Random Thoughts 8/13/07

• I got horribly sick yesterday, vomiting and such. It was fairly rough. It appears to be viral, so does that mean I got the placebo in the flu clinical trial that I'm in? It's been too long to be the virus they supposedly gave (a month ago), so apparently I have something else. Isn't that pleasant.
• Speaking of the clinical trials, I was told that through this study they demanded very specific appointments that I couldn't miss. "No problem," said I, "the only conflict that I can't reschedule would be a funeral." Sure enough, I have a funeral Thursday during one of the appointments. Maybe they'll be flexible with me.
• When I counsel with people for the first time, especially meeting the family of the deceased, I often get comments like, "I thought you'd be older." Sometimes they say it in such as way that I know they mean, "I wish you had been older." But I shouldn't get too defensive because I sometimes feel the same way about the funeral directors. The fellow I met today was the second time in a year that the funeral director will be younger than me (I'm 30). I've never had a problem with a young funeral director (young=under 50?), though I have had issue with some directors that were more elderly. Nevertheless, it just seems more comforting if the guy looks experienced, regardless of how competent he is. That's pretty unfair, and I don't like it when it's applied to me, but that is how people think. Most people want their preacher between 40 and 60, not older and certainly not younger.
  
• What happens when a cartoon like the Simpsons has been on TV for 400 episodes over 18 seasons? Someone (with too much time on their hands) has enough information to draw a detailed map of Springfield. It's kind of amazing in a nerdy, useless kind of way.
• I started a new sermon series yesterday on the night before Jesus died, focusing largely on the upper room discourse from the book of John. I've really enjoyed studying it out and I'm preaching from my NIV Harmony instead of one of my "normal" Bibles.