Movies, ocean surface temperatures, political agendas

Check out this parody movie trailer of the horror movie The Shining, with scenes strung together to make it look like it's a heart-warming film about a boy who finds a new father in Jack Nicholson.

Speaking of movies, Mrs. Ross and I stayed up late last night watching Gone With the Wind. It was good enough at storytelling that it successfully kept us up until 3am or so. That Rhett, what a rogue! And black-hearted Scarlett, what pride! I don't think I've ever seen a Civil War movie from the South's point of view. Then again, maybe I haven't seen that many Civil War movies.

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I recently learned about 'mashups', websites where you mix info from two sites, such as gas prices and Google maps, to get, wa-la!, Map Gas Prices.

Jessica and I would like a site which gives the beach water temperature throughout the world, either actual or a historic average. Suppose you want to go plan a vacation to a place where the water temperature at the beach is warm in December. Typing 'ocean surface temperature' into Google doesn't exactly find the most user-friendly websites.

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It's come to my attention recently that the National Association of Evangelicals, which supposedly represents me and 30 million other Evangelical Americans, issued a statement “For the Health of the Nation: An Evangelical Call to Civic Responsibility” (available here).

The document calls for a broader approach to public policy issues and lists seven guidelines for political engagement by Christians:

• To guard religious liberty and freedom of conscience.
  
• To promote family life and defend children.
  
• To uphold the sanctity of human life.
  
• To gain justice and compassion for the poor and vulnerable.
  
• To safeguard human rights.
  
• To work for peace and the restraint of violence.
  
• To protect creation.
  

Signers include Jack Hayford, president of my international Foursquare Church. Why wasn't I notified? While evangelicals don't exactly recognize the absolute authority of any contemporary organization, be it in Rome or Washington, it may be a good idea to look at a document that others will believe sets my political agenda.

What's on my political agenda for today? Not much. I'm just hoping to make a contribution to apolitical science.