A moment of clarity

It's Suspense Week for my former coworkers back in Approps Land -- the week when hundreds of bills are dispensed with in one hearing that's preceded by countless hours of meetings and handwringing and brokered deals and negotiations and amendments and generalized yuckiness. And for the crew in the Senate, that means extended dealings with Assembly members and their staffs -- and they are legion.

It's the first time in six years I'm not there for the crazy. I can honestly say I do not miss it. But my heart is heavy for those who remain, particularly knowing they're at least a staff member short in the committee and the workload was crushing even when with a full staff complement.

I went to a book signing last week where a lot of folks from the building were in attendance. One lobbyist who hadn't seen me since May told me I looked five years younger. Can't imagine why.

Edited to add: I found out tonight that Suspense was last week -- apparently, they moved the hearing up a full week in order to try to adjourn session a week early. This only confirms (a) I am officially completely out of the loop and (b) I am so grateful that the Lord delivered me from that place when He did. Like Suspense isn't hard enough at its normal time without making it earlier than usual. Wow.

More dorked-out excitement at the pending ESV Study Bible

Crossway has a blog now for the upcoming ESV Study Bible. And a YouTube video!

Which I first saw on Justin Taylor's Between Two Worlds. It's an introduction to the ESV Study Bible where you'll see some of the artwork contained in it (Jerusalem in the time of David, in the time of Solomon, in the time of Nehemiah, in the time of Jesus; the Herodian Temple Mount, the Temple Mount Complex, and a cutaway of Herod's Temple) as well as hear a few endorsements and a description of many of its key features:



I'm even more excited about its coming out now than I was when I pre-ordered since my other ESV went missing.

Product rave: Estee Lauder Double Wear foundation

Male reader(s), turn away now. Nothing to see here.

Lady(ies), on the other hand, you may care about this if you, like me, have oily skin and are interested in makeup and the like. If not, you may wish to join the menfolk in turning away for the moment.

I have been test-driving some new foundation for a few weeks now. I've long worn Bobbi Brown stuff (and I still love it all), but between the longer daily walk to and from my work parking place coupled I think with some of the medication changes I've already made this year, my skin is just too oily for it any more. I mean, I've always been oily, but it's gotten a lot worse. Plus, I'm in the sun a lot more, so I can't scrimp on sun protection, which just adds to the overall gooeyness of my skin.

So I've been looking for some new makeup that won't either leave me like an oil slick or completely disappear from my face by noon (and where does it go, the makeup, when it disappears? a great mystery). A lot of the drugstore stuff breaks me out and/or oxidizes when it comes in contact with the oil in my skin, leaving me Oompa Loompa orange. Plus there are rarely testers available, so getting a good color match is like a crap shoot even if you hit on the right formula.

After failing at Target I tried an online search, and one foundation rose above nearly all others when reviewed by oily-skinned women: Estee Lauder Double Wear Makeup. It almost seemed too good to be true -- 15-hour wear, 20 shades available, SPF 10 (not great, but at least something), oil free. Hmmmm.

Well, I went to the counter and got some samples. And it's amazing stuff. It truly lasts all day -- well, everywhere except my nose, which is like a force of nature. There's no weird fragrance, it doesn't feel strange going on, it doesn't change color and my skin feels like my skin as the day goes on. And a little goes a long way, so a bottle is going to last me a long time. Also, if you wear concealor, they make a Double Wear version that works beautifully with the foundation.

Once my samples are gone, I'm going to buy the full-size bottle. If you're in the market for something new and have similar skin issues, I recommend this.

Going off my meds. Again.

It's no secret to anyone who knows me that I have chronic migraines. I've also been taking "preventative" medications for them for years now.

It started with daily doses of anti-inflammatories and went from there to hormonal therapies and beta blockers to adding a low dose of a old school antidepressant to the mix (not for its antidepressant properties but for what it did to the chemical mix in my brain). These drugs kept getting increased in dose over the years until they lost their efficacy.

