What's in Your Cup?

In my last blog, I brought up the topic of coffee shops. We have been to many coffee shops across the continents. Some coffee shops are rather plain; others go to a great deal of effort to decorate their spaces. It seems common for the purveyors of caffeinated bliss to post signs with various kinds of cute or wise sayings, and that will be the focus of this blog.

For this piece, I will share signs and sayings that particularly relate to the handiwork of the baristas of the world.

I will begin close to home, in the town of Woodlake, a quaint village at the foot of the Sierra Nevada Mountains in Tulare County. A coffee shop with the strange name of Munchies can be found on the east side of Highway 245 (North Valencia Blvd.). With a name like that, I wasn't sure whether I was going there to eat or drink coffee. Inside of Munchies you will find a proverb that, even if you disagree with the first part, you may agree with the second.

Munchies Coffee in Woodlake, California

It's hard to argue with the statement that Good Friends are a Treasure. I can also relate to good coffee being a pleasure. But there is such a thing as bad coffee, which is not a pleasure, and fortunately they did not serve me any at Munchies. Because elsewhere I read that Life is Too short for Bad Coffee. That was the sentiment shared on the wall of The Coffee Shop in Mariposa.

Life is Too Short for Bad Coffee

Unfortunately, life was also too short for The Coffee Shop, as I no longer see it on Google Maps. But back to Munchies Coffee. On another wall of that establishment we find a much more bold statement.

Everything Gets Better with Coffee

Everything Gets Better With Coffee, the saying goes. For some, it even improves their blood pressure scores, that is, if you are looking for higher grades.

From Woodlake, we will travel to the north of Fresno to the city of Madera. Madera is one of the many "M" towns along Highway 99: Madera, Merced, Modesto, and Manteca. These are all Spanish words, which translate wood, mercy, modesty, and lard, respectively. (Fresno is also a Spanish word meaning ash tree, but that's a story for another day.)

One day, we were coming into Madera from the east, having taken the back roads from Oakhurst through Raymond. We had already had a picnic lunch at the Fresno River Recreation Area and we were looking for a place that might sell us a blended mocha. We pored over Google Maps and found a place called Charita's. At Charita's they sell ice cream as well as coffee. And they also sell succulents. (I'm not sure what succulents have to do with coffee and ice cream, but that's how it is.)

There was one sign posted at Charita's that used a play on words, Love You a Latte.

Love You a Latte

Well, they did not love me enough to get a free latte, but the blended mocha was good—though perhaps sweeter than we needed. Elsewhere they had posted a rewrite of Matthew 19:26 that went: With Enough Coffee, Anything is Possible.

With Enough Coffee Anything is Possible

Well, Jesus might disagree with this statement, but apparently not everyone does. This statement is also fairly open, because anything could include good things and bad things; wise things or foolish things.

We'll travel up the road from Madera to Mariposa, to the now defunct The Coffee Shop. Their walls had a lot to say about the beverage that replaced beer as the breakfast of choice in Britain many years ago. I'll begin with one of their milder statements: First I Drink the Coffee, Then I do the Things. I like the use of the definite article in this saying. The coffee. The things.

First I Drink the Coffee, then I do the Things

That one was fairly innocuous, but this next one was a bit threatening: Just Give Me the Coffee and No One Gets Hurt.

Just Give me the Coffee
and No One Gets Hurt

I wonder if they ever had a threat like that. Mariposa does seem like a bit of an outlaw western town. Maybe that's why they had to close. Another sign in The Coffee Shop also seemed like a bit of a warning: Drink Coffee—do Stupid Things Faster With More Energy.

Do Stupid Things Faster with More Energy

The last sign I'll post from The Coffee Shop had to do with the aroma of the morning brew—Good Morning: Wake Up and Smell the Coffee.

Wake Up and Smell the Coffee

With that, we will waft on the coffee fumes over to Thailand, where there are other coffee shops that call out the morning fragrance.

Just up the road to the northeast from Big C in Kalasin City is Ellie Cafe. (The Ellie is pronounced ee-lee with a rising tone on the second syllable.) Their coffee cups shared the same sentiment as The Coffee Shop—Wake Up and smell the Coffee, though it is a bit hard to read the font.

Wake Up and Smell the Coffee

To the southeast of the city of Kalasin, in the small village of Dawn Han, Sae Jom Coffee also called out the fragrance of coffee, proclaiming on their window: I Like Coffee—Smell It and Taste It.

