The Wake/UNC game this afternoon was awesome, finishing up with a final score of 95-82! Wake started off with low energy, but quickly picked up speed, gaining the lead, which we then never lost. More impressively, we shot 100% from the line today; that's 32 for 32. Given that Rick Majerus and Dick Vitale, in their infinite wisdom, announced that free throws were our weakness (only shooting 65% before today) it became obvious that Skip had the boys working on that in practice this week. Speaking of Skip, I want to say a word about what an awesome guy he is. Late last night, as students were huddled outside in the cold, camping out for tickets, he and the team show up with pizza for everyone! He then pumped up the crowd with a great speech, promising a victory over UNC for them, the reason they play ball - for the student fans. Now, that's probably not the whole truth, but I'm willing to accept it because this entire gesture really speaks to the man's character as a college BB coach. Tuesday we head to Tallahassee to play the 'Noles and then we'll have another tough game after that, versus Cincinnati. We're looking good as the season is shaping up...

Before the game, and before everyone showed up to cheer with me, I finally finished my book, Ken Follett's The Pillars of the Earth. The story line was pretty good, but the writing was mediocre at best. I think I particularly enjoyed the story as it was about the medieval English church (12th century) and featured a lot of historical characters of both the state and church - King Henry II and St. Thomas Becket, to name two. Primarily about the construction of a cathedral, the action revolves around the characters whose lives and livelihoods are affected by the building project. With the exception of one character (Jack Jackson), I thought the characters were too plainly drawn; they were mostly two-dimensional, black or white type characters and that always makes for a disappointing and predictable read. Follett doesn't seem to understand interior monologues very well either. His sub-plots were much like the characters. One problem would arise and it would be resolved. Then another would come up and they would work their way through it, but never did things actually seem to happen at once, as if life simply waits until you've dealt with your current problem before handing you a new one. Then, towards the end, he manufactures new sub-plots for no other apparent reason that to keep the book going a few hundred pages, so that he can end it in the decade he wants. Now, as he is the author, you could say the whole thing is manufactured, but in novels, characters take on a life of their own. After that happens, they'll still go where you write them, but it will be as if they're directed their against both their will and better judgment. This happend a lot towards the end of the book. Hopefully, my next book will be a little better. The characters in it are not contrived; they were real people in real places at a real time who come to life in Erik Larson's The Devil in the White City, a non-fiction about a series of murders in Chicago ar the 1893 World's Fair. I had trouble deciding which book to read next before I finally settled on this one, so maybe after I finish it, I'll let you decide which I should tackle next.

Now, I'm to bed as I'm excited about returning to the Church of the Ascension tomorrow morning for worship.

-R