Which wasn't great. I was in daily, significant pain punctuated by regular migraines. I had gained a bunch of weight from the medication combination and its impact on my metabolism (a common side effect). Nothing was working.

So two years ago with great trepidation I started an anticonvulsant medication called Topamax for preventative treatment. For many migraine sufferers it's the silver bullet, but it brings its own challenges and side effects. And since it's a drug that works directly on the brain, basically, it's not messing around. It's not a drug to take lightly.

And -- here I am again. After a brief respite when I started with Capitol Ministries, I am again in pain every day. I'm at a daily dose of Topamax that exceeds what most migraine sufferers take, and it's just not working. Except to provide many lovely side effects (I know why it's called "dopamax") -- memory problems, name- and word-finding challenges, pins and needles in my hands and feet, fatigue, changes in the way things taste... If the headaches were gone, it'd be one thing. But to be feeling this way and still be in pain, and given how expensive it is, it's just not worth it.

This is a very long way of saying that I am going to go off the medication. It could be that I'm wrong about this and the medicine is all that stands between me and migraines the likes of which I've never seen before. But my guess is that the Topamax quit working, just like the other medicines, and I've basically just been enjoying the side effects here for a while.

In which I reveal that I really dislike bugs

Yesterday at work I was alone in the office for a while. Lynne and Sean were out for the day and David had left for lunch with Russell. I was busily toiling away when I began to sense -- a presence. A malevolent, horrible presence.

It's a small office and I was the only person in there, so I knew I was being ridiculous, but I couldn't shake it. The strange feeling went on for several minutes until I had to get up from behind my computer to get something out of the printer. It was then that I saw it.

It was a bug. A pretty big bug. And it was headed straight for me. There was really only one thing to do.

I called David.

You'd think that all these years of living by myself would equip me for these sorts of things, but nope. I just hate bugs in a way that paralyzes me. Hate hate hate. It's completely irrational and the bigger they are, the worse it is, with the exception of swarming ants, which completely skeeve me out for reasons I can't quite understand.

I blame this on having grown up in the Gulf Coast, where bugs the size of kittens were the norm and people and their exterminators were on a first-name basis. I am not kidding when I say I saw two-inch-long cockroaches on a daily basis when I lived there, and that's just not right. I think something in me just snapped, and bug-wise, I'm done.

Anyway, back to yesterday's bug. He basically had me pinned in a corner of the office. He was waving his little antennae at me while I clutched the phone receiver and asked David how long he thought he'd be at lunch.

David wisely suggested I see if the office building maintenance guy might help me out, which hadn't even occurred to me. Because apparently I don't care if David thinks I'm crazy, but I do care if total strangers think I am. In the end the custodian was very nice, saved me from the bug (which was a cricket, as it turned out) (but a very BIG cricket), and then told me all about how crickets come out in August and if I ever needed to be saved from another bug just to call him and it would be no problem.

I must have looked really terrified. Of a cricket.

'I don't have to listen to the music, do I?'

When I became a Christian three-and-a-half years ago, I had two basic questions immediately afterward:

1. "So, I guess I need to go buy a Bible now?" and
2. "I don't have to listen to the music, do I?"

And I wasn't kidding. Yes, I know art and music are open to opinion, and I accept this, but I think any of us who have ever listened to "popular" Christian music for any length of time -- even the most sanctified and separated-from-the-world among us -- can attest to the fact that there are a lot of really cheesy "Christian" lyrics floating on poor electronic keyboarding out there. And I'm leaving aside the doctrinal problems. Even before I was a Christian I knew popular Christian music was, generally speaking, not great and to be avoided. And the thought of having to trade the (pagan) music I loved so much for (what I thought would be) religious dreck upset me.

