Operation Christmas Child 2007

This Saturday a bunch of us from Penn State Christian Grads got together to participate in the Operation Christmas Child toy drive. OCC is an ministry of Samaritan’s Purse, an organization led by Franklin Graham (son of Billy Graham). Their aim is to provide shoeboxes full of Christmas gifts to children around the world, along with Gospel messages, in the hopes of helping these children (and their families) come to know Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior. A very noble cause indeed! Anyway, last year we in PSCG packed about ten or a dozen or so shoeboxes, so we decided to do it again this year. Several of us met up at the Dollar Tree and Wal-Mart on Saturday evening and were able to pick up all sorts of gifts. We all went back to Ash & Heather’s house to have a wrapping and pizza party, and by the time it was all said and done, we were able to pack 20 shoeboxes full of gifts! I was glad that we were able to increase our number from last year, and I’d just like to thank everyone who contributed in some way for their generosity, for it would not have happened without you! I dropped them all off at State College Evangelical Free Church on Saturday night, where they’re being collected until this Sunday. I’d encourage all of you to consider participating in Operation Christmas Child in your area, if not this year, then certainly next year! Need doesn’t take a vacation.
I’ll likely be studying a bunch tomorrow for Thursday’s midterm exam for Atmospheric Turbulence, but once I get past that, it’s Thanksgiving Break time! But we do have a rather interesting colloquium coming up on Thursday afternoon: Kerry Emmanuel of MIT. He’s primarily a researcher in tropical meteorology, and lately that has necessarily gotten into topics of climate change in recent years. Because of that, he’s one of the most prominent people in all of atmospheric science today, and has gotten into some rather high-profile debates/tiffs with other prominent atmospheric scientists who don’t share his viewpoint, such as Bill Gray of Colorado State and Chris Landsea of the National Hurricane Center. At any rate, Dr Emmanuel is going to be giving a talk entitled “Hurricanes and Global Warming.” Whether or not I agree with him, I definitely don’t wanna miss that!
Speaking of climate change, check out Climate Audit, winner of the 2007 Weblog Award for Best Science Blog. I only recently discovered it, and I haven’t yet had a chance to do more than scratch the surface of what all is on there, but it looks very good and interesting to say the least. I added a link to it on my Links page as well.
And congratulations to Walter, Anke & John, who all passed their M.S. thesis defenses here in meteorology since Friday! And I’d also like to give a shout out to Chris, who passed his defense over in acoustics last week too! Must be thesis deadline time again. I’m so glad I got that over and done with back in June! 🙂