A U.S. Army officer told of the contrast in his pupils during two different eras of teaching at the artillery training school at Fort Sill, Oklahoma (Home of the Field Artillery). In 1958-60 the attitude was so lax that the instructors had a problem getting the men to stay awake to hear the lectures. During the 1965-67 classes, however, the men, hearing the same basic lectures, were alert and took copious notes. What made the difference in the class of 65? They knew that in less than six weeks they would be facing the enemy in Vietnam.

Friday June 14, 2002 I received our digital camera in the mail, and I realized that I had forgotten to order a case with it, so I went case shopping. So Saturday I found one that I liked at the Battlefield Mall in Springfield, MO and picked it up. I took it home and put the camera in it, but it didn't fit. Aagh! So I brought the camera with me, and returned to the mall to exchange the bag. I returned the bag no problem, but couldn't find one that I liked, so I began walking back to my car with the camera around my neck. I heard a funny noise, like someone had just dropped a package that they bought. I was between two vans and I couldn't see anything from where I was, and then I saw this 15 or 16 year old blond kid walking quickly along in front of me. He was looking around and saw me, and so he took off running. My brain wasn't working too quickly that day, so it wasn't until I saw the van across the aisle with the shattered driver side window that it all came together. I looked back at the kid, and he had a purse or something in his hads. By this time he was about a hundred feet away from me. I began fumbling with my camera, trying to turn in on, but I couldn't remember how! The kid got away (he had a friend driving a getaway car), so I called 911 and gave them a complete description of the kid and escape vehicle. I went home thinking. I had everything I needed to stop that kid with me. I didn't know how to use it. I wasn't expecting anything to go wrong. Make spiritual application.

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.

Better to be three hours too soon than one minute too late. -- Shakespeare

The time to repair the roof is when the sun is shining. -- John F. Kennedy

The most dangerous thing in the world is to try to leap a chasm in two jumps." -- David Lloyd George

When the time to perform arrives, the time to prepare is past. Chance favors only the mind that is prepared. -- Louis Pasteur

As a general rule the most successful man in life is the man who has the best information. -- Benjamin Disraeli

I always keep a stimulant handy in case I see a snake, which I also keep handy.

Our ability to deal with chaos depends on structures that have been developed before the chaos arrives. When the chaos arrives, it serves as "an abrupt and brutal audit: at a moment's notice, everything that was left unprepared becomes a complex problem and every weakness comes rushing to the forefront. The breech in the defences opened by crisis creates a sort of vacuum" <i>Pat Lagadec's comment about a brutal audit is found on p. 54 of his book Preventing Chaos in a Crisis, published in 1993 by McGraw-Hill.</i>