Slinkys, Signs and Splits

• My next article is about my mother, and it's takingan eternity, so in the meantime here's some random thoughts:
  
• A sign at the McCamey Allsup's:
  Some people are like Slinkys. They serve no real purpose, but it is pleasant to push them down the stairs.

• Actual concert line-up (3 bands coming to Odessa August 14):
  She Turned Us Into Trees, How to Start a Fire, and Hit the Ground Running.

• A very good friend grew up in Andrews (45 miles away) and used to be Max Lucado's biggest fan. She phoned us twice last week to express her outrage over the fact that his church in San Antonio, Oak Hills, had dropped the "of Christ" from their name in 2003. All we could do was look up their reasons for the change - to reach people with the gospel - and send the information to her. She was not consoled. I asked my preacher about it and he said "If you had the power to preach the gospel to more people just by removing two words from the sign, wouldn't you do it?" Hmm...
• It is difficult to tell the story of Frogtown without touching on the church split of 2003, which some say never even happened. It came about suddenly and without warning. Supposedly, it began when two guys didn't agree with the idea of the church hosting grief seminars, financial seminars, and marriage classes. "We need to touch people where they hurt," the preacher at the time said, "not hurt people when we touch them." Those who agreed with the preacher, including the three of us, mostly wound up at the Wink church, eight miles away, while the rest remained in Kermit with the two guys. The preacher moved to Carlsbad and sold cars for awhile, until he eventually got a preaching job again. Can't we all get along?

34 hours after the split, a gas plant blew up 6 miles outside of Kermit, at 5 in the morning. A sign from God? In any case, we remember that week for the church and the gas plant both blowing up. In a manner of speaking.