Smell and Taste the Coffee

Unfortunately, Sae Jom Coffee seemed to be closed more than it was open, and later on two more coffee shops opened in their village including Order Here Coffee, which I mentioned in my previous blog.

I like coffee, but caffeine really doesn't affect me a whole lot. So while I enjoy a good cup of coffee at the beginning of the day, I can also enjoy one before I go to bed. Most people, it seems, are not wired this way. These folks struggle to begin their day without a caffeine fix. This next group of signs is for them.

I'll begin with a sign we saw at Ban Toem Phlang coffee shop in the village of Thanya, Kamalasai District, Kalasin, Thailand. This coffee shop was attached to a restaurant, but it closed down when the proprietor moved to Bangkok. Life Begins After Coffee is the sentiment expressed on this sign.

Life Begins After Coffee

This same sentiment was shared at Coffee Arigato at the Laem Thong Mall in Bang Saen, Chonburi Province.

Life Begins After Coffee

The folks at De Herdt Gardens in Barrhead, Alberta, Canada, seem even more desperate for their morning brew. "I would say good morning but I don't think I've had enough coffee yet" is the saying of a true addict.

Frazzled Cat at De Herdt Gardens

Other folks may be able to get going without their coffee, but the buzz enables them to keep going stronger and longer. This is the feeling expressed at a coffee shop, whose name I don't remember, in the Com Thong District of Chiang Mai. "Coffee. You can sleep when you're dead," declares the sign.

You can sleep when you're dead!

Chao Yan Yen Coffee (the name means "morning until evening") in Nong Khai puts a note on their cups to remind you that life is short, and coffee will help you stay awake for what little there is of it.

Life is Too Short

There are others who seem to need coffee to get their inspiration. Blue Gold Coffee in the Tha Sadet Market in Nong Khai comes right out and says it: Cup of Your Inspiration.

Inspiring Coffee in Nong Khai

Cake Lamoon Coffee—our favorite coffee shop in Phon Phisai in the province of Nong Khai—puts it a little differently: Great Ideas Start With Great Coffee. These guys started out as a modest shop with a good vibe. Then they made it even better by roasting their own beans and adding a bakery where they make all the stuff they sell. So if you're ever in the area, go get inspired with some great ideas (and great coffee and great food).

Great Ideas Start With Great Coffee

Still others have the opposite idea. Instead of using coffee time to be inspired with great ideas, they recommend using it as a time to take a break from thinking. This neon sign, Stop Thinking, Start Drinking, appears to have been made for a bar, but it ended up in a coffee shop called Cham Cafe in the city of Roi Et.

Stop Thinking Start Drinking

There are a bunch of coffee shops who draw a connection between love and coffee, either the love of coffee or the relationship between human love and coffee. I suppose some people might be challeged separating the two. Anyway, these next images will call attention to these.

Good Time Coffee, a coffee shop that used to exist at the Kasemrad Siriburin Hospital in Chiang Rai, was fairly direct about the relationship between Love and Coffee with the bold statement "Love Coffee" in big letters on the wall.

Love Coffee

Sea Street Coffee in Pranburi (Prachuap Kiri Khan Province), took a cue from the Beatles, "All You Need is Love & More Coffee.

All You Need is Love, Well Maybe Not Quite All

Sweetheat Coffee was a really cute coffee shop in the Chai Wan District of Udon Thani. The decor was full of hearts and similar romantic motifs. One would think that a place like this would draw a connection between coffee and human relationships. But, no, you can skip the love because All You Need is Coffee.

Or Maybe You Don't Need the Love After All

If you can't you have love, then at least maybe you can find happiness. After all, this is the weekend when we celebrate the occassion when our American forefathers wrote about the right to pursue happiness. I wrote elsewhere about a coffee shop that promises happiness in your cup.

Piamsuk=Full of Happiness

Other coffee shops indicate that you may need more than just coffee to find that happiness. At Brown Coffee Bar in the city of Kalasin, we are told that you also need cake: Happiness is a cup of coffee and a good piece of cake.

Will a Cookie Do if I Don't Have Cake?

And if cake isn't your thing, then the folks at this coffee shop at a Caltex gas station south of Chiang Rai would have us know that Coffee with a friend is like capturing happiness in a cup.

Coffee + Friend

And if happiness just seems too elusive for you, remember that You can't buy happiness, but you can buy coffee. Such was the wisdom from Tam Sabay (make yourself comfortable) Coffee in Lat Krabang.

