ProBlogger’s hot posts of the week:
Lots of excellent information here. I’ve signed up for Chitika eMiniMalls, and I plan to place the code this weekend.
Show Darren your appreciation by making ProBlogger a regular read.
From Charles Colson:
Fifty years ago, Christians charged that Lewis was teaching kids witchcraft. Yet today, most Christians—myself included—consider the Chronicles of Narnia classics and the Narnia books and movies are in most church libraries.
So how are they different, if at all, from Harry Potter? Colson distinguishes the series’ on three grounds:
Colson’s conclusion?
It’s a simple risk/reward calculation. Both authors include fantastic and preternatural material. Both series should be handled with care—especially if your children have an unhealthy interest in the occult. Parents need to be wise and attentive to the bent of their children.
The reward with the Harry Potter books and movie is a moral tale. The reward with the Narnia books, on the other hand, is nothing less than Christian truth embedded in stories that have delighted and stirred the hearts of Christian kids for generations.
My advice? Use all the hoopla today over Harry Potter to introduce your kids to the real thing: C. S. Lewis and the Narnia Chronicles.
Although Colson says that he has “major reservations” about Potter, note the absence of any harsh criticism of the series that does not also apply to the Narnia series.
C.S. Lewis’ The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe opens in theaters December 9, 2005. Randy Alcorn, in the most recent Eternal Perspectives, asks Will People See Jesus in Aslan (roughly 2 meg pdf):
In The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, Aslan tells the children that though they must return to earth, they can find Aslan here. Aslan says, “There I have another name. You must learn to know me by that name. This was the very reason why you were brought to Narnia, that by knowing me here for a little, you may know me better there.”
This demonstrates Lewis’s central purpose in the Narnia stories—that readers (and in the case of the movie, hopefully, viewers), may have their eyes opened, so they will look for—and hopefully find— Aslan here on earth.
An eleven-year-old American girl wrote Lewis to find out Aslan’s real name on earth. Lewis responded with a series of questions:
As to Aslan’s other name, well I want you to guess. Has there never been anyone in this world who (1) arrived at the same time
as Father Christmas; (2) said he was the son of the great Emperor; (3) gave himself up for someone else’s fault to be jeered at and killed by wicked people; (4) came to life again; (5) is sometimes spoken of as a Lamb…. Don’t you really know His name in this world? Think it over and let
me know your answer!Please pray that The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe movie will be true to the book, and thereby true to the nature of Jesus, which Lewis so beautifully portrays in Aslan the Lion. Pray that it will start a discussion about who Aslan is. And that in falling in love with Aslan, they will be drawn toward the Jesus who Aslan truly is.
Courtesy of Eternal Perspective Ministries, 2229 E. Burnside #23, Gresham, OR 97030, www.epm.org.
Congratulations to math wiz Volpundit, who was the first to correctly identify the trick behind the Can This Website Read Your Mind post.
Volpundit’s explanation is in the comment section of the post, so follow the link to read it. He (or she) added a second comment, on the same theme as my earlier Tennessee Volunteers Score 98 Points - In Six Games post and the suspicious powdery substance bit that’s been floating around the internet in the last several days:
And here’s some more math for you…
Reggie Bush’s TDs this season minus one = Tennessee’s touchdowns this season.
Ugh. I also heard on the radio yesterday, I think, that one of the South Carolina wide receivers has something like nine touchdowns this year. That sounds like more TDs than Tennessee’s entire offense, though I haven’t taken the time to look it up. Sounds like a job for Volpundit.
Anyway, high praise to the magnificent mathematical genius of Volpundit.
Why, yes. Yes it can.
Unless you stink at math.
First reader to figure out the trick wins . . . hmmm . . . a post dedicated solely to the singing of praises to your superior intellect.
Or I could just publicly poke fun at you, whichever I prefer in my sole discretion and depending on my mood.
Day Five of ProBlogger’s 31 Days to Building a Better Blog has several suggestions on how to convert one-off visitors to your site into regular readers.