I was lucky that the Lord had sent me someone who loved the fallen world's music even more than I did. And as the years have passed, I've learned there is some praise music out there actually worth listening to. Too, I've remembered a lot of my grandmother's music, hymns she played on the church organ when I was wee. Current artists are taking these old standards and making them new for a modern audience. I'm not sure she'd approve of this -- even though she was never a Christian, she was a quite a legalist -- but I think she'd be glad that the songs she loved so much aren't being forgotten. Least of all by me.

One hymn I love is "I'll Fly Away." Here's a bluegrass version of it, sung by Allison Krauss (whose voice is so beautiful; she sang a good portion of the soundtrack for Cold Mountain, paired there with Sting) and Gillian Welch:



Moral of the story (at least for me): good Christian music is out there; it just has to be hunted down.

'Lost Boy' chosen to be flag bearer by US Olympians

This made my eyes teary. From cnn.com:

BEIJING -- A U.S. athlete who overcame the chaos of war in Sudan to become a middle-distance runner in the United States will carry the American flag during Friday's opening ceremony of the 2008 Summer Games.

Lopez Lomong, a 23-year-old competitor in the 1,500-meter race, will lead the U.S. Olympic team as the flagbearer.

Teammates chose him Wednesday, the U.S. Olympic Committee (USOC) said in a statement.

Lomong is a member of Team Darfur, a group of athletes committed to raising awareness about chronic violence in the Darfur region of western Sudan.

He was among roughly 3,800 refugees, dubbed the Lost Boys of Sudan by reporters and aid workers, who were resettled in cities around the United States.

Nearly all were boys who had been separated from relatives during the war in Darfur. They endured months of wandering during which thousands died of hunger, disease or attacks by bandits or wild animals.

Human rights groups have faulted China for doing too little to pressure Sudan, its trading partner, to halt unremitting bloodshed in the Darfur region. An estimated 300,000 people have died and 2.5 million forced from their homes in a campaign of violence in Darfur that the United States has condemned as genocide.

The Chinese government this week revoked the visa of Team Darfur's co-founder, former speedskating gold medalist Joey Cheek and activist for Darfur, the group said, without offering a reason.

Lomong said he is thrilled to be a flagbearer.

"This is the most exciting day ever in my life," he said in a USOC statement. "I'm here as an ambassador of my country and I will do everything I can to represent my country well."

At age 6, Lomong fled his home in southern Sudan with his family to escape an attack but became separated from his relatives, the USOC says. He ended up in a refugee camp near the border of Sudan and Kenya, the USOC says.

Lomong was uprooted in 1991 by a grinding civil war in Sudan that pitted black southerners who practiced Christianity and animist religions against a government dominated by Arab Muslims from northern Sudan.

The north-south war in Sudan killed 2 million people and displaced 4 million others before a 2005 peace deal ended the fighting. Yet violence still rages in the unrelated conflict that erupted in 2003 in the western region of Darfur.

Lomong spent 10 years in the refugee camp before the U.S. government resettled him as a refugee in the town of Tully, in upstate New York.

Lomong attended high school in Tully and went on to Northern Arizona University. He became a U.S. citizen in July 2007.

"The American flag means everything in my life -- everything that describes me, coming from another country and going through all the stages that I have to become a U.S. citizen," Lomong said in the USOC statement. "This is another amazing step for me in celebrating being an American."

Starting again

I don't really want to go into why the Bloggedy Blog is no more, but it's gone. And a week and a half after its demise, I'm surprised by the number of people who've asked about it. Quite a few have gone so far as to not believe that I just flat out quit blogging -- like I've been secretly doing it, or that I have an alias or something (which if you know me at all is really funny -- I'm no good with secrets, Appropriations history aside). And the lobbying I've received to start up again, a lot of it by people I didn't even know knew I had a blog, much less read it, has been totally surprising.

So, I'm going to try this again. With some reluctance. I have missed writing and posting various things (getting them out of my system?) and definitely hearing what others have to say. But I may tread carefully for a while and if I start to feel squeamish, I may just bail out.

I hope you'll be patient 'til I regain my sea legs.