We have a young friend, the 13-year-old daughter of our neighbors up the street, who is a very promising runner. She is already the fastest girl on her high school track team in the mile and 2-mile races. AT 13! So, just to improve and train, she has to find people to run with. She used to run with the boys. But now, she’s faster than the boys. Sometimes she runs with one of her coaches. A while back, she got to run as a guest (I think in the marathon world they call them “pirates” or something like that—people who run the course, during the race, even though they are not registered) with another team, on which two of the state’s top runners are members. I understand she fonud that to be a cool challenge.

We have another friend, a 21-year-old woman, who is a very accomplished runner. Runs track and cross country for a college in North Carolina. Wins a lot of medals and stuff. We’re hoping to introduce our two friends. We think Dana (the older one) would be a great influence on Caroline (the younger one)…in a lot of ways. And being able to help a younger girl might also be very satisfying to Dana.

I hope the whole thing works out, because they are both very special people. I know this, because I have observed them (partially through the eyes of both sets of parents). But what’s really cool is that neither Dana nor Caroline seems to see anything particularly interesting or unusual about herself. To both of them…it’s just running. I know one thing; I could train for a year and get a quarter-mile head start, and they would both still leave me in the dust. Probably you too.

Took about as long as it took James Joyce to write Ulysses, but our new site is up. Go check it out. Let me know what you think.

Love the word. Love the ax. Anne got me a little koa ukulele (ooo-koo-lay-lay) back in March, when we were in Honolulu. It’s awesome. Now, there are the $10 ukes you can get at tourist traps or on EBAY. Can’t even keep them in tune. Then there are the real ukuleles starting with mahogany and spruce axes made in china—nice enough, but they don’t appreciate. Then there are the koa axes, wood harvested in Hawaii, shipped to china, parts cut in china, shipped back to Hawaii, assembled and finished in Hawaii. That’s what I got—affordable, sounds great, and appreciates over time. Then there are the ones completely made in Hawaii—sound and priced like national treasures. Gotta get one of those some day.

In six weeks, I’ve learned “Something in the Way She Moves,” “You Are My Sunshine,” about a half dozen hymns, and IZ’s “Somewhere Over the Rainbow.” Sweet.

We had the opportunity to return to Hawaii last week. We gave a report to some very cool clients (I guess they’re products of their environment). We made a presentation in the morning to the marketing team. Then, we went up the elevator in the afternoon to present to the executive team. I think the findings were well received. So, we look forward to building the brand.

Spent Saturday with our friend Ken, who showed us around some parts of Hawaii most haoles don’t get to see. First, we went to the Honolulu Academy of Arts, where they have a once-in-a century show of antiquities from Bhutan. There were some fabulous textile pieces that were hundreds of years old, but looked better than some of my ties. And a few small statues were from as far back as the sixth century. Wow!

Over lunch, we got some more teaching about Hawaii culture. We learned that a lot of names are transliterated into the Hawaiian language, but because the language has a limited number of sounds the names have to be changed slightly. For example, Kenneth is “Keneke.” I was delighted to learn that in Hawaii, I am “Kimo.” Cool, huh!

Then, we headed to Pearl Harbor. Turns out, Ken is a retired Navy Captain, so he was able to take us backstage. We got pictures of the Missouri and the Arizona Memorial, but our favorite part of the visit was the Utah Memorial (we were the only ones there). We stood on the shore and Ken explained the brilliant Japanese strategy for Pearl Harbor—and how their failure to complete the mission allowed us to get back on our feet and eventually win the war in the Pacific. Good case study in strategy and execution, which I will surely use at some point.

Last stop of the day—a Shinto shrine right in the heart of Honolulu. Ken explained the role of Shinto and Buddhism in the traditions of Hawaii, especially among Asian Hawaii people. We appreciated his willingness to share these things with us.

Keneke is an incredible person, yet completely unassuming. It was an awesome day. Mahalo!

I always thought it would be easy to do the old Jackson Pollock paint drizzle thing. I always thought it was a clear case of an interesting, promotable guy creating a “style” that he could reproduce fast, in his sleep, and make a lot of money. Well, maybe that’s all true. But the paint drizzling thing is not as easy as one might think. And if you don’t believe me, try it.

My problem is knowing when to stop. Also, it’s hard do decide, on the fly, how much to use of a given color, or what color works well drizzled over what other color. Of course, unlike Pollock, we can just hit the refresh key and start over. Once he drizzled on a canvas, the die was cast.

Try it. Let me know what you think.

We’ve been looking at hybrids for quite a while. We knew our ancient cars would eventually wear out, and we knew we wanted to replace them with something more fuel efficient and something that would be a better environmental stewardship testimony. I think a lot of people have those two motives (in some combination) for going hybrid: save money, be responsible.

Our pal, Zufall, was more about saving money (I think). He talked a lot about wanting a hybrid car that got really good mileage, but “looked” like a normal car. He was not interested in making a statement. He ended up with a Honda Civic, and at last report, he was delighted.

Our friends Owen and Beth got their first Prius a while back—they are more the “statement” types—and they are delighted with the fuel efficiency, comfort, performance (such as it is), and styling—styling that screams, “intelligent, hip, environmentally responsible.”

Anne and I are not normally big on statements. In fact, I have drove a 1992 Saturn from 1994 until yesterday, when I inherited Anne’s 2001 Isuzu Rodeo. I’ve studied this a little bit. The best thing you can do for the environment (car-wise) is to have a walking or cycling lifestyle. Barring that, the best thing you can do is avoid forcing somebody to build a new car. About half the carbon footprint of any car is in the manufacturing. So, if you already have a functional car, keep driving it.

