Stories and other stuff

I had this huge post I was gonna write that tied into the weirder and weirder post.  I didn't delete the post about stuff.  It's still there, you just can't see it right now. Let's face it; it wasn't one of my better efforts.  An important topic that I don't think I did enough justice too, if you will. Anyway, I was gonna. And then I didn't. Two very nice things happened to me yesterday.  I got a check that was ten times the amount I was expecting.  I don't get to keep all of it.  I have to share with the ex.  And the tax man.  And others, I'm sure.  But it's enough to fix my problem. On my way to work yesterday, I heard something very interesting.  If you re-read the post about weird, you'll notice the part where I said something was just noise.  I found out yesterday afternoon it wasn't, through a radio program you can hear, too, by clicking on the link. http://bbnradio.org.edgesuite.net/BBNOnDemand/htmfiles/english/E0BBFT...

I had some things to do today before I dropped the truck off for middle son who is movin' on out of mom's house. As I pulled out of the driveway today, it was like I was headed on an adventure.  Something felt kind of different today and what that is, I have no idea.  It was just a feeling. On the drive down I got to follow the Perkins Pest Control truck for a few miles.  Nobody tried to kill me on the way down  but about half-way there, I realized I'd forgotten to check the oil in the truck when I gassed it up this morning.  I got to where I was going and checked it.  It needed some, so I ran to the Wal-mart on Redwood Road & 53rd South. When I was going out, in walked this, well, whatever it was, it was dressed up like a woman.  It looked like a guy dressed up like a woman.  My first instinct was to grab a sharp stick and jab my eyes out.  Me second one was to grab my cell phone, take a photo, and send it to peopleofwalmart.com. ...

You know me, I think I can fix just about anything.  A lot of that is born of necessity.  But sometimes you find yourself at the point of decision:  Do I fix it or replace it? Sometimes what you have is junk.  Sometimes what you think is junk should be fixed.  My tillers are a case in point.  I did not know how easy it would have been to re-engine my Troy-bilt.  I gave it away and kept the Craftsman that went with my tractor.  The year before last, I blew up the engine.  I mean that.  When I was trying to disassemble it earlier this month, I saw the hole in the side of it.  That's what happened to the Troy Bilt, too. The Troy Bilt had a Briggs & Stratton engine on it.  They still make those engines.  The Craftsman has a Tecumseh, which they don't make anymore.  I could find a cheap engine at Harbor Freight, buy a sleeve for it and a new pulley from Sears and the thing should work again.  But the tines are...

I'm all about comments on the blog.  Honestly, I think more people get stuff out of a discussion than a story and I encourage comment.  I really wish there were more of them, especially if God is doing something in your life. Having said that, I delete comments, too.  If I think they're left by someone who shouldn't really even be reading the blog or anything else about my life, they're gonna get deleted.  People have tells and I can usually tell.  If the innocent get deleted with the guilty, so be it.  I really feel that strongly about it. Move along.  Nothing to see here. I mean that. Lately, though, there have been new kinds of comments and by the way they're written, they're probably foreign and are basically spam.  Today, two of them got past the spam filter.  I had to delete them myself. So, please don't click on a link unless I or someone who's not anonymous leaves them and they're germane to the story at hand. And to the s...

Many are the plans in a person’s heart,     but it is the Lord’s purpose that prevails.          Proverbs 19:21 (NIV) Today was a day filled with God's providence but I'm gonna back up a bit to last night. As I left work, a very dear friend of mine was on my heart.  I didn't put her there, but she'd been a burden on my heart off and on all week; for what reason I don't know.  Last night, though, I just told God that there is only one woman who can be a burden on my heart and that I really needed Him to take that from me. This afternoon, she called me out of the blue. After some prayer, I called her back.  I'm well aware that God's no means no and I wasn't tempting fate; for some reason I just felt that it would be all right to return the call.  I'm pleased I did because God in His providence let me see a bit of the why things worked out the way they did. God really does have a plan for all of us and us being together wa...

I felt pretty good this morning when I woke up.  I got in the shower at 10:20 and still managed to be 3 minutes late for church.  I hate being late and I really gotta work at this; I'm getting worse, not better, but I'm always early for work.  I can start being early for other things, too.  I'm gonna work on it, I promise. Anyway, after a good sermon about being the GLOCAL church, which I enjoyed immensely,  came home and had some errands to run.  I procured a new chain for my saw.  I also had to buy gas for the trimmer and mowers and decided to change the sludge that was passing for oil in my tractor.  Ugh, what a mess. I'm in the middle of mowing the lawns.  I'm thinkin' I'm done for the day after running the tractor/mower over what I can.  The rest of it will have to be done by hand and I have to buy a can of fix-a-flat for the boat so I can move it so I can mow under the apple trees.   Anyway, when I decided to change...

