16 June 2020 - Plague Journal Day 96

Micah 6:8
1 Corinthians 13:12
We all are still sheltering in place, but I'm here to keep you sane and entertained.
One could hardly ask for much more than that, now could one?

As one of my friends has said, it's easy to hate when hate is in your heart. I think he's right.
It's also easier to hate when you're hating "them," not a specific person whom you know, "them." If we put a name to a person, if we see him or her as an individual, not as just part of a group, suddenly they're human, they're real, and we can't hate as easily.
Here's a piece I wrote a long time ago about putting a face to the name:

Have you ever seen a picture of a radio personality and discovered that he really doesn’t “look like his voice” – or at least not the way you’d imagined him? I know I have.

In the same vein, I remember a coworker I had in our New York office. I had worked with her for a few years, always by phone, before she had any reason to visit Detroit. When she did, I was surprised to find that she didn’t look the way I expected at all.

Despite those surprises, I always find it’s helpful to put a face with a name, or with a voice. When I can picture the person on the other end of the phone call – or at the keyboard sending email – I have a much easier time dealing with him as a person, rather than as a job title or a resource.

I think that’s one of the great things God did in sending Jesus to us.

Before that, we had the writings of Moses and David and the prophets. They had heard God’s voice, somehow, and they told us what He said, and what He was like.

Then, suddenly, right there among us, was Jesus – God in human form. At last we could put a face to the Name, we knew Who it was when we heard His voice.

I know we don’t have a photograph of Jesus – we don’t know exactly what he looked like (pace Rembrandt’s exhibit at the DIA), but we do know enough:
We know He looked like us, we know we were created to look like Him, and we know that one day we’ll see Him face to face.

What Joy!

Thought for the Day:
May the Lord bless you and keep you;
May the Lord make his face to shine upon you, and be gracious unto you;
May the Lord lift up His countenance upon you, and give you peace. Amen

Yes, He looked like us. We look like Him. All of us. Don't forget that.

Keep Calm and Stay Away.
I'll be back tomorrow.

Update:
I had forgotten that today is Bloomsday.  If you're not in Ireland for the celebration (and nearly all of us are not in Ireland), then your best bet is to pull out your copy of Ulysses and read it today. It only covers about 24 hours, so give it a go!

25 April 2020 - Plague Journal Day 44

We all are still sheltering in place, but I'm here to keep you sane and entertained.
One could hardly ask for much more than that, now could one?

We're all being told "Don't touch your face" more times than we can even hope to register.
Have you noticed that you feel more agitated when you don't touch your face?
Why do we touch our faces all the time anyway?

Let me explain both of those things.

It's not really that you're touching your face, rather it's that you're smelling your hands. Why? Because our hands let us know if there's some foreign DNA in our system based on how they smell.
Think about it:

• Mothers know the smell of their children, and when it changes, they know something is amiss. 
• Babies know the smell of their parents - when they smell someone else, they get a bit agitated.
• Mary Katherine Gallagher from SNL knew the smell of her armpits and used that to calm herself down.

The examples are endless, but I hope you get the picture by now.

Further, one of the less well known symptoms of the current coronavirus (COVID-19) is a loss of the sense of smell. Likely that's a survival mechanism for the virus - if we don't smell the difference in our hands' emanations, we're less likely to take anti-viral precautions and are thus more likely to spread the contagion. A very clever virus. (Clever is probably not the right word, diabolical is more to the point!)
So - you're agitated because you can't check your health by smelling your hands. 
(N.B.: That may be why people wearing gloves often have sweaty palms. That can be caused by subconscious worry about not being able to smell their hands, along with an attempt to be able to smell them in spite of the gloves. This is pure conjecture on my part, but clearly matches all the facts.)

At any rate, today's commemorations are perfectly timed to celebrate this amazing bit of design: today is DNA Day and it's also National Sense of Smell Day.

Remember to thank the Lord for your sense of smell.

Keep Calm and Stay Away.
I'll be back tomorrow.

Here's a bonus celebration-in-place for you today. In addition to the commemorations noted above, this is also Bob Wills Day and World Malaria Day. I suggest we all listen to a bit of classic Western Swing while enjoying a fragrant gin and tonic (the tonic has quinine - protects from malaria).
Cheers!