Devil in the Details

Mid-July and I'm knee deep in alligators!  This weekend is our American Legion Officer Installation and next month is our 3rd annual celebration of "Keep the Spirit of '45 Alive" honoring WWII Veterans.  I am also job-hunting and just came from a weekend trip to Fredericksburg then followed that with a weekend of American Legion State Convention events.  The infamous "they" say that the devil is in the details and at this point I have had alot of details going on.  WRhat has impressed me most in the past month or so of preparations is how much the Good Lord has protected me from that devil!  The trip to Fredericksburg was fun and relaxing.  The Convention allowed me to meet a new friend and visit with old ones.  Plans that seemed to get thwarted worked to my advantage...well, except for lunch in the bar and a broken elevator!  I'm watching things come together for installation and look forward to getting to work on some old and new projects this year.  As I head into August, the Spirit of '45 is also falling into place as the guest speaker I was really hoping to have come is able to share her incredible story.  I think the Lord has put the devil on the run...again...and I'm so grateful!  Running yourself crazy today?  Give it to God and let Him dazzle you!

Desperado

  A great friend of mine posts a Word for the Day devotional for a group of ladies.  She recently had one that she made a comment on that said, " I have found that most people don’t want to change until the situation is so desperate they have to."  I've seen this with people who get sick, lose relationships, gain weight and a host of other situations that makes you wonder why people ignore warning signs.  I think it may have to do with the thought that bad things happen to other people...not me!  I've been one of those people and that particular stronghold is very much alive and hard to exorcise!  I guess I could be a modern day desperado just living my life according to whatever happens on a particular day and then face the stress of having to deal with that "whatever".
  My prayer for myself (and any other desperadoes out there) is to make today a day of change.  I really don't want to find myself facing God as an unfaithful servant having hidden the talent I was given. 
  Laying it at your feet, Lord.  Help me exorcise...then exercise!!
 

Get busy, Sara

Tomorrow is June 1st, beginning of the 6th month of 2012...and I've failed to reach one goal already.  After squeezing every nickel out of my meager funds last year I swore to either save $100 a month towards Christmas or purchase one nice gift per month for my immediate family.  That way December wouldn't be such a season of panic but a season of peace...financially anyway.  If I don't get a grip on things pretty quick, I may be betting on the Mayans come December!!

There's a Hole in My Bucket List!

Since I posted last a few years ago, I've seen the movie, The Bucket List.  I had this unspoken pressure to develop my own list but the thought of making a list of things to do before I die was a little more than depressing!  I would like to see the aurora borealis, cherry blossoms in Washington D.C., write a book, learn Spanish, weigh 120 again, and a few other things.  But at 64, I've had plenty of time to do this stuff and nothing's happened yet...makes me wonder how important these things really are to me.  Along the way, some cool things have happened that have brought me much joy and made precious memories for me.  One in particular is meeting and getting to know the gentleman pictured with me.  I'd like to introduce you to Glenn McDuffie, the Kissing Sailor from Times Square, VJ Day 1944.   I know, there's a book out and blah, blah, blah.  Mr. McDuffie, however has been forensically identified as the man in the famous picture by the top forensic artist with the Houston Police Dept., Lois Gibson and has passed every lie detector test ever given (a couple by F. Lee Bailey)!!  I'm hoping to see him again this year and you bet I will keep you posted.  In the meantime, I'm happy with the serendipity trails I'm following and the wonderful people I'm meeting.  And I think he's cuter than a cherry blossom!

Everything Old is New Again!

It's been suggested that I dust off my blog and start posting again.  We'll see what happens as this whole place is different and I'm not sure yet what google has to do with it.  I agree with my friend, Bonney, that social media isn't so friendly if you want to post more than a recent trip to the grocery store or make vague innuendos about people you're unhappy with.  Besides, now we're all on the grid and Big Brother knows where we are and what we're thinking...and who we're mad at!!  It's late and my last Dr. Pepper is wearing off so I'll think about something interesting I've done or am planning to do and get back with details.  In the meantime, y'all be careful out there, ya hear??

