the candle burns on

It's been almost a month now that I've been burning the candle at both ends. The first two weeks of this month were some of the most productive I've had in a long time--several deadlines converging at once, lots of pressure to get things done, lots of hours at the Nehemiah Center, and a lot of energy and focus. However, the candle is getting shorter, and I'm getting tired. I think I need to force myself to rest.

Among other things in the last month, I finished the Spanish version of a promotional video I was working on in the Media Studio for Hand in Hand Ministries. I might be able to shrink it down to email size if anyone is interested in seeing it--I still don't know about posting it on YouTube since we don't have licensing to publish the music in it, though I might try it anyway. I'm in process right now of adapting it for English viewers.

This past Saturday I took my two little Nicaraguan friends to a super cross event, of which there are very few in Nicaragua. It was a lot of fun. There were quad and motorcycle races, and even several heats of kids on small dirt bikes, impressively fast and fearless. Of course there was also the stunt riders that did wheelies and stoppies, and all kinds of other tricks 30 feet in the air off the giant ramp. They make it look so easy...I can't wait to try it when I get my bike fixed! ...right. The guys had a great time taking pictures with my phone (I had lent out my camera, unfortunately!), watching the stunts, checking the raffled ticket numbers with ours--we didn't end up winning the free motorcycle, sadly. One of the boys is in risk of losing his sponsorship. Unfortunately the parents of these boys aren't very supportive at all of their kids' education. While one of them seems to have a lot of internal drive and motivation, the other gets discouraged easily and has been bahaving poorly in class and not doing his homework. I hope that my interest in them will be an encouragement to them in many ways.

We're at about 90% legal with our software in the Nehemiah Center now! This past week one person who has been quite resistant to this movement actually asked me to push her completely into the change rather than little by little weaning her off Microsoft, and I consider this a huge acheivement. Even more shocking, she told me that she's actually been liking Ubuntu and OpenOffice! I've spent a lot of time working with her to make the transition as smooth and painless as possible, and convincing her that it's a good idea. I figured that if I could get her onboard, others would naturally follow. A lot has been acheived in this area in the past year--and I'm speaking mostly of mindsets--which are hard to change. Everyone at the Nehemiah Center now understands the difference between legal and illegal software, as well as the benefits of using legal software. They're also learning about the world and benefits of Free or Open Source Software (appropriately called "Software Libre" or liberated software, in Spanish). Moreover, the perception of the open source alternatives has been improving and I've already had several people at the Nehemiah Center ask me about installing the same stuff on their home computers. We're creating ripples, I do believe, and can already see the way our efforts to have integrity in this area are impacting others.

So the candle is still burning. And I suspect it will be for a while. It's nice to be able to take a couple hours this morning and rest a little before going in! Have a great week, make sure you also get your rest!

Prayer items:

-Please continue to pray me in terms of balancing my workload, and for balancing that with my personal life outside of work.
-One of the most stressful things at work is when the computer equipment all crashes at once--a lot of people count on things working right in order to do their jobs effectively. We've had a lot of challenges in this area lately--pray that our equipment cooperates, and that I have wisdom in knowing how to respond when it doesn't!
-Praise God for the advancements we've been able to make with software, and pray that we continue to have an impact in Nicaragua in this area.