Double Urgh!

Okay ive found something that sucks more than revision,
revision on a sunny day .....
It seems unlikely that such a thing would happen in England, but it has! BBC weather actually says 'sunny' ..... im not sure that ive seen that symbol before, ive seen the sun with clouds over it symbol and im very familar with rain but sun and clear blue skies? thats unusual, and if this is what global warming has lead us to them im totally okay with that!! Its 20C outside (thats 68F) which is unusually hot for us! Ive taken to wearing a sleeveless top. Yet tragedy of tragedies im in the LRC in front of a computer missing it all because i need to revise - so annoying.

Urgh!

Urgh!!! Revision sucks, it really does, like Liam very rightly said "it would be okay if we were actually interested in the material still", Ive already read the interesting parts, now im just rereading to focus on the details like what specific transcription factors move to cause this signalling pathway to cause something to happen which causes other ligands to be secreted which interact with hedgehog receptors which causes transcription of the wingless protein .... its really not interesting anymore. The weather is grey .... thats the only way to describe it .... not quite fog, no rain so far, definately no sun .... but its grey ... very grey and the cleaning lady is talking to herself, i dont know what she is saying but it sounds quite sinister .... yes im procrastinating .... autoimmune diseases are needlessly complex .... i was lulled in by the name 'horror autotoxicus' Damn it Paul Ehrlich! You get me every time! *shakes fist*
Okay okay less procrastination, the solution to this is quite clearly the worlds smallest and most expensive bottle of lucozade that i just brought from the canteen, which will, advertising tell me, 'give me the physical edge' .... i miss proplus .....

Ravi Zacharias

So i was listening to the Ravi Zacharias DVD, from the K-state lecture that he gave - courtesy of Weston, last night - wow that brought up so many questions and ideas. The thing that surprises me most about it was that i understood it and the thing that surprised me most after that was that he brought up one of my thoughts that id blogged about a while ago - apparently im on the same wave length as some 19th century philosopher, which is pretty darn cool. I had to keep stopping and starting it though, its kinda hard going - im not sure that i would have taken it all in if i had actually been there, and im not always sure that he finishes a thought, like he'll start talking about something else and somehow avoid the question ...
But blooming thought provoking lecture though!

What now?

Dissertations in, celebratory barbeque is finished, nothing until exams in a months time .... what now?

Genetics

I just had an interesting thought,
Im revising for my viva, and realised, the mechanism of gram staining really doesnt interest me, Liam often says "im a microbiologist, anything with a nucleus doesnt interest me", well im a geneticist i like things to be even smaller than that, i like things at the DNA level, at a maximum at the protein level. Why you might well ask? why be so interested in something so small? Im a geneticist because i like to look at phenotypes (outcomes)and wonder, what made that happen? what caused that? Interestingly my answer to why im a philosopher is the same - why do i like philosophy?? because i like to look at things and wonder, what made that happen? what caused that? The two are surprisingly intertwinned.

*Knock Knock* "Whos there??" "God!" "not now God im kinda busy"

