One of the lessons of history is that nothing is often a good thing to do and always a clever thing to say.

The experiment started in 1927 when a physics professor at Australia's Queensland University poured some molten tar into a stoppered glass funnel. Three years later, he removed the stopper, placed the funnel on a stand, and put the whole setup inside a glass bell jar. Slowly, the almost-solid tar began oozing down the funnel. Every nine or ten years the accumulating drop of tar drips down into a beaker below. The seventh drip happened in 1988. The eighth drip was expected to happen over Christmas in 1998, but the tar oozed more slowly than expected because the room had been air-conditioned, cooling it slightly and hardening the tar. According to the current physics professor at the University, the tar should keep dripping for another century at ever-increasing intervals. Drip number eight might have been witnessed on the internet: http://www.physics.uq.edu.au/pitchdrop/pitchdrop.shtml http://www.physics.uq.edu.au/media/drop.htm http://www.physics.uq.edu.au/media/drop_news_release.html

A really patient man neither complains nor seeks to be pitied; he will speak simply and truly of his trouble, without exaggerating its weight or bemoaning himself. If others pity him, he will accept their compassion patiently, unless they pity him for some ill he is not enduring, in which case he will say so with meekness, and abide in patience and truthfulness, combating his grief and not complaining of it.

Patience serves as a protection against wrongs as clothes do against cold. For if you put on more clothes as the cold increases, it will have no power to hurt you. So in like manner you must grow in patience when you meet with great wrongs, and they will then be powerless to vex your mind.

If you don't like someone, the way he holds his spoon makes you furious; if you like him, he can turn his plate over into your lap and you won't mind.

To the Owner of the Extremely Loud Bass, I have to get up at 7:30 tomorrow and your music is driving me out of my mind. I felt compelled to write to you and try to discuss my feelings on this issue, having exhausted every other reasonable alternative; I've tried kicking on both the ceiling and the walls, while moaning loudly, but the responses in each circumstance gave me to understand that my neighbors are not the producers of this horrible, horrible noise. I don't know what to do anymore. I feel used, I feel vulnerable, I feel more than a little psychotic. . . Please turn down your music. Even better, just turn it off. I realize this request may seem offensive considering that we're not personally acquainted -yet- but on many levels I feel as if I already know you, because I've been lying in bed envisioning various ways of maiming you for about an hour now. It's unlikely that I would be able to carry any of them out because most of the weapons I was thinking of using would be difficult to construct, also you're probably stronger than me, but I urge you not to think about that, and still be moved to some degree of respectable fright when I conclude that: You don't know me. You don't want to know me. Just turn it off. Jessi

ILLUSTRATION: Waiting, Delay A magician was on stage doing his act, when he called for a volunteer from the audience. A man volunteered and went up on stage. A 16 lb. sledgehammer was on stage next to a cement block. The magician told him to pick up the sledgehammer and break the block apart, so the audience would know the sledgehammer was real. So, the man swung the sledgehammer with all his might & shattered the cement block. The magician now told the man to hit him square in the face with the sledgehammer. Horrified, the man said, "No way. It'll probably kill you." The magician insisted that the man hit him in the face, saying, "I'll be fine. I promise you — go ahead." The man swung the sledgehammer at the magicians face. He struck the magician, knocking him flat on the ground. After 6 months in a coma in the hospital, the magician was lying in the hospital bed. One eye opened, the fingers flexed a bit, the other eye opened, and the magician sat straight up and said, "Ta-da!"

Every time there's a successful mission to Mars or another planet, I think about all the workers at NASA assigned to the project. For years they built and labored, then they launched the vehicle. Then they waited months while it sailed through the inky blackness of space. Finally the moment of truth appears--the vehicle must land. Can you imagine being one of those technicians? For years you have worked on something, preparing for an opportunity, and now it will either come to pass or explode in a fireball. And there's no way to know until it does. We're like those techicians. We live with faith and hope, and we wait for a day we cannot see--the Day of the Lord.

Patience with others is Love, Patience with self is Hope, Patience with God is Faith. -- Adel Bestavros

God made me realize that His mercy does not grow weary of waiting for some souls and that He enlightens them only slowly. So I took good care not to anticipate Him.