Sleep

That elusive Sleep! I have often desired to have a decently composed musing on sleep and I have just found one in chapter 19 of Scottish Chiefs. Miss Jane Porter sums it up in one sentence:

“Sleep, the gentle sister of that awful power which shrouds man in its cold bosom, and bears him in still repose to the blissful wakefulness of eternal life – she, sweet restorer! wraps him in her balmy embraces, and extracting from his wearied limbs the effects of every toil, safely relinquishes the refreshed slumberer at morn to the new-born vigor that is her gift; the gladsome breezes which call us forth to labor and enjoyment.”

Hotel Hadron: The End

Hooray! We officially ended work on Hotel Hadron today after presentations. Here are a couple renderings (of which there are several).

The VIP lounge in The Atomic, a jazz club bar and restaurant

Loft Room on the 17th floor of Hotel Hadron

Today at the presenations, several practitioners and faculty saw the hotel projects for the first time. Though we work in studio together, today was the first time I truly encountered the projects in their entirety – a shame considering  how much improvement can result from regular pinups. Alas, this is over, we shall see how the senior terminal projects evolve next semester…

Will

A word from Amy Carmichael

“Where the will of God and the will o f the flesh are in conflict there will be rough water, and if the flesh does not yield to the Spirit there must follow the painful breaking up of  hopes and expectations, even as the timbers of that ship were broken up with the violence of the waves.”

Acts 27:41 “But striking a place where two seas met, they ran the ship aground; and the prow stuck fast and remained immovable, but the stern was being broken up by the violence of the waves.” - NKJV

Can the LHC Succeed?

Hotel Hadron is the official name of the hotel we are [almost done!] designing for senior studio. The source of inspiration for the atomic/subatomic concept comes from the Supercolliding Super Conductor south of the site in Dallas, TX. Congress decided to cancel the project, leaving Texas with a $1 billion + hole in the ground and our design team an incomplete source of inspiration!

We turned to the Large Hadron Collider [LHC] in Geneva Switzerland to gain insight about the SSC’s what-might-have-beens.  Last September the $10 billion LHC was completed, only to have one of its many complex joints damaged by a manufacturing flaw. Why all the trouble? Ultimately physicists from around the world are joining forces in an attempt to discover the infamous [but theoretcial]  Higg’s boson, otherwise known as “the God particle”.

Then I read Hebrews 11 this morning. Since particle colliders have been on my mind recently,verse 3 leaped off the page:

“By faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that the things which are seen were not made of things which are visible.” – NKJV

With that said, I have two thoughts:

1. Atomic and subatomic particles could fall under the category of “Things Which are Not Seen”, but is it possible that there is nothing more that humans can see with their own eyes, no matter the innovations of technology? One part of me says this idea puts a limitation on the depth and richness of God’s glorious creation. Would he allow us the pleasure of discovering more and more of his mysteries until Jesus returns?

Or would he deny these pleasures to people who would use this knowledge to puff themselves up, rather than returning the glory and praise due to the Creator? Say that you created a universe one day. You put people in it. Over time they categorized and gained understanding to control more and more of the forces in nature which you created. They reveled in the achievements of mankind without a hint of gratitude to you who granted them an intellect in the first place. Would you let them continue, or at least slow down this process [even though the world and the things in the world are passing away, but that is another matter, no pun intended]? End thought.

2. Hebrews 11:3 could mean one of two things by “the things which are seen are not made by things which are visible“. One is obvious: the sock on my foot is visible. The multitude of atoms which comrise the sock are not discernable by my naked eye. Socks belong in the ”Things Which are Seen” category. Everything else which is not naturally seen [including atomic particles] is apart of “Things Which are Not Seen”. Simple enough.

Two: while the sock on my foot is composed of invisible atoms, there is another “thing” which is not possible to be seen by the naked eye. Much effort is spent to make visible the things which are invisible (i.e. inventions such as particle accelerators produce images of subatomic particles.) Thus there is a real, physical way to make unseen atoms visible by the human eye. In this case, both subatomic particles and socks go in the “Things Which are Seen” category. This leaves “Things Which are Not Seen” empty, and would imply that this category would best be named “Things Which are Not Possible to be Seen”, i.e. the “God particle”, i.e. Acts 17:28:

” …for in Him we live and move and have our being” – NKJV

End thought.

Currently the LHC is up and running, but only after another problem: somehow a bird managed to drop a piece of baguette into the machine, causing an electrical problem. Will God allow further discovery to be made about the physical world? I do not know [and if you do please explain!], but it wouldn’t be contrary to the nature of God if  more birds are reported to frustrate the activities of the LHC!

A link to a November 22, 2009 report on the LHC: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/8372737.stm

Friday Night Rainbow

Psalm 144: 3-4

“LORD, what is man that You take knowledge of him? Or the son of man, that You are mindful of him? Man is like a breath; his days are like a passing shadow.” – NKJV

arrogant of arrogance

no learning, lessons repeated on and on

and on to satisfy this

Moment desire

forget a moment’s Sacrifice of old

unitl a prism in the sky

unworthy of men’s eyes

mercy come down to earth

can pride continue?

no, but every morning fight

Drawtime 1

Sometimes you just need a good draw

Design Circles

We just turned in our first project for my senior Interior Design Studio this week – no all nighters for this entire project! Next up: working with the Arch grad students on a boutique hotel design in Dallas, TX.

They have worked on this the entire semester and we are now entering the picture. After attending our final presentations, the students gave suggestions of who they would be interested in working with.

Circles Shall be the Theme of Studio this Semester

The one who suggested me is the same one that designed the floorplate on the left of the above image. My reflected ceiling plan is 0n the right, one among many circle-packed drawings and diagrams. I had a good laugh – shapes influence our lives more than we realize!

Helmet Shower

I woke up at 5:30 this morning to get some work done so I could spend some quality time with Cadex, my bike. October has just started and the nights are chilly, but afternoons have yet to loose their warmth! According to Bicycling magazine, the proper ok way to cleanse one’s helmet is to wear in the shower. In three years of owning the helmet I had yet to wash it, so I decided to do finally do it.

Hemut + Shower = Awkward

It was weird. Since I attribute human characteristics to Cadex, all things associated also have a human aura about them. Thus, my helmet seemed to be intruding on me and I couldn’t help but rush through the shower!

Map

Map for which my Savior died

On the wall, underneath I sleep

Would He sleep, to look away

To go on, compassion left there

At the alter, the mirror, I soon forget

go here and there and buy and sell

And slumber, but can I ignore?

The world above me, I here below

Desire to stay here, can I not go?

For the world above me

Offers far greater rest

I, here and now, worries for tomorrow

“Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him.” – 1 John 2:15, NKJV

Swift to Hear

A few weeks before leaving for Taiwan, I spent much time with my family and Josh. We had great times together, however I often reflected on my conversational contributions and found nothing that edified its hearers as Eph. 4 commands us to strive for.  Soon the Holy Spirit whooped me big time with Proverbs 10:18-21:

“Whoever hides hatred has lying lips, and whoever spreads slander is a fool. In the multitude of words sin is not lacking, but he who restrains his lips is wise.     The tongue of the righteous is choice silver; the heart of the wicked is worth little.     The lips of the righteous feed many, but fools die for lack of wisdom.”            – NKJV

What an appropriate lesson to learn while one is lingustically stranded for a month in a foreign land! In my month here, I often went through days where I said little more than thank you, hello, goodbye. Most of my communications seemed to involve asking what a sound meant (as a result of listening…).  Praise God for correcting his children in the most curious, unsearchable ways!