Are we sometimes too busy that we miss God at work? Life is busy, we're constantly doing something, meeting deadlines, preparing for the future, working working working, and when thats all finished we just want to lie down and zone out. Yesterday i was getting ready to head back to the LRC (im going to start getting my post redirected there), and Liam woke up and came downstairs to the kitchen for a chat and about 5 minutes later Alec walked through the door (i guess he had just gotten in from whereever he'd been the night before), i guess i should have thought this was strange in itself because those guys are never up and about before 4pm on a saturday. Anyway i was eating my breakfast and we were watching the Jehovahs witnesses systematically knock on every door across the street (no one answered - although we could see they were home), this lead to a discussion on faith (Liam was planning to open the door to them wearing a towel, clutching a open bottle of wine, hug Alec and invite them in for the orgy ....) Well heres the thing, i was busy, i have a lot of work to do, as i was putting my coat on Alec said something about the Bible contradicting itself, which bits were you supposed to follow? Liam answered that the New Testament superseeds anything before it but that didnt seem quite right, when i asked Alec why he thought the Bible contradicted itself (baring in mind i know his never actually read the Bible so i was interested in where he got his info from) he said about sacrifice, in the old testament they sacrifice things all the time, whats up with that? God had prepared me for that one, i told him about blood covering sins, but when Jesus came along and was sacrificed for all our sins, His blood cleans us so we dont need to sacrifice animals. This made him think, as i was tying my shoelaces he then said, yeah but really all gods are the same, well Jews and Muslims and stuff, thats the same god, because the old testament is all jews, so whats the deal, your worshipping the same god, again Liam agreed "ha yeah" (which i thought was strange because if you ask him about his faith he says Catholic ... yet doesnt believe any of the concepts, and apparently doesnt believe in God/is too embarrassed to admit infront of his friends that he does - its like people who have been brought up to call themselves something and feel the need to define themselves but dont actually have a connection to God, so really arent). This annoyed me because it seemed like Alec actually wanted to know and these faulty answers were being reaffirmed in him without having the opportunity to hear the Truth, or at least another side to the arguement. I asked him how the God of the Jews could be the same God of Christians if Christians believe that Christ is God, the trinity comprises the father, son and holy spirit, three parts of one, if you believe in one part but not the others then you arent believeing in the same God are you? He thought about it and agreed. As i was walking out of the door Alec said to Liam, those commandment things, there not in order of importance are they? coz that would mean murder is like way down there Liam chuckled and said nah its just an arbitary list, i was out the door by this point, and didnt get a chance to think about it again until i was lying in bed that night, i should have been less busy and taken the time to suggest that maybe they are in order of importance, the first four are about God, whether you have faith and respect for Him, thats got to be the most important thing, if you dont believe in God you're screwed from the start - its like saying "hey if you dont have this down stop reading this list and sort your life out before you move on" Number 5 is about respect too, if you cant respect your earthly parents how can you respect your heavenly one? 5-10 seem to me to be things that you dont need to know God to follow, so yes you should do them but they are less important because you dont need to know God, you can be forgiven for murder (after all didnt Moses murder a guy? but God still used him, his faith was more important than anything) but if you never believe that there is only one God and this is Him then youre kinda screwed. I didnt say that .... i was too busy, ive been praying for opportunities for these guys to build a relationship with God and when spring is finally here and i have the opportunity to sow seeds i dont take the time to do it, i was kicking myself, why didnt God point that out to me at the time?! Anyway the good thing is spring is more than a day long, i didnt anticipate the guys getting up until this evening so i wrote my point up on the board (with my bible opened up to the right page underneath) for them to pick apart at some point later on today. We'll see what happens

Awesome people reflect an Awesome God

When you ask somebody a question do you have a set of answers you think they might give? Kinda like Who wants to be a millionaire, i do, it decides how i think of the person, this is what i would like them to say, this is what they probably will say. The greatest people i always get wrong, i always underestimate them even if i readjust for how great they are, they always go above and beyond my hopes, these are the people i want to be surrounded by daily, yet make me think "God i dont deserve this - you know how crap i really am? right? .... you sure you have the right person?".

I hope he doesnt mind me using him as an example, but like Weston
Im struggling with my (very important) dissertation project, ive been given a programme that i have no idea how to work and am pretty stressed out about it, so i guess im just moaning

It goes something like this
"ARGH!!! why is this thing not working!! *contemplates throwing laptop out of the window*" (obviously this isnt word for word ... the general gist is there though)
My thought process on telling someone this is thus - im just moaning, i dont expect anyone to actually be able to help me, if it were me i would probably sympathise and suggest a couple of solutions

Hence my expected responses are these
"im sorry, why dont you ask your tutor tomorrow" (expected response - would make me think the person cares about me, but expected - not going above and beyond in any way shape or form)
"im sorry, that sucks" (standard response - obviously doesnt care a great deal but its not their problem, person is most probably a friend but not a close friend
"oh well, but lets talk about me" (negative response - dont feel very loved right now)

Obviously im not expecting these responses word for word but something along those lines, and most people fit in here. Which is why Weston always surprises me, i have my expected answers and then i have a backup 'really good' answer something like

"hmm how can i help?"

The kind of answer that would make me think - this person is awesome, but he doesnt even do that response, he always goes one better and i can never anticipate it, which is just wonderful. I think the actual response was

"Sure you can do it, lets work it out together" Followed by actually helping me and asking other people for help too, not being statisfied until something had been achieved, even though there was other (very important) things to be done. Basically going above and beyond what you could ever hope from a friend, and its always like that. I want to give that response, it makes me strive to be a better person.

You can never anticipate how God will help you, you have your standard 'this is what id do' response and you have a response that would be one better than that and one which would be one worse than that, but God wont do any of those, God will repsond in a way that is infinitely better ... because thats the definition of God.