I have no happy thought right now.  Fortunately for me, I have someone I can share that with, and when I did, I felt a lot better.  What I mean by this is that I don't have a goal or a dream.  It seems that everything I wanted to do doesn't seem to be in the cards, or at least it's on hold. I mean that.  Everything in my life is up in the air and the only highlight in a week of lowlights is that I fixed the bathtub.  It don't take much to make me happy. I forgot an appointment on Tuesday and was able to reschedule it for Friday.  I'm so glad I did because I got a verse to store in my heart I think will come in handy.  It's Psalm 101:3  But in the broader lesson, it was just a chance to review some very important things to mature as a Christian man.  And even as mixed up as my life is, which I'll get to in a minute, there's only going forward in faith and trusting and obeying God. I know a lot of y'all think I'm nuts.  Sometimes, I'...

I posted on a plumbing website my problem with having a stuck brass tub stopper.  A few plumbers answered and basically told me to dig out the pipe and replace it.  Not a bad idea, I suppose, if that's an option in your budget. Listen, there's nothing I would have rather done than to tear out the bathroom and re-do it.  The mechanical in this house makes no sense.  There are three furnaces.  I'm pretty sure two would do the job.  I'd also really like to re-do the tub/shower/washer-dryer hookups.  Someday I'm gonna redo that room and take out the hookups and install a jetted tub.  The bathrooms upstairs are too small, but the one downstairs would work. That's in the future.  The present requires a little bit more, well, inexpensive, alternatives.  I thought for sure a saws-all would work.  I didn't have one.  I do now, but because of the way the tub is installed, that's not gonna work.  I bought the battery operated one...

This is gonna read like I ripped off a Larry King column.  Heck, maybe I did, for all I know. But I see things; no not dead people.....don't even go there. Here are the things on my mind: There are a lot of people from Oregon around Ogden.  I got behind one the other day and asked God if He was trying to tell me something.  The guy then waved.  I looked and there is the cutest little coffee shop for sale.... I know I've mentioned this before, but it's worth repeating:  Before you post that Facebook meme about your ex, maybe you ought to think if he/she likely feels the very same way about you.  Just sayin'... My nephew posted an interesting thing about Scripture and taking it as it's written.  I think it's not wise to cherry pick a verse to make a point; again not new news to anybody that's a long-time reader of the blog.  But then, too, I think the Holy Spirit helps us understand Scripture and so do good Bible teachers, but I t...

Pray gang, for the folks in Boston.  For the folks in Provo looking for the missing girl. For our country.  For our world.

Good morning, gang!  It's a beautiful spring morning up here on Lark Circle.  The birds are chirping, the sun is shining, the apricot tree didn't get wiped out by the frosts, and I have joy from the Lord this morning.  It's going to be a good day.  I can just tell. I have to do a quick set-up for today's post.  I usually listen to BBN radio.  On Saturdays, though, they have programming for children so I usually flip over to K-LOVE radio if I'm out and about.  I usually listen to that station if I'm out in the yard, too, which is how the radio wound up where it did. On my way to work yesterday, I heard Ginger's story.  I know Ginger's story because I live it and I have a great deal of compassion for her.  I don't know her but I know her life.  Honestly, I do. Ginger had called in to make a pledge to fund the ministry of K-LOVE during a pledge drive last week.  The presenter (the British term for DJ) told how Ginger was at work ...

Sometimes, people make me laugh.  I can't help it.  We're a bunch of funny folks. I had a good day.  I had the opportunity to teach young son something and learned something about myself.  When I showed up at their house today, the lawn was in bad need of being mowed and while I was getting some stuff back from my middle son who'd cleaned out the truck, I noticed their lawnmower had a bent wheel.  A badly bent wheel. I love my son to pieces.  I do.  But I know he gets a little discouraged from time to time and it's hard to make yourself do things when you find yourself there.  I was mad that he hadn't done what he was supposed to and told his mom to make him do it after school or I'd come down and put my foot in his butt and make him motivated.  I thought about that on the way home and decided instead of yelling at my son, maybe the best thing I could do was to help him.  Not push him, or holler at him, but just be there side by side...

