Stories and other stuff

Well, I dodged a bullet, so to speak, last night.  My co-workers and I didn't win the lottery.  That's a good thing in a lot of ways because there are a lot of things I don't have to do today because I didn't win. First off, there is this guy that goes to our church.  One of his "things" he thinks is funny is to ask folks for a million dollars.  I would have had to give it to him and as bad as his life looks to me from the outside, giving the man a million dollars would make it much, much worse.  We're both better off without that headache. I don't have to worry about disputes that would have arisen with my children's mothers.  Money tends to bring out either the best or the worst in people.  I've been around too many things and places to do anything other than hope for the best from people but expect the worst.  I'm not saying there would have been "issues", but now I don't have to worry about it. Another thing I don...

You know you attend a small church when: Our regular organist was not at church today and her backup was ill today, so we did it the old fashioned way.... without accompaniment. I'm happy there are folks in the church that are really familiar with the hymnal and could lead us into making a joyful noise to the Lord.  The thing that made me laugh was the singing of the Doxology.  We sing this every Sunday.  Granted, there are two arrangements for this and we seem to switch off from time to time, but we sing it every Sunday. And it's the one we had to start over. It kind of made me laugh.  And it made me think about little churches that don't have fancy organs, or maybe back to the days of people doing just what it says:  Making a joyful noise unto the Lord. The congregation of First Baptist is never going to win a Grammy.  We're not gonna get recorded and sell a million albums of our fine hymn singing.  We're blessed with some in the congregati...

One of the many things the good Lord is working on changing in my life is my spending habits.  I'm really getting to the point where I hate to spend money on anything.  I've never been like this in my life and I'm having a hard time adjusting to it.  I mean, I don't even like buying things I need. I did need a new to me washing machine.  I really want the shiny red ones but they're not in the budget any time soon and that's all right.  The used appliance store was open and I decided it was better to buy a used one with a warranty than buy one off KSL not knowing what I was getting.  That and my truck is in SLC, so by the time I drove down to get it, drove back up with a washer, and drove the truck back down, it would have added $50 to the cost.  It was cheaper to go to the used store and have them deliver one.  I really hated doing it, but I found a washer.  I'm waiting for the guy to clean it up and deliver it sometime this evening. He g...

Hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving.  I enjoyed mine.  We had a good afternoon and a Washington win; the first ever for the team on Thanksgiving, against Dallas only made the day better.  I'm enjoying a lazy day.  I worked on my bathroom project for about a half-hour today and ventured out to look for a washer.  The used appliance store was closed today, though, so that didn't happen.  Tomorrow is work on the car day.  A friend of mine is going to let me use his driveway to change the brakes on the Saturn.  It's getting new plugs too.  But today is normally the decorate the house for Christmas day and that didn't happen. I just didn't feel like it.  But then my sometimes roommate blew in and informed me that when she's done watching babies sometime late tonight or in the wee hours of tomorrow, which I'm used to seeing anyway, that we will be going through our Christmas decorations.  Oh, O.K.  Maybe I should have hung up th...

If I started listing everything I have to be grateful for, this would take you two hours to read and I'd only make a dent in the list.  But on a day like today, I think it's well and proper to give thanks to the gracious God who has blessed me in ways I'd never even dreamed of. Above all, today I'm thankful for God's grace.  I know, first hand, that God is God and that I'm even able to write this in the comfort of a warm home is a testimony to His grace.  I've seen Him do mighty things in my life and each and every one is a reason to be grateful and thankful.  I am.  And I know that everything in my life stems from the grace I found through accepting Christ as my savior. I'm also thankful to God for an abundant harvest from the garden.  In the cupboards and freezer in my home, the product of that blessing is well-evident.  Today, we'll be enjoying some of the vegetables we saved from the garden for this day.  There will be green bean casserole...

I haven't been this tired since last year when I drove 2/3 of the way across this country after a three hour nap.  I guess I'm getting old and need my sleep.  Sleep, though, has been pretty tough to find the last week, with working and all of the things going on around here.  This week looks to be no exception because of the holiday on Thursday.  If I hadn't already purchased the meal and invited people to dinner, we'd be dining out. Yup.  Dining out. I heard Golden Corral puts on a pretty good feed on Thanksgiving. I love Thanksgiving.  It's my second favorite holiday, next to Christmas.  I love everything about it, even the cooking part which has fallen back to me.  I like to cook so it's not a big deal.  It's just going to take a few extra days to get things done and time seems to be at a premium. I started the prep work today by making things that could be made ahead of time, like a cheese ball and the spinach dip.  Those wil...

I was really happy today.  I still am, and for no particular reason. I'm just happy.  I can't explain why.  I don't know why.  Maybe it's because I'm getting excited for the holidays.  Maybe it's because I haven't had much sleep lately.  Maybe it's because it's hard to not be happy when you've been blessed as much as I have in my life. I really don't know. Maybe part of it is starting to be comfortable with my job.  Some of the bigger, more complicated tasks I've done a time or two.  I think that always helps.  Some of the stuff I do can be a little intimidating.  I get to wear a hard hat for some of it, because we have to use a crane to lift the flight controls into place. I'm getting the hang of keeping the pieces from swinging back and forth when they're on the hoist.  I can tell you though, that if most people saw what holds airplanes together, they'd take a train instead.  It's neat to me and I really enjoy my j...