SUPER DUPER

I'm not sure if I'm just ignorant or if the public is once again being duped by the politicians. But what the heck is a "Super Delegate"? I know about Super Glue, Super Heroes, Super Sonic, and Super Size Me. There's Super Bowl, Super Novas, Super Mario and Super 8 Motels (see you along the way). The adjective, "super" has to be one of the most superfluous words in current language and has lost the impact it once had. By sheer repetition, the word starts to look silly and insignificant. So, why has it now been the superlative of choice to define a delegate to a political convention? Are these delegates of greater renown, greater power, greater income? Are they sitting in proxy for legions of other delegates too lazy to go to the convention? And...if so much superb rhetoric is being bandied about regarding their impact on the choice of a presidential candidate, can't they just phone in their decision and save everyone a boatload of super funds? I think deep down, we're being conned by some Super Dupers!

Lost in Space...and Time

Reading a blurb from Uncle John's Bathroom Reader (my other Bible) I see where it is estimated that people spend on average one year of life looking for things. I doubt that. I wouldn't still be sporadically hunting for treasure if I dedicated that much time to the search. Think about how much time has passed just this year! It's already coming near the first day of the fifth month of 2008. Imagine spending just these nearly four months searching for misplaced objects, no vacations, no going to work or play or school...just looking for things that I once had.

If I had put even 25% of that time, say one month, 30 days just looking for things, I'd have already located the library book I just checked out. Mike had it last and has no recollection of where he might have put it down, so maybe that's a technicality. I can lay that lost item at his feet and send him off to find it. At any rate, it cost me $20 at the library to replace it.

Add another month to that and I'd know where my little ornament was last hung. It's three girls dancing. I got one for me, Middle Sis and Baby Sis to celebrate our good fortune to be sisters. I'm kind of into "sister" things like that. I've seen both of theirs at their homes, but don't know what I did with mine. It'll turn up. I might also have found my one missing earring that's a light blue and silver. I've had the pair for years and they didn't match a thing. Now that one's gone into hiding, I have about three blouses that they would match perfectly with. Of course!

Spending an entire year would be a bonanza! I know I'd be able to find my book of poems that I've written (I know it's around somewhere), James' missing baby shoe (his precious wife has the other baby shoe on display in their home), and maybe, just maybe, the ring my mother gave me when I was a teenager with the initial "E" (for Elizabeth) on it. She told me to be careful!!!

Think I'll start this weekend ~ tempus fugits, ya know!

Great Ideas!

A good classmate of mine sent me an email recently from a news broadcast touting a car engine that runs on water! The inventor has already been invited to speak before Congress and I'm wishing I knew how to contact him and tell him, "Don't go!!" He desperately needs to talk to the inventor of the lifetime light bulb and see how far that technology got him! If I had the answer to the problem of high gas prices I'd keep it under my hat...ecology be damned! Will the people on the receiving end of those obscene oil profits really let this guy's research move forward? He'd have been smarter to just go directly to some forward thinking car manufacturer and sell it to them (assuming the patent is in place).

And really, what's Congress done for you lately?

Blue Sunday's Coming!

In case you didn't know, Baby Sister founded an organization for helping abused and neglected children and those who rescue them, namely, Blue Sunday. Blue Sunday is always the last Sunday of April and the focus is to get churches to sign up at their website if they will commit to pray for the children, foster families, and child welfare and CPS workers to tirelessly labor to improve the lives of these small victims. Several Texas Catholic Archdioceses are onboard to make up the over 500 Texas churches already in agreement to pray.

Please check out the website at www.bluesunday.org and then forward the information to your Christian leaders and pastors. Maybe they will see the value in helping the foster children and those who rescue them.

Thank you ~

Write Now, Right Now

Someone recently pointed out that I hadn't written anything lately. If you're wondering if I ran away, I did...but I came back. Sometimes life just happens and happens hard. I took some time off to regroup and I think I have it together...or at least I'm moving in that direction. I also took a great word I read and 2008 is the year for me to:
1) Release my children to their destiny (and quit trying to help it along!) - have you every seen that saying "Never try to teach a pig to sing. It won't work and it annoys the pig." Not that I think my children are pigs as I've raised three wonderful boys who are producing wonderful grandchildren, but the point of trying to ... well, I think you get the point!
2) Quit trying to be skinny! I'm aiming for healthy and pledging to make a concerted effort to lose weight along the way, but I have to realize that it is what it is! Even if I could get into a bikini, it still wouldn't be pretty.
3) Get back to regular church attendance. I know, you can worship God under a tree, but I have discovered that I thrive and my spirit thrives on constant, regular contact with other believers. And they're not meeting under trees.
I'd move along to items 4 - 104 but I'm on my lunch hour at work and since they aren't about you, you might get bored.

