500,000,000

That's a big number. The estimated jackpot for the Mega Millions lottery drawing this coming weekend is now at 1/2billion dollars. I'm not attaching a picture to this post or making it look fancy or pretty because I think the lottery is a sad thing.

• Only the government can run a lottery, for some reason they lawmakers have decided that a lottery drawing is too dangerous for the general public to manage.
• People's lives will be ruined by winning all or part of that huge payout. Somebody poor enough (relatively speaking) for the lottery to look like an attractive option has no business trying to manage that kind of money.
• The winner(s) will never see anywhere close to the total jackpot amount. After all of the partial winners who got all but one or two numbers right, about half will actually be paid, then about half of the amount actually paid will be taxed at more than 50%.
• I would still like to buy a ticket. The prospect of getting something for practically nothing is always inviting.
• I think it would be really cool to give large amounts of money to people who could really use it; people swimming in medical debts and other such problems. I like to think I would actually be a good enough person to really do that with half of my winnings.

Heroes

I had to look up that word at Dictionary.com to make sure it's spelled right. I wasn't sure about the e in the plural, and I didn't want to go all Dan Quayle.

The move The Hunger Games is opening the weekend and my wife and a couple of my children are bent on seeing it. I think I will like it too. The reason I think this is because it's about a hero (heroine in this case if you don't consider that a chauvinistic term), and everybody likes a hero. Songs have been written, stories have been told, and movies have been made about heroes since the beginning of human communication.

We want a hero that we can look up to. We want to be a hero that others can admire. The real-life heroes that are offered up to us leave us wanting more. Politicians, athletes, singers, and actors all fall short of our expectations of a hero.

If you want to find a real hero who you can aspire to be, look in the books of the Bible. Start with Hebrews chapter 11, which tells about a stutterer* who led a nation to freedom, a murdering adulterer who had a heart like God's, a womanizer who defended God's people, a prostitute who helped God's spies, a liar who received God's promise that he would be the father of a huge nation.

Of course, the real hero is found in the four books about Jesus' life. Learn to love like he loved. Learn to care like he cared. Learn to pray like he prayed. Learn to speak like he spoke. But most of all, learn to live by God's agenda, not your own. That's the stuff of which real heroes are made.

Spring Break!

I always try to add a picture to each of my posts because I think it looks better and more interesting. I noticed that most of the blogs that I read do that and decided that it must be a good idea. I searched Google images for "spring break." Oops! That was a bad idea. I changed the search to "broken spring." Much better.

I'm ready for a break. This is one of the times during the year that I'm reminded how much I like working for a school. Once you accept the fact that your kids will qualify for reduced-price lunches at school because you don't make much money, it's really a nice place to work.

I need to work on the house/lawn next week. That's actually pretty relaxing stuff for me.I'll fix what I can and the rest will stay broken. No worries. The weekend is going to be chilly and rainy, but next week looks like it will be beautiful weather.

I'm also looking forward to some great projects at school when we get back from Spring Break: a new technologically connected training room, testing out the use of Apple TV's in the classrooms, getting our wireless infrastructure rolling. Good times.

If you haven't browsed around the YouTube lately, go have a look at these:

• Eric Whitacre's virtual choir song1, song2, and promotion for song3. Why not audition?
• Vijay Kumar's TED speech about robots that fly and cooperate.
• Angry Birds Space advertisement from the Space Station.

Archie knows...