In reading through this post, I realized why I was having so much difficulty following the organization of ProBlogger’s 31 Days Project. Basically, instead of following a pre-ordained 31-day schedule of topics, ProBlogger instead told readers that he was going to blog on blogs for 31 days, and he encouraged them to participate. He facilitated the discussion, throwing out ideas and engaging readers in conversation. The organization was therefore a bit fluid, but in doing so, he was harvesting regular readers.
Here are his tips on turning first time visitors into regular readers:
By the way, I didn’t get a lot of mileage out of social bookmarking for whatever reason.
Long Term Care Risk Management Report is a new blog about, well, risk management issues in the long term care industry.
His first post concerns the recent report by the Kaiser Family Foundation indicating that nursing homes rank below the pharmaceutical industry in public perception.
Thanks to Matthew Hollingsworth (no relation), who posted instructions on how to remedy the installation problems associated with upgrading to iTunes for Windows 5.0 (it works for iTunes for Windows 6.0 as well).
I feel like some sort of crack addict. My frustration practically rose to the level of violence as I tried to resolve the installation problems and get back to using iTunes. When it finally worked, it was quite exhilarating.
Aah, there you are, my good friend. So glad to see you. (Sigh.)
I’m hooked, and I blame Steve Jobs both for my habit and the four hours I lost wrestling with the worst engineered upgrade install in the history of software.
Well, almost an entire month after my September 19, 2005 Aahh, So That’s the Problem: iTunes for Windows v. 5 post, and they still haven’t rolled out an easy fix.
Apple has, however, released a newer version — iTunes v. 6.0 — but it doesn’t work either. The frustration of windows users everywhere is almost palpable.
Do not — I REPEAT DO NOT — upgrade to iTunes for Windows Version 5.0 or higher.
Day Four of ProBlogger’s 31 Days to Building a Better Blog concerns something called social bookmarking. Wikipedia defines the phenomenon as “an activity performed over a computer network that allows users to save and categorize (see folksonomy) a personal collection of bookmarks and share them with others.”
ProBlogger says that the benefit of such sites to bloggers is that they “have the ability to push vast quantities of visitors around the web at the drop of a hat.” Most of them apparently allow you to submit posts which they then link to, thereby acting as sort of an online billboard, driving interested passers by to your site. According to ProBlogger, most accept all submissions provided that you don’t spam them, but some, like Slashdot are more selective. The traffic one might get from such a tool can apparently be quite dramatic, and while the increased traffic might be short-lived, it gives you an opportunity to catch a few regular readers.
ProBlogger specifically mentions and links to the following social bookmarking sites:
The Wikipedia Social Bookmarking entry, though, has a very comprehensive list.
I’m going to check out some of the links myself, submit some of my better posts to some of the sites, and I’ll report back.
If you’ve ever seen The Shining, I think you’ll find this hilarious. It’s also very instructive on the question of perspective and selectivity.
Okay, so the Tennessee Vols lost to Georgia for the fifth time in six games, but Freaktoe and I had a good time at Neyland Stadium on Saturday.
Our comp tickets — thanks, Jimmie Miller, Esq., and Hunter, Smith & Davis! — were high up in the lower section at the south end zone, Section K, Row 63 to be exact. They gave us a great view of the Pride of the Southland’s Power T formation:
as well as the team running through the T:
I took several other pictures, but we were a bit too high to get anything very good. Freaktoe had two Cokes, peanuts, popcorn, and a few M&Ms, and we were only one row from the top and about 20 feet from a bathroom, so we only had to tick off two people instead of ten for Freaktoe’s five bathroom breaks.
Here’s a free tip to fathers taking young daughters to football games: less Coke, more peanuts.
The loss — and especially the as-yet-unknown-extent of beloved Jason Allen’s hip injury — put a damper on things, but we had a pretty good time. Freaktoe was actually quite into it when Jonathan Wade intercepted D.J. Shockley’s pass and ran it back for what should have been ruled a touchdown. (Rick Clausen snuck it in on the next play, and we got our seven, anyway.)
It’s a bit strange to hear Freaktoe telling people that we just had terrible field position all day. There’s hope for her yet.
In the A-Child-Can-Dream-Can’t-She file: About halfway through the 4th quarter, Freaktoe asked, “Wouldn’t it be great if we actually made a touchdown?”
Yeah, that would be nice.
