Heaven is for real.  Absolutely true.  But is this story for real?  Did Colton Burpo really go to Heaven and meet Jesus, his great grandfather, and his sister who died in a miscarriage?  Does the painting made by a girl who has had visions from God and confirmed by Colton to be accurate really depict the likeness of the second person of the Trinity?  There were a couple of things in his account that troubled me, but I think you will be doing yourself a disservice not to pick this book up at your library or bookstore, read it for yourself, and make your own judgment.  Be sure to click on the images for more information on the Burpos and on the girl behind the painting.

This is a video I think all ought to see.  I am not going to say anything about it other than it focuses on a topic that is rather controversial among the population.  I don’t want to say any more lest I cause someone who might come across this to put on blinders before even watching (I don’t believe my regular readers would do such a thing).  This site will put it in a somewhat small window- I would encourage you to actually go to the main site: 180movie.com to watch it, or select the 720p version and make it full-screen.

There is a parental advisory on this for disturbing images.  Running time is about 33 minutes.

More on my life soon, but in the meantime I saw this and just *had* to post it here considering the season, the animal people some of my readers are, and- oh just watch it already! 🙂  I give you…

In a response to a friend’s blog post and a play on his own title, I got a new toy too- the HTC Inspire 4G (aka Desire HD).  Yep, that means I’m back on contract to AT&T, but I don’t have a problem with that.  I am now Apple-free once again.  Well, I’ll likely still use the iphone as an ipod touch since I have it- I don’t think I could sell a 3G for very much.  Android is the way, at least for the next two years.  Why did I get it?  Well, I thought $20 was not too much to spend on a new phone.  No, a zero isn’t missing- $20 is all I paid.  The phone itself sells for $100 with a contract which is already a nice deal considering what you get in comparison to the iphone 4.  My Costco membership took care of the rest.  I had never looked before at their prices on mobile phones, but wow- they are cheap compared to standard prices even without this month’s special on the HTC.  The Motorola Atrix, a new phone like the Inspire 4G was selling for $80 less than standard.  Nice.

I haven’t played much with it yet, but it’s nice to be on an open system despite the malware scare last week.  Unfortunately, being on OS version 2.2.1 this phone has that very exploit so I will need to be a little careful until the 2.3 update is made available.  Hopefully they fixed whatever hole allowed the stuff to be uploaded to the marketplace in the first place.  Already I like much of what I tried in comparison to the iphone 3G (can’t compare with the 4 since I never tried it).  I did notice though a voicemail downgrade.  Apparently Android doesn’t do visual voicemail yet.  The iphone would have the messages listed and playable right from the phone rather than having to dial up a voicemail number and pressing 1, 2, or whatever to hear the messages, then 7, 9, or whatever to save or delete them.

Like the iphone 3GS and 4, and unlike my 3G, this has a GPS built in.  I should try it next time I’m on the road to see how it compares with the Tom-Tom.  The map application is much nicer too, being based off of Google Maps.  The app store is much faster too.  On the iphone, I would really have to use itunes to get apps since the store was really slow on the 3G, but the marketplace is really quick on this phone.  I wonder if there’s something that will tell me if an app has been temporarily updated/reduced in price like with AppShopper for iOS?  [checks]  Ah, it looks like I found one- AppBrain.  Will look.

The camera is better- has a flash like the iphone 4 (and the requisite flashlight app as well)- and it does 480p and 720p video as well.  Unlike iphone, it can use a memory card (comes with 8GB) and a changeable battery which is just as well since one of the downsides of this phone is the battery life, even without a dual core CPU like the Atrix.

Well, enough for now.  Time for a look at appbrain…

In addition to added work these past couple of weeks with new dealers to serve, I have also had the pleasure of a new toy.  Much as I espouse a dislike for a certain fruity computer brand, I now find myself in possession of one of their phones.  That’s right- I now have an iPhone.  Realistically, I knew I couldn’t afford a new Android-based phone, which would probably also require my switching providers as I am currently with at&t, and have been for the last several years- being THE iPhone provider they have not seen fit to add the better HTC Android phones to their lineup.  To make things clear, I couldn’t afford a new iPhone either, but when my nephew decided to jump on the iPhone 4 bandwagon he sold me his 3G for a nice discount.  I now have to pay $20 more per month (was paying for insurance on the other phone), but the difference between the two phones will make it worthwhile.  For the last few days I have been downloading several free apps, mostly games but also the Bible, a camera enhancement app, and a couple others.  I also made the mistake of installing Appminer, an app that finds discounted and temporarily free apps- what a time waster!  I have not tried all the games I installed yet, but as they are touchpad-controlled (and gravity-controlled in some cases- can’t forget the accelerometer!) games they are quite a different thing from normal computer or console games.  I couldn’t find any free versions of games I know, but with a different control scheme they wouldn’t be the same anyway.  Note I write free versions- I could pay $5 for Pac-man (are you kidding me??) and I noted a version of Dragon’s Lair, but cheapskate me is only getting free apps at this time.

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In any event, back to the dislike of Apple thing, at least they aren’t getting a dime of this purchase from me- no contract, no new iPhone, and at least for the moment, no 30% of app purchases.  I had to go to an at&t store to get everything switched properly- ended up waiting about a half-hour for someone as I picked a busy time.  Or are all times busy due to the iPhone 4?  In addition to the phone, the sales rep talked us into at least signing up for an install time for their U-Verse (internet and cable over fiber optic) service.  It seemed like a really nice service and I wouldn’t mind switching over from DirecTV, but I have been on Comcast internet for so long, since it was TCI internet, that I am unsure I would want to switch at this time, though for the start we would get much more for a little less than we are paying now for phone+satellite+internet, currently from three different companies so of course some of the savings comes from going at&t for everything. I am just worried at what will happen after six months.  They promise no installation charges and $200 back for signing up, DVRs capable of recording four standard-definition (or two HD) shows at once, networked receivers so anyone can view a recorded show off any receiver in the house, a complete package with all movie channels (something we can easily drop of course sometime down the road since we have been going sans movie channels for quite some time now), and full HD equipment ready for when we eventually need to replace our analog SD TVs.  Fortunately the appointment isn’t until the 31st, giving us plenty of time to consider whether we really want to make the switch.

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I will continue on the camp topic probably next post.

A BP video making the rounds on the web.  This video has a 720p version, so switch the default resolution and go full screen if your connection can handle it. 🙂

With Friday we honored the blackest time in history- God’s Son, put to death in the worst possible way, and the front page of this site went black in remembrance.  Peter, one of His closest friends denied ever knowing Him.  “Now what?”  People wondered.  Wasn’t this man Jesus supposed to save the world?  And for two days the Adversary laughed and people mourned.  Then came the third day, and the tomb was found open and empty, and soon the people’s grief turned to joy…

Didn’t we just have a (winter!) week of 50°F plus weather, culminating in two days over 60)?  Oh well, that’s Chicago for you! 😮

Okay, who can do a backflip?  Well, can you at least do one with the help of a trampoline?  I can’t either.  How about when driving  a several-ton monster truck?  Say what?  Apparently for the first time ever this stunt has been achieved.  Check out this video:

Maybe if I use the wall I can do it…  Without the truck of course.

Sorry for the lack of posts.  Time, stress, not feeling like posting- you know, the usual.  Still nothing about my life at the moment, but here’s a cute video.  Merry Christmas!

Oh, I’ll start reading some blogs soon too…