On Books and Rice

While this is the kind of reading Mike really loves to do: he does a lot of the more academic reading these days as he is finishing his Ph.D. Our family loves books.  We love to read at the dinner table and, of course, before bedtime.   And we have a LOT of books. And Mike reads a LOT of books in all his studies.  So it is no surprise that our dining room table looks like this right now: It doesn't always look quite so heavy-laden.   But the books do go back and forth between home and office depending on where he is studying.  And these books came home so he could prepare for a trip to Princeton to work on his dissertation there.   He was going in order to use the seminary library, to check out some books that he will need, do some research, you know, the kinds of things you do when you are trying to finish a dissertation.   Here is the point of this story...just before he left on this trip he found out that every five years or so the library shuts down its entire computer system in order to upgrade it.  The upgrade was scheduled for two days after he arrived in Princeton, of course.   This left him with one day to do all he needed to do using the library's system.   He handled the news much better than I would have if it had been happening to me.  This is one of the major differences between the two of us.  I get all in a huff about circumstances that I can't control while at the same time I do not do things that are within my control to improve my circumstances.  He does not let circumstances dictate his attitude and tries to do things in a way that will make the best of his time and circumstance.  I could learn some things from him, you know. Fortunately, everything worked out fine and he was able to get done the things he needed to get done there. Nothing like a little pressure to motivate you!  It's like a rice cooker.   Um, does that even make sense?