Dekker does it again with this amazing new thriller that challenges the reader to reject what the world deems to be “normal” and “beautiful.”

Brad Raines is an FBI Agent tracking down a serial killer who kidnaps beautiful-seemingly innocent-women, and drains the blood from their body and leaves them hanging up to be found as perfect and blemish-free brides, hence the name The Bride Collector. Nikki, a psychologist working with Brad on the case, helps Brad for the sake of the case, but it is clear she has romantic interests in Brad. Quinton Gauld is the killer Brad is tracking: he leaves no evidence behind except a note revealing his intentions-to make things personal. Brad, with no other clues in the note than an implied reference of the mentally instability of the killer, stumbles upon The Center for Wellness and Intelligence, a secluded home for the mentally and emotionally challenged, yet extremely smart people. Here he meets Roudy, a self-proclaimed modern day Sherlock Holmes, Andrea, a stunningly beautiful schizophrenic who is great with numbers and patterns, Cassanova, the ladies’ man, and Paradise, a broken and unkempt young woman who may have the ability to see the last few minutes of a person’s life before their death. Hoping to use Paradise’s gift, Brad brings the rag-tag group in on the case, but not before the killer strikes again.

The Bride Collector is an intense ride, with naturally gruesome scenes, quirky characters, and a message that applies not just to the characters, but to the reader themselves.

Interestingly, I was really impressed with the literary depth of characterization Dekker implemented into this story. Unlike most murder-mysteries, the reader is almost immediately introduced to the killer himself, revealing his name, his methods, his insight on the world and why he is killing these women. Dekker compares and contrasts the hero, Brad, and his antithesis, Quinton: their personalities, their purposeful actions, their motivations, the environments in which they surround themselves and the traumatic events in their past that they are still coping with. He asks the symbolic question, “Are these two men the same?” and then lets the story play out.

Dekker also introduces us to two women which are compared and contrasted. Nikki is Brad’s partner on the case, a psychologist whose interest for Brad is to the world, natural. Paradise is a young woman haunted by psychological disorders, a past that scars her, and the possible gift that she can see ghosts and possibly experience the last few minutes of a person’s life before their death. Dekker compares the two women, focusing on Nikki in the first half of the book, and then on Paradise in the last half, allowing the reader to experience how both women are valued, cherished, favored, and beautiful.

Dekker’s characterization is spot on, with rich background history of the main four characters, along with a cast of mentally and emotionally challenged-yet extremely intelligent-characters who attempt to help Brad and their friend Paradise crack the case of the Bride Collector. Their quirkiness provides humor that lightens the weight of intensity of the situation for a brief moment.

The story and plot is a fast ride, taking twists and turns and unexpected results that refuse to let the reader put the book down for a second.

Dekker also explores such themes as “normalcy”, motivations and desires, and “who is God’s favorite?”. All in all, Dekker has a well-written, purposeful story that is sure to shape the hearts of those who read it.

I did not hear about McCain’s pick for VP until Friday afternoon when I was having lunch with a friend, and she told me who he picked. I had seen earlier that morning that some governor, Sarah Palin, was a good possibility…but nothing had been confirmed then. As my friend told me about Gov. Palin, I was intrigued and read up on her when I got back later that afternoon.

Late in that afternoon, I noticed that my good friend from college, Aaron Blake Huddleston, wrote up a great article detailing strengths and weaknesses regarding McCain’s pick of Gov. Sarah Palin for VP on a note on Facebook. He did a great job on the research and explaining a few not easily understood topics. With his permission, I am posting it here on my blog for anyone who is interested, or not interested since it should not be confined to those on Facebook. Give it a read, even if you don’t really care.

I think that Gov. Sarah Palin was an excellent choice for Senator McCain. (True, I would have preferred he choose Huckabee, but that’s beside the point.)

Strengths

Gov. Palin is a woman which will help Senator McCain go after some of the swing votes who liked Senator Clinton but don’t like Senator Obama. This is not to suggest that Hillary supporters would vote for anything in a skirt, but simply that (in some cases) the fact that she is a woman will help get their attention so they’ll hear what McCain/Palin have to say.

Gov. Palin is a TRUE conservative. Sen. McCain needs to earn the trust of right wingers. He’s a self-described Maverick. He’s considered moderate, and slightly left of where most conservative voters are comfortable placing their votes. Having a TRUE conservative on the ticket with him will help bring him back into favor with those who were concerned about this (and about his ability to appoint the right kind of justices).

Gov. Palin is STRONGLY pro-life. She is a part of the group Feminists for Life. This will help Sen. McCain secure the pro-life vote (a large group who were on the fence about him because of some of the people on his VP short-list).

Gov. Palin is a bit of a maverick herself. While staying true to conservative values and platform, Gov. Palin has spent her time in office digging out corruption, throwing out old policy (set in place by republicans) that just wasn’t working, and “cleaning house” of appointed officials who were either corrupt or just not doing their jobs well. This will take the wind out of the sails of Sen. Obama’s “Agent of Change” campaign. Sen. Obama has no record to support his claims to be an agent of change, and his VP pick CERTAINLY is not an agent of change. Meanwhile, Sen. McCain has proven he can go against President Bush’s policies and incite change where it is needed (the Surge, for example), and Gov. Palin’s entire time in office has been about changing what was wrong with the previous administration.

