this is SO freaking brilliant:

To reach the suqs and madrassas of Cyberistan, and with them you, Dear Reader, the Review comes by caravan from Bactra. The caravans take off at right angles to the Silk Road, crossing the mountain wastes and deserts of the Real World (so-called), by yak, by camel, by foot: and sometimes a part of the manuscript gets left behind in a nameless caravanserai at the edge of the Tarim: and sometimes it comes down from the roof of the world illegible: and sometimes the caravan master decides to make war, or a pilgrimage, or a city: and sometimes more white matter is added to the salt flats, or the snows, or the sands, and it never arrives at all. Patience.

from: Cosma

http://vserver1.cscs.lsa.umich.edu/~crshalizi/notebooks/

...to remind everyone that apart from the sovereign predestinating grace of our glorious Lord and Savior Iessos Maschiach the first-begotten Son of God and the second Adam who lives forevermore and who holds the the keys of Hell and Death, the Yes and the Amen, the Wisdom of God and the Second person of the Holy Trinity, the King of Kings and the Son of Man, the ONLY name given among men by which we MUST be saved, the crucified and risen Savior of all men (but especially them that believe)

ummm - wait, where was I ?

Oh, right -

apart from the unfathomable mercies of the Dayspring from on high who is the Judge of all mortals and unto whom every knee shall bow and every tongue shall confess; apart from the finished atoning work of Yeshua Christos on the cross at Golgotha outside Jerusalem 2,ooo years ago; apart from the divine promise of the restoration of all things in the world to come; apart from the irresistible grace of God made manifest in the poured-out blood of Christ to which angels and demons alike bear witness; apart from that -

you can do absolutely nothing and will die in vain. 

just sayin'...