The Best Thing Money Can Buy

Some coffee shops are less philosophical. Hom Kaew, a small coffee stand down the street from where we lived in Kamalasai, Kalasin, stuck with a simple definiton of coffee on their cups.

How Do You Define Coffee?

Well, maybe that is not the definition you might find in Merrimam-Webster, but it will do.

And this coffee shop in Vientiane, the capital city of Laos, devoted a wall to the benefits of coffee.

Just in Case You're on the Fence About the Magical Brew

Some coffee shops leave us wondering what they are actually feeding us. That coffee shop in Com Thong, which told us that we can sleep when we are dead, puts this on their cups:

What Exactly Did I Order?

PEA in love! What exactly is in this cup?

Canada's Tim Hortons seems to generate a lot of strong emotions. Some people seem to swear it is the best coffee and others seem to think it gives Canada a bad name. But leave it to Tim Hortons to keep the mystery going: Same Secret Recipe Since 1964.

Not Sure I'll Get Coffee at Timmy's Anymore

Secret recipe!?! I just want roasted coffee beans and water! I'm not a great fan of Starbucks, but after reading this cup, I think it might be a better option.

While we may be confused about coffee and love and relationships and secret recipes and caffeine addictions, at the end of the day, as the Comfy Corner Cafe in Roi Et reminds us, just remember: Life isn't perfect, but your cup of coffee can be.

Life Doesn't Always Go As Planned

And with that, I think I'll have another sip.

Real Books!

Yesterday we were doing some errands in the Reedley area and afterwards we decided to take a coffee break in town. We stopped at Brick and Stone Coffee on G Street.

Brick and Stone Coffee is run by Christians and it is apparent from the decor and the background music. It used to be in Dinuba, but then they moved to Reedley. Bad for Dinuba but more convenient for us. As I was sipping my coffee, I was looking around at the decor.

Brick and Stone Coffee

Something seemed a little off, but I couldn't figure it out at first. And then it struck me. They had real books!

Real Books

When we lived in Thailand, we liked to visit independent coffee shops. They tended to be better than the big chains because their prices were generally lower and we could usually get our custom drinks the way we liked them. Because competition was pretty fierce in the coffee shop business, the different shops would have to do something to draw customers. Typically, they would have an environment conducive to taking selfies. And so there would be props and decor geared toward that end.

Order Here Coffee Shop even had a Fake Washing Machine as a Prop.

One of the props we would see is fake books. Usually they stood out because the titles were in English.

Order Here was the name of a coffee shop in a small village in Kamalasai district of Kalasin. People would actually come with changes of clothes just for selfies. Some of the outfits were definitely not the type you would see on the streets! They had fake books scattered about, such as the one below. These books were basically empty cardboard boxes with book-like images on the outside.

Fake Book at Order Here Coffee Shop

But Order Here was far from the only coffee shop that did this. Black Coffee in Khon Kaen went all out with them.

Empty Boxes Disguised as Books at Black Coffee

Finding real books as "props" to actually read while sipping coffee was not that common. And even if there were such books, they might not be accessible. In one coffee shop in Chiang Khong, we sat down near a bookcase hoping to browse some of the books, only to find they were on the other side of the glass with their bindings facing inside, giving you false hope you might be able to look inside them.

Books on the Other Side of the Glass at Rider Coffee

So if you want to actually look at books while you're sipping your coffee istead of taking selfies or browsing social media, check out Brick and Stone Coffee in Reedley. (Cornerstone Coffee in Fresno also has books.)

When the Rooster Crows on the Manure Pile

Weather forecasting is an interesting science. In Thailand, we live close by the provincial meterological station. I've never gone in there, but we do look at the weather forecasts, though I'm not sure why.

We moved to Kamalasai in the dry season. One really doesn't need to look a a weather forecast in dry season, because it doesn't rain. And the temperatures are relatively similar each day. But as rainy season approached, I started to look at the forecasts more. For many days on end, there would be a probablility of precipitation between 30 and 35 percent. One would figure that it would rain about once every three days—but it didn't.

Later I figured that the forecasters must just be good statiticians, because as long as you predict a number between 1 and 99 percent, you're never wrong, you're just playing the odds. You just might not want to bring these people along as consultants when you go to the casino.

But then this happened: they predicted a 100% chance of preciptation for a certain portion of one afternoon, but then they changed their mind and lowered it before the time came. This has happened on more than one occasion. Are they allowed to do that? I mean, I think that if you predict a 100% chance of something, then you are committed to the outcome.

