I gotta have my orange juice.

As it turns out, there is a kind of servant leadership that is quite alright:

YHWH said to Shemuel:
Until when will you keep on mourning to Sha’ul,
when I myself have rejected him from reigning as king over Israel?
Fill your horn with oil and go:
I am sending you to Yishai the Bet-Lehemite,
for I have seen among his sons a king for me.
Shemuel said:
How can I go?
If Sha’ul were to hear, he would kill me!
YHWH said:
A she-calf of the herd you are to take in your hand,
and you are to say:
It is to sacrifice to YHWH [that] I have come.
Then you are to invite Yishai for the sacrificial-meal,
And I myself will make known to you what you are to do:
You are to anoint for me the one that I tell you. (1 Samuel 16:1–3, Everett Fox, emphasis mine)

Twitter brought me a supposed Solzhenitsyn quote and an Orwell quote that I would love to share. But as far as I can tell both quotes are fake. However that may be, this is not:

And not only socialists were now politicals. The politicals were splashed in tubfuls into the fifteen-million-criminal ocean, and they were invisible and inaudible to us. They were mute. They were muter than all the rest. Their image was the fish.

The fish, symbol of the early Christians. And the Christians were their principal contingent. Clumsy, semiliterate, unable to deliver speeches from the rostrum or compose an underground proclamation (which their faith made unnecessary anyway), they went off to camp to face tortures and death—only so as not to renounce their faith! They knew very well for what they were serving time, and they were unwavering in their convictions! They were the only ones, perhaps, to whom the camp philosophy and even the camp language did not stick. And were these not politicals? Well, you’d certainly not call them riffraff.

And women among them were particularly numerous. The Tao says: When faith collapses, that is when the true believers appear. Because of our enlightened scoffing at Orthodox priests, the squalling of the Komsomol members on Easter night, and the whistles of the thieves at the transit prisons, we overlooked the fact that the sinful Orthodox Church had nonetheless nurtured daughters worthy of the first centuries of Christianity—sisters of those thrown to the lions in the arenas.

There was a multitude of Christians: prisoner transports and graveyards, prisoner transports and graveyards. Who will count those millions? They died unknown, casting only in their immediate vicinity a light like a candle. They were the best of Russia’s Christians. The worst had all . . . trembled, recanted, and gone into hiding. (Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, The Gulag Archipelago, Vol. 2, 309–310)

Church and Harris Teeter and Home Depot have lulled me into a false sense of quasi-normalcy. Much to my surprise, apparently the NC DMV has been in tailspin for months! Right now many offices are closed, incidental closures are being announced on a daily basis, appointments are strictly required, phones are simply not being answered, and all available appointments are at least six weeks away.

No, the old proverb does not lie: Look for the brave in prison, and the stupid among the political leaders! (Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, The Gulag Archipelago, Vol. 2, 317)

Although Anthony Bradley regularly reminds us that Walter Williams is not . . . was not . . . a Christian, I nevertheless pray that his soul found rest in Jesus.

Prior to capitalism, the way people amassed great wealth was by looting, plundering and enslaving their fellow man. Capitalism made it possible to become wealthy by serving your fellow man. (Walter Williams, Capitalism and the Common Man)

Overheard on Webex (which now allows you to press Space to talk):

Participant 1: gives status update
Participant 2: Shhhhhhhhhhhh
Participant 1: Is someone trying to shush me?
Participant 2: Ha! I was muted, but I started blowing out my keyboard and it must have unmuted me.

This is a delightful combination of levity and medieval plague-defying throwback. Almost I am tempted to wear a mask:

Mark Horne shared this fascinating article on barbell training:

Instead of slowly dwindling, . . . our death can be like a failed last rep at the end of a final set of heavy squats. We can remain strong and vital well into our last years, before succumbing rapidly to whatever kills us. Strong to the end.

That, my friends, is Big Medicine.

And he wrote this helpful article. I still think there is a good chance that the fraud can be overcome, but of course we do not place our hope in that.

For the look on [Judah’s] faces bears witness against them;
they proclaim their sin like Sodom;
they do not hide it.
Woe to them!
For they have brought evil on themselves.
Tell the righteous that it shall be well with them,
for they shall eat the fruit of their deeds.
Woe to the wicked! It shall be ill with him,
for what his hands have dealt out shall be done to him. (Isaiah 3:9–11, ESV)

Maranatha!—