The Olson Zoo Weblog

We’re continuing to pray for our friends John & Wendy Gerhardt and their ministry in New Orleans, Urban Impact Ministries.

News seems to be encouraging…several of the UIM staff have returned to the city and they are making plans to rebuild and restore their neighborhood, and so help to bring hope to a situation that often seems hopeless. For more up to date information, go to their website and look for the “Evacuation Journal” link.

I’m pleased to note that we are more or less finished with our big deck project. You can view photos from the entire project duration in the photo gallery.

Here is a photo of the planter box & bench that sit on the corner of the deck:

This photo shows the wraparound stairway on the east side of the deck in progress, from a few weeks ago.

The only things left to do now are:

• Build doors for storage area under planter box
• Stain & seal (next Spring)
• Add lighting - also probably next Spring

Yesterday in our Adult Bible Fellowship, our teacher Alan Peterson was going over the doctrinal statement of the Evangelical Free Church, our denomination. When we got to point #12 (”We believe in the bodily resurrection of the dead; of the believer to everlasting blessedness and joy with the Lord; of the unbeliever to judgment and everlasting conscious punishment.”), Alan read the following passage from Revelation 21:1-4:

Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and there was no longer any sea. I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Now the dwelling of God is with men, and he will live with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God. He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.”

Reading this again reminded me of how much I look forward to eternity with God. This life now is great (well, most of the time!), and we have important work here to do, but there is so much more awaiting us on the other side, and that’s exciting!

It was recently discovered by Mark Russinovich in his SysInternals Blog that Sony Music has been quietly installing a “rootkit” on Windows computers of unsuspecting music buyers. This is a very unwelcome development in the Anti-Piracy Wars.

By doing this, Sony Music has stooped to the same level as the virus writers, and worse, they have made it easier for those same virus writers to “piggyback” on their work and install viruses or other “malware” that can avoid detection by virus scanners.

So what can be done? First of all, I will refuse to buy any music CDs that have any kind of digitial rights management (DRM) software on them. Secondly, I think Sony may be liable for any damage caused to computers by this software, and I wouldn’t be surprised to see them taken to court for this willful abuse.