Anyhow, as we started looking for a new vehicle for our road trips and for Anne’s commute, we decided to look for a Prius. Not that we wanted to make a statement, but Toyota had the guts to step up to the plate with this technology, while it appeared Detroit was trying to deep-six it. And, they have the best hybrid on the mass market (not all hybrid is created equal) for fuel efficiency and emissions. We thought they should be rewarded for their innovation and guts—and we thought we should be rewarded in the form of lower fuel bills.

We were not actively searching, but the Lord works in His own ways, you know. Our pal Seth does some consultation with Landrover of Greenville. So, he had the inside track, when somebody traded in a 2006 Prius. We got the heads-up, and there we go. The only problem is that you can get fixated on the little display screen and forget to watch the road. Other than that, it’s awesome.

Now, we’re looking for somebody who needs a 1992 Saturn SL2. Somebody who thinks its cool to drive a 16-year-old car. Somebody who will drive the wheels off of it, then recycle the parts. Any thoughts?

To those of us who are not web savvy, it’s a little creepy. As I understand it, search engines have these virtual spiders (robots) that crawl all over the Internet, making exhaustive notes of everything they find. Then, when you do a GOOGLE search for something, say, “Stately plump Buck Mulligan,” the spiders remember all the places they encountered “Stately plump Buck Mulligan” and post a list of all the pages where they found it in their explorations. There are secret formulas by which they decide the order in which they list the pages.

In your site, you have code, HTML text, images, meta tags, and some other stuff. My friend Dan at Blueridge Solutions could give you the technical scoop on this. But as far as spiders go, they recognize HTML text and meta tags, but they don’t recognize pictures (spiders hate art it seems). Meta Tags are tags, written into the source code, not visible on the interface of your site, that tell spiders what’s important to you. Our meta tags, for example, include “Bank Branding.” This helps you be attractive to spiders (like I want to be attractive to spiders) in a way that helps you when people search for companies like yours. There are specialists within the web design business, who do nothing but “Search Engine Optimization,” (SEO) which is the art and science of attracting spiders.

Quick aside, I head that for the movie, Willard, they put peanut butter all over Ernest Borgnine, so he would be attractive to the rats, so they would look like they were eating him in the scene where the rats ate Earnest’s character. Told you this was a creepy post. Anyhow, SEO is to Internet spiders as peanut butter is to movie rats.

Some people are very sensitive about their image and frequently GOOGLE their own brand. This is a pretty smart thing to do, actually. A couple of times, for example, I mentioned UMPQUA Bank, you know, the world’s greatest bank—UMPQUA. Sure enough, within a couple of days, we got a bunch of hits from UMPQUA and others within their region. Hey UMPQUA, I mentioned you four times, I know I’ll be seein’ ya. Love ya’ UMPQUA. Mean it. You’re awesome.

Anyhow, SEO is great if you want to seat a position. But only if you’re prepared to back up the expectations you’re inviting. Gotta go.

In Permission Marketing, Seth Godin makes the point that in the future, as options become more plentiful, time will be the common currency, not money. There will be so many options, at such low prices, that people will be able to afford to buy whatever they want, but they will not be able to afford the time to consider all the options. This is one of the basic principles of permission marketing. Well, along those lines, I’ve been thinking about time as currency.

There is a principle in the Bible, where your treasure is, that is where your heart is. So, the idea goes, if your heart is on Heavenly things, that’s where you’ll be investing your treasure. I’ve been noticing a lot of no-shows at things that ought to be important.

We had a big conference at our assembly over the weekend. We heard two great speakers. One lived for 21 years in Senegal and is something of an expert on Islam. The other was a Raleigh police officer for 21 years, and is an expert on presenting the Gospel to kids. Very powerful stuff all the way around. Too bad so many people missed it.

If you ask them why they missed it, they would say that they had other time commitments. If you asked whether they considered the information important, they would probably say yes. If you asked if the souls of children and Muslims were at least as important as the computer installations, house painting, ball games, and other things that comprised their time commitments, they would probably say, absolutely. If you presented the credentials of the two men who spoke, many of the people who weren’t there would be impressed and want to hear what these men had to say. Yet, their treasure was elsewhere.

There are times when I have schedule conflicts. I end up wishing I could be two places at once. And as often as not, the commitment that went onto the schedule first wins. But I hope the Lord helps me to have my priorities right. I hope that, all things being equal, I will chose to invest my time in things that have eternal value.

While I’m here, here’s a little homework. Please, somebody show my “family values” in the Bible. Please, somebody show me where Scripture says, “family first.”

Tomorrow, two high-octane smart guys are going to debate whether or not God exists. It will be quite an event. John Lenox, author, serious math genius, Oxford professor and Biblical Christian will go toe-to-toe with Richard Dawkins, author, serious physicist, Oxford professor, and spokesman for the “new atheism.” Should be a great debate. Fun to listen to. Fun to watch. Fun to talk about later.

I’ll be rooting for Lenox, of course. But in the end, the debate will not make one bit of difference. God doesn’t need a math genius to prove He exists. Nor can a physics dude prove He doesn’t.

To paraphrase Daniels three pals, if God wants to prove Himself, He will. If He doesn’t He won’t. Either way, I will not bow down to your stupid statue, Nebi. And to paraphrase Ester, if I parish, I parish. To quote my big sister, God’s God, He can do what He wants. And to quote my former business partner, don’t use God, He doesn’t like it.

I was just outside, and I noticed that it was getting a little cooler—at 94 degrees! Last week we set a record—five days in a row over 100. So, 94, by comparison, is a little cooler. But anyone who thinks the words “cooler” and “94 degrees” in the same thought needs some sort of adjustment in perception.

This must be what it’s like to be a boiled frog.