Email: Post-holiday calm [EH]

Molley likes the quiet, though I think she misses having extra tummy-rubbers around.

Press: Recipes re-created with a dash of Scripture, pinch of guesswork - HC

(Houston Chronicle) "Hesse, 51, and Chiffolo, 47, combed seminary libraries and pored over at least 60 translations of the Old and New Testaments to figure out who ate what — and make an educated guess as to how the dishes were spiced.

They have packaged their findings in an encyclopedic new book, Cooking With the Bible: Biblical Food, Feasts and Lore.

Essays explore the religious and cultural significance of 18 passages that revolve around meals, such as King David's wedding or the feast to celebrate the return of the prodigal son. Hesse and Chiffolo then present an imagined menu for each occasion."

(I would call it less "an educated guess" and more "rampant conjecture," esp. for their gall in concocting a recipe for manna.)

Press: Texas firm is 'world's first human embryo bank' - HC

(Houston Chronicle) "A San Antonio company has started producing batches of ready-made embryos that single women and infertile couples can order after reviewing detailed information about the race, education, appearance, personality and other characteristics of the egg and sperm donors."

(Is Jenalee Ryan, owner of The Abraham Center for Life -- oh, please! -- trying to single-handedly bring about Armageddon on Earth?)

Press: Forging PEACE in Rwanda - HC

(Houston Chronicle) "During the past year, Rwanda's powerful president has embarked on an uncommon partnership with Pastor Rick Warren and his global PEACE plan, an effort to link churches in networks of evangelism and practical good works.

PEACE is an acronym that stands for 'plant churches, equip servant leaders, assist the poor, care for the sick and educate the next generation.'"

Words: rugose [MW]

Function: adjective
Etymology: Latin rugosus, from ruga
1 : full of wrinkle (rugose cheeks)
2 : having the veinlets sunken and the spaces between elevated (rugose leaves of the sage)

Musings: Adding injury to insult

I just learned that an accepted variant spelling for "voltamogram" is "voltammogram" -- and I think half the population can be glad it's not a variant spelling for something called a "voltmammogram" -- because such a procedure, if it existed, would only be adding injury to insult.

Press: A modest proposal - VentureBeat

"Let’s review my argument so far. I surmise that both individual women and Silicon Valley itself are suffering from the opportunity costs imposed by lack of sufficient numbers of female engineers. [...] For whatever reasons -- and they are probably far more complex and multivariate than I could possibly touch on here -- women are not self-training themselves as software professionals at nearly the rate of men."

(Excellent pair of thought-provoking articles. I hope it helps get the ball rolling!)

Email: Our daily multitask [CH]

Would it be easier if we could just communicate via brain implants? Nah, it would be just one more stream to multithread or multitask. Choices!

Email: Happy New Year [CM]

Father Mario's homily was about how no family is as perfect as our image of the Holy Family, but our family is where we become holy through the daily tussles and choices we make in the Lord. (Another reason I'm glad to be back in the Catholic Church is that [my youngest son] is attending services with me, not required to go off to some kids' place because Protestant services seem largely to not want children present until they can be completely adult about the worship service. I've always liked it that the Catholic Church not only prefers children to be present but offers a "crying room.")

Time really did get away from me, for the first time this year, because I was probably making [my youngest son] some hot cereal right at the moment when midnight passed. I think that's a fine way to pass the moment too -- so absorbed in family life that the instant no longer stands on its own but as a part of the whole. Not "Look at the beautiful tree!" but "What a lovely forest we are having a walk in! Look at all the hundreds of beautiful trees around us!"

Musings: Dog's credo

Rule 1 of the Dog's Credo: Sniff everything.

Besides the obvious ramifications of this truism, it came to me as I spied Miss T stuffing her head between the armchair and ottoman trying to sniff ... whatever single spot that has not been sniffed yet if at all.

Weather: 46 for 45 degrees

I just walked Miss T, guessing a morning temperature of 46 degrees (and it was 45). The official temps are from Bush Intercontinental Airport, I think, so locally (halfway between Bush and Hobby airports) it's anyone's guess. Or I could get serious and set up an outdoor thermometer of my own.