There are some things I could live my whole life without knowing. Anyway, yesterday I was looking at the blog stats.  One of the web thingies I subscribe to suggests that you can make a passive income from writing a blog by having advertisements on it.  I'm not ready for that, I don't think, but every now and again, I look to see how many people read the thing.  After all, if nobody read it, there's really no point in writing the thing, save for my own sanity. One of the search terms that popped up in the blog stats yesterday was "dale cooper big God".  That interested me because in the back of my mind, I know I'd written something about telling your problem how big your God is.  I looked through the blogs from 2012 for an hour and couldn't find it.  But clicking on that bing search that showed up in my stats revealed a couple of things. First off, there is/was a chaplain at a college that shares my name so, I can't say with any certainty that wh...

I had this song stuck in my head today, well part of it anyway.  It's about doing everything you do to to the glory of the One who made you, cause He made you to do everything you do to the glory of the One who made you.... And then from 1 Corinthians 10:31  " So whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it for the glory of God"  (NIV) And then the daily devotional from  Our Daily Bread  today is all about doing things to the glory of God. Three times in the span of an hour or two and I'm all about listening. Today I needed to rest the squash.  I dont' feel ill or anything, just tired and the brain feels like things are just swimming around.  That, and I have a feeling that a rest is gonna be what's required to get through what's left of this week.  So I'm resting and getting ready for what's coming.  It's a pattern in my life that when I see things happen like they did today it's usually an indication that it's something ...

I want to start out today's second post just thanking God! Last summer, I wrote some stories about my tractor and the mower deck.  I hooked up said mower deck to cut the grass in the back yard today.  It was longer than the front and still too wet to gather up properly in the grass catcher, so it was the ol' cooter bug to the rescue. The last time I ran the mower deck, the mower didn't seem to quite run right.  So I adjusted the carburetor IAW the instructions I read on the interweb.  Um, maybe that was a bad idea because I spent the rest of the summer thinkin' it was gonna need a carburetor job.  Naw.  Just turning the mixture screw the other way fixed it today when I hooked up the mower deck to the cooter bug. Vroom!  One back lawn mown.  Tomorrow, I have to go over it with the Toro and clean up the clippings.  But I had fun playing my own version of NASTractor!  Vroom! Vroom! Why do I call the tractor "cooter bug"?  I'll ...

On Friday night, I was telling my boss that I used to be pretty good at being an airplane electrician.  On the ride home, I thought what I said sounded a lot like bragging.  I didn't mean it to be, but it really was, and not something anyone who knows me is a stranger to.  I never thought I was the best at what I did, but I always had a high opinion of myself.  A lot of that got me into a lot of trouble a few years ago and it's something I don't want any part of anymore.  God gave me some talents and I use them to His glory, not mine. So on the ride home, I asked God to help me remain humble.  I thought it was enough to recognize it and to ask God to kind of help me keep that in mind.  I think though, that what I wanted and what I needed were two different things. On Friday night, I inventoried my toolbox and I thought everything was there.  I've been inventorying toolboxes for almost thirty years.  It's not the first time I've overlooked...

Yup, this is gonna be one of those kinds of posts.  It's gonna have more holes in it than a swiss cheese. Sorry.  But the bottom line of the story makes it worth telling because it's about God and answering prayers. I have a lot of things up in the air in my life and sometimes it seems to me that I'm just going around in circles in my own little desert.  Sometimes it feels like it's a bit pointless and sometimes I get downright discouraged.  I hit discouraged yesterday. I lost hope. And then I found it again. It's right and good to trust God but sometimes it's easer to say than to do.  I think I hit that day yesterday.  I was tired and sometimes when that happens, you become vulnerable to start believing all kinds of things.  My little bout started the day before with one of those "I don't believe in coincidences" things. I was where I wasn't headed, and something happened out of the ordinary, etc.... God just put me where I needed...

When I got in the car this morning, the last thing I was thinking about was where I was and where I was headed. I mean, I knew what I had planned, which was to help a friend with a quick project.  I got that and even though I felt like doody today, I went because I said I would.  I gotta start working on being prompt, though.  I forgot to drain the oil out of my catch pan, but Miss June recycles, bless her little pea pickin' heart, and I found a gallon jug in the trash can to do that.  I had the tools out so that part was easy. I have to set up the rest of this:  Sometimes I hear things I need to, and the set-up for this week's Insight For Living  was that it was a time-sensitive message from Chuck Swindoll.  I heard that sometime over the weekend.  They're interrupting a planned series on parenting to present this message today, and over the next three days.  As I got into my car to follow my friend to our next destination I was greeted w...