The Weekly Wrap-Up: July 15-19, 2024

It has come to my attention that these titles make things look very same same on the website when looking for new blog posts. I’d like to keep the same tag for these, but I might have to start changing up the post titles. I just need to figure out what I want to do. If you have any suggestions, I’d appreciate hearing them.

So it’s been quite the week, hasn’t it? I feel like someone subjected me to that old chestnut of a Chinese curse: may you live in interesting times. They haven’t, of course, mainly because being a follower of Christ protects me from whatever curses someone might try to inflict upon me; but also, this is pretty much just how life works. There has always been something that makes people question how we all ended up in this mess.

I blame Adam and Eve.

So yeah, I’m not getting into the politics of it beyond what is absolutely necessary, but someone tried to assassinate a former President and current candidate on Saturday. Someone else in the crowd died. That is so incredibly wrong and horrifying. I’m a historian, so I read about assassinations and the repercussions thereof quite often. But that’s history. We’re supposed to learn from these things and do better.

This is not better.

Can we all just check on the people around us? Make sure we’re all still capable of having a civil conversation with one another? Get out of our bubbles a bit and walk a mile in someone else’s shoes? Find something you have in common with that person who drives you nuts. Even if it’s just that you’re both human beings, that should be enough. I can’t deal with all of this bitterness and enmity being sown right now.

The world needs Jesus. That should be more obvious than ever. This is why we do what we do at OMS. (I know. The transition was a little weak. But we’re pivoting to the week in review, so I had to do something.)

This was CROSS-training week at OMS. Yes, as with all acronyms here, it does actually mean something. CROSS stands for cultural, relational, organizational, spiritual, and skills training. What it looks like has changed a lot since I started (four whole weeks of personality conflicts and crying - okay, it wasn’t all bad; but there was a lot of crying).

Anyway, I got to help out with one of the sessions. We call it the Four-Culture Game. It’s pretty much what it sounds like - we split the trainees into four groups and assign each group a vague cultural framework. I was just facilitating this time, keeping everything on time, but my group was the rigid, hierarchical, formal culture. It’s always funny to see the different cultures interact (and try to keep a straight face).

The formal society hosts a very laid back culture.

I am still working on previously published files, but now I’m uploading them to the appropriate servers. I have to double check the titles of the booklets since that’s how people decide what they want to download. It’s all tedious, but it’s so important to pay attention to the details. People don’t really notice when you do things correctly, but they notice when there is a mistake.

I’m outing myself a little bit here, but I needed proof before it disappears again. This is the dashboard for our cyber security training (apropos this week). We have short videos to watch every week and then a longer training every year. I, as you can see, have a perfect score. I highlight this because I was sitting at 799 for the longest time, and then I went up to 800, and then I went back down for no reason! So I needed to document my perfect score. And my top score for OMS. I am the most cyber secure. Or I just test really well. (If you can guess why that’s my username, I’ll give you a virtual cookie.)

On a more personal note, Sarah and I went to our county fair this week.

We try to go every year because it’s fun, and there are a lot of things to see and sign up for. Sarah rolls her eyes at me, but I’m going to win this year! It won’t just be a ton of emails and spam calls!

Anyway, I also entered a couple of things and won a ribbon!

These suckers were not easy to put together. I might go into more detail at some point, but they are not regular Legos, and I have callouses on my fingertips from taking these apart and putting them back together. But I do like them.

This was my baby blanket, and I entered it into the antique quilt category. Because it counts as an antique now. Eeek! Anyway, I didn’t win anything, but my good friend Lori McFall did for the lovely quilt on the right. It was well deserved.

I think that’s about it for this week. Let me know your thoughts on titles and what else you’d like to hear about. Tell me a funny story about a time you encountered a culture vastly different from your own. Check on your neighbors.

Bye!