My wife told me an old German saying that seems to be a good weather forecasting tool:

Kräht der Hahn auf dem Mist, ändert sich das Wetter oder bleibt, wie es ist

Which roughly translates: When the rooster crows in the manure pile, the weather will change — or stay the same.

We're fortunate that we have a weather forecaster that lives across the street from us. This cockerel belongs to the proprietor of a coffin maker, and it hangs out in front of shop all day and all night, every day. It may not have a manure pile, but this prognosticator of precipitation starts his forecast about 3 am each day: the weather will either change or stay the same.

This Storm Passed us by to the North

This Storm Passed us by to the South - with Lots of Thunder

This Storm Finally Brought us Rain

Poisonous Snakes

Usually I post at least one of my own photos on my blogs. But recently I came across an old cartoon that struck so close to home, I thought I would share it.

This cartoon could sum up so much of our lives living in a foreign culture. Before coming to Thailand, we read several books and talked with experienced people about living here. In spite of this, we might find ourselves doing something that seems so innocent and which we can't imagine being something that would offend someone, but we manage to do so anyway. We have found that no matter how many books we read about living in an adopted culture, there is always something that you miss—something that wasn't covered in all the pages you've read.

It gets to where sometimes we end up second-guessing ourselves. Just in the past few weeks, we haven't been able to arrange to meet with someone because they were always busy. The reason they gave was legitimate enough, but was it the real reason? Or were they avoiding us because we somehow offended them unawares? We've had that happen enough times before.

Thai people generally avoid confrontation, so when they are offended, rather than saying so, they will just avoid the offender. I can relate to this because I, also, am one who would prefer to avoid than confront. So if we cause someone to be upset or somehow feel shame, if we hear about it at all, it will probably be from someone else.

On one occasion, I offended someone by confronting them too directly about something they did. That person contacted a mutual friend of their same culture who happened to be in another country. That person, also being of their culture, did not want to contact me directly either, so he contacted yet another mutual friend in another part of Thailand, who then called me. So then I went to apologize to this person who happened to live just 1/2 kilometer away from me. Seems kind of like flying from San Francisco to Los Angeles with connecting flights out of Paris and Sacramento.

It's not like there isn't a reason to be confused by all this. When I ended up talking to our mutual friend in  the other country about the things I had said or done that offended this person, he said, "I can speak to that person in that way, but you can't." Something about the relationship of that person with the person I offended allows him to be able to speak into their life a way that I can't, but I still don't know exactly what that is. It's like one of those unwritten exceptions to the "wagging tail means friendly" rule that is not covered in the guide books.

The longer we live in Thailand, the better we get at not offending people, but we still want to be careful. We don't want our lives to be the reason that another refuses to believe in Jesus.

Therefore let us stop passing judgment on one another. Instead, make up your mind not to put any stumbling block or obstacle in your brother's way. Romans 14:13 (NIV)

Recycled

The length of our days is seventy years-- or eighty, if we have the strength;
yet their span is but trouble and sorrow, for they quickly pass, and we fly away.
Psalm 90:10 (NIV) 

This past week marked a significant event in my life, I celebrated my 5th cycle birthday.

In Thailand, there is a recognition of the Chinese zodiac, though the zodiac year begins on Sonkran (April 13) and not according to the lunar calendar as they do in China.  Because of this, cycles of 12 are more significant than the cycles of ten (decade) that we follow in the west.

I was born in the Year of the Rooster and this year is the Year of the Rooster (until April 12).  Maybe this explains why I naturally get up so early in the morning.

This year was even more special because 5 cycles coincides with 6 decades (5x12)=(6x10).

To celebrate this occasion we went to Phu Phrabat Historical Park, located in Udon Thani province, about a 2 hour drive from our home.  When you're walking around some features that were made by humans 2000 to 3000 years ago, you don't feel so old.  In this case, humans made modifications to some unusual geological features that were there already.

Tower of Nang Usa, one of many ancient features in Phu Phrabat Hirtorical Park

Section of trail in Phu Phrabat Park

Following our morning at this park, we drove north about an hour to Nayung-Namsom National Park.  We had hoped to check out the waterfalls there, but they had already succumbed to dry season and they were now just cliffs in a canyon.  Still, the 2.5 km trail to the falls looped around to Pha Daeng Viewpoint.  We climbed a lot of stairs!

And because there was no water, the park was only kinda open, so we did not have to pay an entrance fee.  The parking area was at the Park Headquarters and one of the staff was very helpful in explaining things.

Pha Daeng (Red Cliffs) Viewpoint in Nayung Namsom National Park

After climbing a while, we got to the steep part.