More on Gov. Palin’s maverickhood….This will also help Sen. McCain fight the attacks from Sen. Obama that he will be “a third term for Bush.” By pointing out Gov. Palin’s history of digging out what was wrong with the previous republican administration and fixing it, Sen. McCain can argue that he intends to do the same with the White House.

Gov. Palin can win votes and trust. Gov. Palin’s approval rating has never been under 80%, and, in fact, has been over 90% for much of her time in office. This shows that she is able to win people over, that she is good at what she does, and that she will be able to help secure votes.

She’s a surprise! Weird that it’s a strength, but it is. Nobody had even considered her an option until they found out that it WAS her. People were surprised, almost shocked, when they heard. This is good for the campaign because it keeps it in the news. She’s such a surprise and such a shock, that the media will want to pay a lot of attention to her in the coming weeks and months (especially because they missed her in the coverage leading up to her selection when they were focussed on Gov. Romney and Gov. Ridge). This continued media coverage will help the McCain campaign get face time in what has (thus far) been dominated by Sen. Obama.

Weaknesses

Inexperience. Sen. Obama’s campaign has tried to argue that Gov. Palin doesn’t have enough experience to be “a heartbeat away from the presidency.” However, Gov. Palin’s experience makes Sen. Obama look like a school boy in some ways. While she is only a 1-term governor of a smaller state, her time there has done well to prepare her for this office. She is one of few governors who can boast foreign policy experience. Because of Alaska’s location, she has had to work out foreign policy with both Canada and Russia. Being governor has given her administrative and executive experience. She has accomplished more for the state in her 1 term as governor than Sen. Obama has done in his time as a Senator from Illinois. (Where he passed no legislation, and missed most of his votes).

Speaking ability. This is a big one (and one of the reasons I would have preferred Huckabee). While the text of her speech today was good, her delivery left something to be desired. She didn’t know how to handle a crowd that big and often found herself stuttering and seeming very awkward whenever the crowd would erupt into cheers. With a weak public speaking ability like that, I fear she will not be able to hold her own against the very experienced Sen. Biden.

The controversy. Okay, it had to be mentioned (even though it’s pathetic)…There IS a slight controversy surrounding her in Alaska right now. It seems she fired the Public Safety Commissioner in Alaska. She says that she did this because there were State Trooper vacancies that were not being filled (in other words, he wasn’t doing his job). The former commissioner claimed that it was because he didn’t fire her sister’s ex-husband (a state trooper) who was engaged in a bitter custody battle with Gov. Palin’s sister. Apparently a member of Gov. Palin’s administration had contacted him to discuss the issue of firing this state trooper without Gov. Palin’s knowledge. When she found out, she placed this member of her administration on a 2 month suspension for acting outside of the scope of his authority. An investigation was later launched, which Gov. Palin welcomed, opening up her files and saying she had nothing to hide. Those conducting the investigation have not had to subpoena anything because she has given full cooperation, and they’ve come up with nothing on her. Also, before we get carried away with the man asking that this state trooper be fired, let’s look at why he was making the request. It was not because he had divorced Gov. Palin’s sister. It was because he had threatened to kill his father-in-law (yes, the Governor’s father, but that doesn’t matter…he threatened to kill an innocent civilian…), he had tasered his 11-year-old step-son (at the boy’s request, but it’s still not allowed), and he had broken gaming laws. To me, that’s 3 strikes you’re out. Those were the reasons that a member of the administration asked about firing the state trooper, it had nothing to do with the Governor’s sister, and it was done without Gov. Palen’s knowledge. All that said, as much BS as the controversy is, it is possible that Sen. Obama and his campaign will attempt to exploit it to deceive voters into thinking Gov. Palin is corrupt (although certainly voters are smart enough to see Sen. Biden’s corruption…).

She’s a surprise. Yes, I listed this as a strength as well. For all of those reasons it’s a good thing. But for this reason it’s a bad thing: Nobody knows much about her. All that I know I found out through researching her extensively today, but the average voter doesn’t know much about her. That’s bad on 2 levels. First of all, it’s bad because she doesn’t have a name recognition that will automatically bring some voters over…she’ll have to work hard for all the votes she gets. The second reason it’s bad is because, sadly, most voters aren’t as responsible as me. Rather than dig and search and do their own research on Gov. Palin, they will wait and listen to what sources like CNN and MSNBC have to say about her. Which means they will get all of their information about her from sources with a definite bias. This could definitely hurt the McCain/Palin campaign.

In all, I think she was a very wise choice, but they will have a few bullets to dodge. Hopefully Sen. McCain’s campaign advisors are up to the challenge. I just thank the Lord that Sen. McCain picked a true conservative running mate instead of somebody like Gov. Ridge…I wasn’t sure what I would do if he’d picked Gov. Ridge or Sen. Lieberman.

posted from http://www.new.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=38317098696&ref=mf

I knew most of the points that he made already, but Aaron did a great job summarizing them and showing how each point could go one way or the other.

