and we need to be thankful.

Click to Watch

~Jason

Just got tired of the old one, and thought I’d try something new. Hope you like it.

I also put up some other information just for fun… A philosophy of ministry, my personality profile, a basic resume, etc.

Feel free to comment to tell me what you think. It’s been a while since I had any comments!

~Jason

I went on to play later than I expected. I was thinking I’d be going on right at 6, but they weren’t even set up yet when I got there. Turned out I played more like 8 p.m. Unfortunately, a couple of MySpace people who came to hear me had to leave for the Elton John concert before I got to sing.

But a great audience! Everyone really listened, and I had so much fun.

Thanks to everyone who came to hear me. See you next time!

~Jason

I finally decided to spend some time re-working and improving this metaphor site, “thePathway.ca”

This is one of my favourite sites, topically, just because the metaphor is so cool and consistent. I started out with the initial idea for this metaphor, and Bryan Wylie helped connect it with our phases of discipleship. Together we really worked out the various descriptions and FAQ. As of this writing, I’m still tracking down bugs created because of the server change and domain name transfer last year… when it’s all smooth again I am going to rewrite and add new content.

~Jason

I’m on the pathway…. are you? If so, put this link on YOUR blog or site.

~Jason

The crontab entry for sending messages every 10 minutes is:

    0,10,20,30,40,50 * * * * $HOME/bin/run_afu.sh >> $HOME/run_cgi.log

This logs the output from the cron job to $HOME/run_cgi.log so cron doesn’t object about not knowing what to do with the generated output. Some systems send