I'm got an UPDATE! with destiny.

Cloudthreads Update has detected you have x Critical Updates and y Optional updates. Do you wish to install them now? If so, please pull this string.

The cow says: Moo. Um. Try again.

The doggie says: ruff! One more time . . .

The User Account Control says: ARE YOU SURE?!

UPDATE! LUCIUS, our router, only needed a firmware update. Ala ANDY BERNARD, he hasn't dropped his handshake with the modem in three days. Who knew??? Perhaps the approaching arrival of the ethereal router scared him into acquiescence.

UPDATE! The plans with you and your husband for this weekend, I mean, dinner with DAN AND JENNY went splendidly. TRIVIAL PURSUIT cozied up to me with easy questions and spot-on rolls, and with the Suptic family house rule of once a king or queen of a pie-piece earning segment, always a king or queen of a pi-piece earning segment, I dominated: fully-baked rainbow pie to third pie to third pie to empty pie pan. Even went out on the first try with the second of two SL green hockey questions with the same answer I got lobbed my way. There are two possibilities for a TRIVIAL PURSUIT hockey question: Bobby Orr and Wayne Gretsky. I got Bobby Orr twice.

UPDATE! After church on Sunday, and on our way to AMANDA AND KATIE'S TRIUMPH PALACE EMPORIUM for soup and grilled cheese sandwiches, I happened to strike up a conversation with the world famous JOHN RAUX. He has a gallery show tentatively set for February 7 or 8. He's done several large oil abstracts and is going to be integrating photography, narrative, multiplies titles, and sketches into the presentation of each piece to tell the story of each one and make it more accessible.

UPDATE! Over the past 7 days, I have successfully decreased my average daily consumption of DMND (Diet Mountain Dew) to less than 80 oz. This is entirely due to my mode consumption being just over 80, and there being a weekend in which I am nowhere near a store that sells 64 oz fountain drinks. Still, SUCCESS. My goal is to cut of caffeine entirely before Lent.

UPDATE! The world is no long a vampire sent to drain. Wait, no. that's still a valid metaphor. Never mind.

UPDATE FROM A DIARYLAND ENTRY FROM LONG AGO! Thanks to our own burgeoning sense of responsibility, and the methuselaian compact flourescent lamp, we no longer have the problem with light bulbs burning out and not getting replaced for weeks on end.

UPDATE! Recent reports from THE NEW YORK TIMES via REVOLUTION IN JESUSLAND indicate that MIKE HUCKABEE is the current pop choice for radical Xtians in the upcoming RACE FOR THE CURE OF NOT HAVING A LEADER OF THE EXECUTIVE BRANCH OF THE EXCESSIVELY UNITED STATES THAT ARE IN THE AMERICAN NATION.

See, to me, MIKE HUCKABEE seems like just one more religious-rightist interested in legislating morality. I'm pro-morality, believe me, but I don't know how much the government should get involved. As little as possible, says I. I mean, JESUS OF NAZARETH (something good came from there. Finally.) said that his kingdom is not of this kosmos, and I tend to think that we shouldn't be trying to affect Jesuskinds of change through those world-systems of power. I mean, he didn't. RON PAUL is the only candidate I see who seems to be espousing a view that reduces the power of the EMPIRE OF AMERICA domestically and internationally.

But, the whole thing is complicated. How can you be a whole-life follower of JESUS OF NAZARETH and still render to AMERICA what is AMERICA'S? Is't possible?

Do we also have a civic responsibility to consume as many goods as possible? Should we try to bolster our own economy to raise the standard of living for those around us and the amount of money available to charities for world-wide activities? And how does that fall in with the call to live simply? And the fact that PAUL OF TARSUS ties greed and lust together in his letter to the COLOSSIANS seems to indicate that they are both, essentially, sins of unbridled consumption.

We have a civic responsibility to vote, right? But is a civic responsibility one that counts under the render clause? If we do vote, what do we base it on? The desire to set up a system that encouraged Christians and Christian communities to act themselves, that is, help the poor, stand the way of violence, befriend the friendless? Or do we vote on the desire to affect change in the world by having government act as an agent of JESUS OF NAZARETH? I believe the former. I think this is why TIM KEEL'S call to care more about people than issues is so important. It's easy to lose focus on an issue. It's hard to lose focus on helping a person you love.

Furthermore, is social justice even relevant if we aren't, like CHRIST, becoming like the people we are trying to help? Should we feed the poor and hungry, or become poor and hungry ourselves? Should we free slaves, or become slaves?

UPDATE! Remember THAT BUTTON, the one on my laptop with picture of the house that takes me to an advertisement for Dell? Actually, if you wait through the ad, it takes you to some sort of Dell Media Center that is in all ways slower and less user-friendly than PICASA and FOOBAR and VLC, even with the fact that that's three separate programs without a cohesive graphical interface. Heck, even WINDOWS MEDIA PLAYER 11 is more sleek. Now to figure out how the heck to remap that key to something more useful on a daily basis. Like format c:\.

DOWNDATE! Dear YAHOO MESSENGER, I installed you yesterday to talk to some friends online who only have a Yahoo account. You installed your bloated and non-functioning IM software, a Yahoo Web Mail Client and the Yahoo toolbar onto both INTERNET EXPLORER and FIREFOX. After seeing your ugly face, it took me ten minutes to find PIDGIN, download it, and get it running in the place of MSN, Yahoo and Myspace. You can die in a fire. BALEETED.

UPDATE! I wore that Under Armor Arctic Beanie green with yellow logo stocking (yeah, try finding that color for sale anywhere now, suckers) cap to bed again last night. Its temples-snug fit helped me easily overcome the two cans of Vault Zero I consumed at DAN AND JENNY'S. Thanks, hat.

UPDATE! My goal is to now get CLOUDTHREADS posted by noon every day, rather than midnight. Good luck to me.