After the stair climbing, it was time to celebrate in style-stopping at Swensen's in Nong Khai on the way home.  Swensen's may no longer be a thing in North America, but there are quite a few here in Thailand.

I ordered their chocolate lover's sundae with the malted milk balls, because they didn't have what I really wanted.

What I really wanted was a chocolate and coffee lovers' sundae, which would be a modification of this, from top to bottom:

chocolate wafer and cherry

chocolate chips

whipped cream

chocolate covered coffee beans

kahlua

chocolate ice cream

whipped cream

malted milk balls

chocolate syrup

coffee ice cream

hot fudge

Now that's what I want for my birthday!
Are you listening Swensen's?

The Evil Weed

It should come as no surprise to you that I was first introduced to the evil weed in Santa Cruz.

We had just moved to California from Haiti where we had spent 7 years working with the Baptist Haiti Mission.  Now I was beginning an Apprenticeship in Ecological Horticulture at UC Santa Cruz.  There were 40 of us apprentices camped on the farm.  We stayed in our own personal tents, but otherwise lived communally.  It was great to be on a farm where we grew our own organic fruits and vegetables.  We took turns preparing meals for the group.

We rotated between 3 locations on the farm: the "Up Garden", which was the original location  of Alan Chadwick's garden which started the program; the "down garden", with its large double-dug beds; and "the field", where tractors and larger scale equipment was used.

My first rotation was in the Up Garden.  I love salads, and I was excited at the nice, big bowl of greens that was prepared for us one day the first week.  But when I bit into the salad, I tasted something that seemed like a pesticide, which surprised me, since this was an organic farm.  Later, I asked a fellow apprentice about this, and she told me it might be something called cilantro.  I had never heard of this before, so later she pointed some out to me, and I found out this was the culprit.

It turns out that several of us there were not very fond of this evil weed, so we convinced the group that when making certain things like salsa (which we had fairly often), that a certain portion should be free of the weed.  The next time we had salsa, I was happy to see a big bowl free from those little green pieces of poison floating around.  But when I tasted the salsa, it still had a strong weed flavor.  Turns out they used the same utensils, and that was all it took for me to taste it.  That night, I was on clean-up detail, and when I was cleaning the counters, whenever the wet rag passed over where they had laid the cilantro that morning, I could tell.

Not long after we finished the apprenticeship, we ended up moving to Bakersfield.  We were attending a church and as part of that, we were part of a small group that met weekly for prayer and Bible study.  For Christmas, we were doing a gift exchange.  We each drew a name, and we also had to list something we liked and something we disliked, to help the gift-giver make a choice.

When we had our Christmas get-together, I found out that Marc had drawn my name.  He had found a Christmas ornament made of wires woven into the shape of an apple.  It was designed to be filled with some kind of potpourri.  He managed to cram it full of a huge amount of cilantro.  While I did not appreciate the cilantro, I certainly loved the creativity.  We kept the ornament (less cilantro) until we moved to Thailand.

A number of years later, I went on a two-week mission trip to India.  I was a bit apprehensive because I heard they use I lot of cilantro in their cuisine.  Well, that certainly was the case.  Still I forced myself to eat a little bit of everything until the middle of the second week.  I couldn't take any more, and for some meals I just ate plain rice.

A couple years after that, we made our first trip to Thailand.  I heard that the Thai cuisine has lots of cilantro, and found that also to be true.  However, there were usually cilantro free dishes to be had, so I stuck with them.

One day, they brought out a bowl of steaming hot soup with a huge mound of cilantro on top (this is fairly common practice).  Since I was at the end of the table, the server put it in front of me.  When my nose caught the steamy aroma, I almost threw up into the soup.  I quickly pushed back from the table until I recovered.

Steamy soup with cilantro on top

At the time we made that trip to Thailand, we had no idea we would ever go back.  But then, a few years later we found ourselves on a team going to Thailand for 10 years.  At this point, I thought, I really need to learn to eat cilantro if I am going to live in Thailand.  Surely this would be doable.  So I determined that I would to just that.  I was very intentional, sometimes even munching on sprigs of the stuff.  But I could never get used to it. It still tasted just as awful as ever.

Upon arriving in Thailand, I soon learned the Thai name for cilantro (pak chee).  I learned which foods normally have it and which ones don't (though there are always exceptions).  When I remembered, I would ask them not to put cilantro in the food.  Sometimes, if there was cilantro, I would just pick it out. (I can tolerate it a little if it has been cooked, because cooking sometimes drives off some of the aromatics that I am sensitive to.)

