BagOfNothing.com

• While watching the evening news on CBS11 I couldn’t help but notice the latest First Baptist Dallas commercial. Dr. Jeffress stated Ainsley Earhardt of ‘Fox and Friends’ will be interviewed, his sermon will cover if Christianity is the only right religion, and visitors get a free lunch. But wait, there’s more. If you are a first time visitor, you get a copy of his new book. Get the details here.
• First Baptist Dallas tweeted this earlier in the week.
  
  • I took a gander at that article or whatever you call it, and I think I found a mistake. Don’t they mean “Commander In Chief”? For a place that is so involved with politics and pro-military, I’m surprised to see this oversight, twice.
    
• In other CBS11 news, they also had a crew out in the small West Texas town of Moran, a population of about 270. That caught my attention because one of my closest friends was the youth minister at First Baptist Moran for about three years when we were in college. You may hear about the town often now. The largest manufacturer and inventor of bump stocks is based there. Per The Dallas Morning News, two companies manufacture the device in Moran. I’m not trying to get political, but with a movement further regulate or ban the manufacture of the bump stock, which I understand the NRA is even going to endorse, that would affect local employment numbers bigtime for a town of fewer than 300 people. I’m sure they will be contacting their congressmen.
  • The first time I attended a worship at First Baptist Moran the preacher shared a story of how he met his wife. He was a student at Hardin-Simmons and there was a BSU (Baptist Student Union) lunch or dinner. All the seats were taken when a group of female students arrived. One of the girls mentioned how there were no more seats. He pointed at his knee and said, “There’s one here if you’d like to take it.” She did, and they quickly got engaged and were married three months later.
• The Cowboys play the Packers this weekend. I remember the first time I saw Aaron Rodgers play. The Packers were playing the Cowboys at Texas Stadium. Favre started the game and he was known for never winning a game at Texas Stadium. The Cowboys injured Favre and I thought Green Bay was done for since their backup, Aaron Rodgers was in, but he played very well.
• UAB football: Blazers honoring ailing patients by putting their names on jerseys
  • To honor and memorialize the children and their families served by Children’s Harbor located one block off of UAB’s campus, the Blazer football team will wear the names of patients on the back of their jerseys for UAB’s Homecoming game vs. Louisiana Tech. The 100 game jerseys will be presented to each child and their family after the game. 
• The Democrats aren’t saints, but at least they don’t campaign on the platform of family values – Anti-abortion Rep. Tim Murphy, who reportedly urged abortion, resigns from Congress
• U2 must be bored, they just released the fourth video for the song “You’re The Best Thing About Me”.
• For the First Time in 40 Years, Rome’s Colosseum Will Open Its Top Floor to the Public
• The New York Times did a piece about Dale Hansen.
• Hey man, sh– happens – Watch the Saudi king get stuck in midair when his golden escalator breaks down in Russia
• I don’t know when to take President Trump seriously, especially when he says things like this.

  • While taking photos alongside military leaders and their spouses before a dinner at the White House, President Donald Trump made an ambiguous statement, citing “the calm before the storm.”‘
    “You guys know what this represents? Maybe it’s the calm before the storm,” Trump said at the photo op Thursday night, following a meeting with his top military commanders.

• Texas AG Ken Paxton faces new investigation under bribery statute over $100K gift
  • The company mentioned in this story is the one that performed the MRI on my back.
• Someone hacked the White House chief of staff’s personal phone
• I received an email from Google providing stats on how I traveled last month. I don’t mind being tracked so I think the data is kinda cool. The data would be better if I didn’t work from home. Here’s a sampling.
  • 8 cities visited this month
  • 39 places visited this month (12 new)
  • 32 hours spent in a vehicle this month

Every morning I go to CNN.com to see what major news events I may have missed overnight. When I saw this news alert this morning, I thought somehow Kellyanne Conway became president. I guess I was still groggy, but all I could focus on was the “President Kellyanne Conway” section of the alert. But hey, a comma would have helped.

• I think there are only two pictures of the Las Vegas killer that the news have been displaying. Both of them are somewhat out of focus and he looks a bit wasted. I’m surprised there are better pictures of him in the age we live in with camera phones and such.
• One of the more touching stories I heard of the massacre was a woman running for cover but stopped to render aid to a victim. She knew there wasn’t going to be any hope for the victim, but didn’t want him to die alone.
• I received an email from a legal representative yesterday requesting I take down something I posted about back in February 2013. I complied.
• Within the next ten years, dashcams will be a standard feature on all new automobiles.
• Man, time flies. Next week will mark the ten year anniversary of when Greg “The Hammer” Williams was fired from The TICKET. I only know that because of this article about Corby.
• Why Christian conservatives supported Trump — and why they might regret it –  “Because I’m a Christian, I’m able to say that Christian people can be idiots.”
  • When I first saw this article I thought it wasn’t going to be very substantive; however, I found it to be pretty insightful. It’s an interview with a conservative Christian author who didn’t vote for Trump but understands why many Christians did.
• Sometimes I asked friends questions they may feel are odd. Stuff like, “How often do you call your parents?” Since mine are no longer living and I’m still relatively young, I wonder how often I would call my parents. In college, I always called home Sundays at 8:45 PM to catch up on things.
• Google has an interesting new product, Google Clips. I think it’s one part neat and one part creepy, and at $249, very pricey. Here’s a WIRED article about it.
  • Google Clips is a camera, but it only has some of those parts. There’s no display. There’s a shutter button, but it’s completely optional to use. Instead, it takes pictures for you, using machine learning to recognize and learn faces and look for interesting moments to record.
  • Here’s how it works: you turn it on by twisting the lens, then you set it down and forget about it. Clips then watches everything it sees in its 130-degree field of view and records little seven-second moving images of stuff it finds interesting. It learns faces over time and tries to take more photos of those people and fewer photos of strangers. It can also recognize pets.
• How Dictionary Editors Find Meaning in the Age of Internet Speak – Is it the modern lexicographer’s job to protect the English language, or to document it?
• Women who escaped Edmonton prison arrested at escape room