Thanks Aaron for clearing up the “controversial” issue with Sarah Palin…The news tried to explain it, but to tell you the truth, I didn’t get “the controversy” totally until reading his post.

Yep, I agree, she’s not Huckabee, but she’s still a great choice.

P.S. I did think it was amuzing that a search for Sarah Palin on Facebook already results in precisely 480 groups (at this moment) dedicated to loving her, hating her, or hitting on her. Check it out.

Let me tell you my story about what happened today.

I signed a 2 year contract back in January ‘07, and bought a Razr. It had been working just fine until a month ago when I noticed it started randomly dropping calls (even when it reported having four bars in a densely populated area). I have about a month and a few days before I am eligible to upgrade to a new phone, and so I figured I could stick it out (sometimes it worked fine).Then this past week, the Razr would just randomly shut off on its own (even did this during one or two conversations). Finally today, it seemed to die…at least when it wasn’t on a charger. So I broke down and took it into my friendly local Verizon store.

After explaining the situation, and asking them to resolve the issue, the tech support guy told me that they do not fix phones (anymore), and that my phone was fried (he had tried to install a system update, but said that my onboard mini-USB was flaky, which prevented the update). My only options were to either purchase another Razr refurb for $50, or upgrade to a new phone….Then I got a bunch of mixed hoopla from him and another sales associate about how I would only get a $50 credit instead of the $100 credit that was written on the contract I originally signed towards an upgrade. This was either because of their new two tier plan ($50 credit for less than $79.99 per month plan, $100 for $79.99 or more), or because I was upgrading early ($50 new every year, $100 new every two years), I got both answers, but not any consistency. Frankly, the people I interacted with were pretty jerkish. I decided to walk out and try a different Verizon store across town.

My hunch was correct, I walked in and told them about my issue. I mentioned the fact that I had come from the other store, and told her what they had said. She immediately handed me off to the manager, Kenny. Kenny looked at my phone, and told me I had the two options the other store had first mentioned. I questioned him on the $50 upgrade credit, and he said it was the two-tier policy change that Verizon recently made, and I reasoned with him about what I signed in my original contract. I also mentioned the fact that the people at the other store had been jerks, and that I had heard that the people at this store would treat you right. He still did not budge, but he did take my old phone to see about an update. While I was waiting for the update to occur, he mentioned to me that he made a note on my file to go ahead and give me the $100 credit when I did come into upgrade (”since apparently you didn’t know about the new policy” were his words). A few minutes later, he let me know that they were unable to upgrade my phone, so they were going to give me a new refurb to last me the last month, for free, since I was having all this trouble. Just 10 more minutes of waiting, and downloading my contacts from Backup Assistant, and I was on my way. Thanks so much for the help Kenny! You are awesome!

My advice, if one store is harassing you, try another one. Be sure to tell them that the other store were jerks, and that you heard that the people at this store would treat you right. Be polite, firm, but realize that these are people too. And be sure to give them accolades when they do go out of their way to help you.

P.S. Users can also use this website to submit comments about what Verizon can do better: https://www.survey.verizonwireless.com/vzwsurvey/

Yes, that is right. I spent today updating p2pConverter. I guess I got inspired, and after spending all morning in research, the afternoon became productive enough that I was able to make this great plugin even better!

Let me remind you of what this plugin does: For you Wordpress users, you might have found that Wordpress differentiates between Posts and Pages, and its not too easy to change one to the other when you accidentally forgot to hit the “Page” link right after going for the “Write” tab. Never fear, this plugin is here to save you from your miserable self resorting to copying and pasting an hours work of typing and thoughts.

p2pConverter makes it extremely easy to convert your Post to a Page, or vice versa.

And now, just introduced in the new version, is the ability to convert it while you are actually in edit mode (be sure to save first!). Other new features include cooperating better when you are using the search function in the Manage section to find certain posts/pages (it now remembers your search), which also makes this easier to convert multiple posts/pages. One more feature is the new “p2pConverter” capability that is automatically only to Administrators and Editors to prevent anyone else who has access to the backend from going crazy with this awesome tool. This capability can be adjusted easily for other roles via the Role Manager plugin.

Well, I hope this new update works well for all of you and brings you joy. Especially since you might have need of it according to Lorielle. If you have found that this plugin has been very helpful to you, please be sure to Donate to the poor post-graduate that would be very appreciative.

Let me know if you have any thoughts, questions, problems, or requests with the new version.

• p2pConverter 0.6

About half a year ago I learned that Facebook had a new look in the mix. Today, that look has been gradually released to its users a little at a time. I did not know about this (as I have not been asked to change over as of yet) until I read a few friend’s status updates commenting on the new look. Therefore, I checked the Facebook blog, and sure enough there was a post about the new look. There was also a link to check it out if we had not seen the new site yet. So I clicked it.

Go ahead an follow through the image gallery to learn about the New Facebook look, and my thoughts on it.