The bad part is, with soups, the only vegetables are often cilantro and green onions, which are cut up and mixed together ahead of time and called pak hawm.  So if I ask for no cilantro, I get no greens of any kind.

Pak Hawn--enough to kill off the Roman Empire

I figured that if I lived in Thailand long enough, I would eventuall get used to the evil weed.  But instead, my sensitivity has become worse.  If I am in a poorly ventilated room with lots of fumes, I get nauseous, short of breath and lose my appetite.  Still, if I am careful I can manage to get by without making too much of a scene.

Two weeks ago Somdy, our teammate, wanted to take us to this really nice Vietnamese Restaurant in Nong Khai.  Since it was a steamy day, we opted to sit in the air-conditioned part of the restaurant.  At this restaurant, they bring you out some wraps and raw leaves of various kinds, and the object is to roll them together with some sauce and eat them.  We were clear that we did not want cilantro and they obliged.

When they brought out the leaves, I was quite happy at the nice-looking, cilantro free, pile of greens.  I did not recognize any of the leaves, but that has never been a deterrent for me.  I put together my first wrap and took a bite and...

the reaction was instant,

the reaction was strong,

it was like cilantro, only worse.

Vietnamese coriander is the smaller-leaved vegetable on the left side of the plate.

After I went outside to get some fresh air for a few minutes, I went back and found out what the culprit is.  Vietnamese coriander is an English name for this plant.  Pak phaew is the Thai name.  The scientific name is also very fitting—Persicaria odorata.

I ended up taking some cilantro- and Vietnamese coriander-free spring rolls to the open air part of the restaurant to finish up my lunch while Ingrid and Somdy finished up theirs in the air conditioned section.

Anyway, if we are ever sitting together, sharing a meal, and I quickly excuse myself, don't worry.  It is probably not your deodorant or lack thereof.  I'm probably just trying to escape some fumes of the evil weed.

So I recommend having fun, because there is nothing better for people in this world than to eat cilantro-free food, drink, and enjoy life. That way they will experience some happiness along with all the hard work God gives them under the sun. Ecclesiastes 8:15 (NLT)
(Bold text mine)

IQ?

My son, beware of anything beyond these. Of making many books there is no end, and much study is a weariness of the flesh.

Ecclesiastes 12:12 (ESV)

Recently, my brother made a post about IQ.  I haven’t read it yet, but it got me thinking.

I, too, have an IQ.  I’m sure of it.  But I’m getting older and I can’t always remember where I put things.  So, if you see my IQ lying around somewhere, please let me know.

I always wonder about the way we measure our smartness.  Is smartness the ability to make good decisions?  Then, in that case, I know I have that ability because I have done so on at least two occasions in my life:

1. The decision to follow Jesus.
2. The decision to marry Ingrid.

After that, I’m not always so sure.

Is smartness measured by the facts we know?  In that case I know all the important facts I need to know:

1. I know my wife’s birthday.
2. I know our anniversary date.

Facts beyond that may or may not be worth remembering.

Once we went to a church where we met this really awesome woman.  She was not in any position of leadership.  She was not highly educated.  She did not have a high paying job.  She was perhaps not, by some measures, one of the brightest persons in the church. BUT (and this is REALLY important)—she led more people into a relationship with Jesus than anyone else in the church.  She was active in reaching out to the disenfranchised people of the city.  When the crowns are passed out, I’m sure she will get a much nicer one than I do.

My IQ might be higher than hers, but she is far smarter than me.

In the internet era, but long before the days of facebook, I once took an online IQ test.

I passed.

Meaning that after I answered a bunch of silly questions, I did NOT click on the link that would have given me the opportunity to forfeit some of my hard-earned money in return for which someone would tell me what an awesome person I am.  Anyone who would do that must not be very smart.

I know I’m an awesome person.  I don’t need to take a test to tell me that.

You are an awesome person, too.  I tell you that for free, and without your having to take a test.

By the way, the number I got in return for answering the silly questions was 135.  This is a really cool number:

     1+3+5=9
     1x3x5=15

     9x15=135

(My wife got a higher number and she can’t do that with her number.)

I’m not sure what the number means beyond that. I can't even get a small blended mocha in Starbucks in Thailand for 135 baht.  But I can get 3 large ones at our local coffee shop for 120 baht.  That's right--40 baht each.  And it tastes better.  And it's locally grown.  40 vs. 145, your choice.

40

Now that's smart.