The best news for media in Canada that I’ve heard all year: NetFlix is officially bringing their streaming video service to Canada this fall.
Details are still sparse regarding device support, and they aren’t giving an exact date, but finally we’ll have a decent Internet-delivered content option around these parts. Of course, expect Canada’s ridiculous content rules to be applied.
Read more at the Financial Post, and sign-up to be informed when the service goes live.

Nic and her dad built an amazing, multi-level garden on the hill in our backyard last summer, and this summer she had reasonable success in making meals out of what she grew. The corn didn’t work out, and the potatoes, although good, were comically small. But beans, peas, lettuce, and sunflowers were an astounding success…

So I sat down for lunch today at a table with some folks I hadn’t met yet – there’s only about 50 at this conference, so I’m trying to get know them all a little. And this guy was talking about how he and a partner in Burundi, Africa, had just gotten funding from the Dutch government, to start a soap BAM (Business As Ministry) in Africa to employ locals, and address poverty in a God-honoring way. He goes on to say how he’s stymied though, because although he owns a successful business in the U.S. manufacturing cabinets, he knows nothing about soap at all – but thinks maybe laundry detergent might be a cost-effective place to start.
Well the guy randomly sitting next to him, goes next, and says that he’d just recently been exposed to a refugee camp, and since we’re talking about “Poverty: When Helping Hurts” today in our sessions, he talked about how he could see in these people’s eyes that they didn’t want to beg for help, that they were hard working people in the countries they’d escaped from, but now had no hope. And how God had really placed on his heart that he needs to use his business and technical skills to help heal the broken, and reach people for Christ… and by the way? The company he owns is in chemical manufacturing, with a specialty in… soaps!
Everyone here is a Bible-thumping Republican, with a southern drawl to match, but for all the faults of the religious right, one thing you can’t hold against them is that they really do love Jesus. And here are two good American capitalists, making good money in their Christ-directed professions, randomly stuck together at lunch time… with exactly complimentary skills and giftedness. They’re not looking for “social justice” – they’re just looking to obey God with the things He’s blessed them with. Social justice will come out of this, but it will be for His glory, not for humanity.
I ate lunch quietly and watched and with fascination as God worked in His magnificent way to use two of His people, and the gifts He’d given them, to bring grace and truth to the broken and needy.

God often blesses us for serving obediently. Sometimes He blesses us while we’re serving.
Dad got a trip to Bali out of his gig. We got a beautiful weekend in Muskoka Woods at literally the nicest cottage in the area. There were boats and tubing and seadooing and cliff jumping, camp fires and smores, and a couple nice conversations while the water lapped lazily at the shore. Ben did all of those things except the cliff jumping — which I only did once, due to my advanced age. Abi stayed with friends this year, but we’ll bring her along next year.

It was a good weekend.

Despite being 4 years since I last rode, when I got notice this spring that my license was about to expire, I made it a goal to graduate to my full license by the fall. I booked my road test early enough that if I failed, I’d have time to try again. Fortunately that won’t be necessary. I passed! I have my full M license, and can trade that in for a motorbike license anywhere in the world.

I lost a couple points for not being on the right-hand side of the lane when I was in the passing lane, but otherwise the tester’s feedback was “you ride smooth.”
I’m looking forward to riding for fun, instead of practice, now. I wonder what I should go after next…