Doggone!

I'm trying something new out by posting a link. I haven't done that before but maybe you can teach an old dog new tricks. We'll see!

I'm excited about this link to www.kingdomdog.com. I never had much use for dogs. Couldn't ever housebreak one. Shoot, I'm just glad my boys were housetrained and they did most of that themselves!

Hank Hough (pronounced Huff) has a ministry that deserves taking a look at. He has a program for every age group and he shows off his award winning chocolate labs as he teaches how important it is to be obedient to God.

I hope I haven't crossed any lines here by posting his link or mentioning his work without written permission. In fact, it seems kind of silly to advertise for something you've never seen. But I was immediately charmed by his gentle voice and his testimony...and his dogs! Take a look!

Electric Glide

I love the cooler weather of fall and winter. I embrace the darker, grey days as great sleeping weather. Just in time for great sleeping weather is the arrival back of the hour of sleep that the government robs me of every darned spring. I love this time of year! Except for one little thing.

I haven't figure out how to swivel out of my car and shut the door without getting jolted from the build up of static electricity. I rode with a friend today in her little convertible. She only had glass windows with no metal frame so I could go buy me a cute car like hers and avoid the problem. Except for one little thing.

Walking across the floor to same friend's office (she's actually a boss and a friend) I lean against her door and get jolted again. Darned static!!! I have to wear shoes, nothing rubber soled. I can't figure out how to not touch the door. You'd think that after a few times of getting buzzed, not in a good way, that I'd learn not to touch the door frame. But no, I'm still getting zapped.

So, I can't get out of the car, open doors, or touch anyone without the electricity charging through my system. I'm afraid of setting something on fire when I fill up for gas if I reach across the seat for my purse. If anyone has any idea how to fix this, please let me know. It's going to be a long winter!

No Pot Here!

I was driving over to the north side of Houston Friday afternoon with Susan to do a craft show (she's very talented with making jewelry and stained glass). The sun was shining but we drove through showers all the way to Kingwood. When we were nearly there, the rainbow that we'd been watching in League City reappeared and we could see the colors ending on the ground between our car and the stand of pine trees on the side of the road! We had to look several times to make sure that we were really seeing it touch the ground!! Maybe it was the way the sun was shining through the misty air maybe there is some really good explanation to what we saw. It was magical. What we didn't see was the pot of gold. I have to assume it's because we were on Hiway 59 headed north and it's so heavily travelled someone beat us to it. Somewhere there's a leprechaun with his pantaloons in a twist and two women still searching for his illusive treasure.

He's Too Sexy for His Shirt!

I fell in love again today! It was the darnedest thing too.

I took the week off to be totally unproductive (and have almost succeeded) and was planning to leave today to go see the grandchildren in F/burg. Unfortunately, the handle of my kitchen faucet fell off yesterday and I asked Mike if we could wait until tomorrow so he could replace the broken faucet today. Middle son informed me that we could probably still leave today as this was usually a simple job. Well, it wasn't!

After making three trips to Home Depot and a huge mess in the kitchen, Mike gave up the project and told me to call a plumber at 3:30. We found out that the leak has been going on for longer than we thought as the first shelf is rotted out. You wouldn't believe all of the cleaning products I had stored on the shelf. They were so far back that spiders had made a little home on one of the bottles. Gross!

For most of the day, I watched my senior citizen hubby crawl in and out of that cabinet under the sink, balancing a flashlight, crescent wrench and other sundry tools. He would back head-first into the shelf and work shirtless with his tools over his head while I stood there trying to figure out which tool he would be needing next. It was the sexiest thing I ever witnessed...or at least that I've witnessed in a long time. And it was fun to work with him on something around the house.

I'll have to remember that as I head into the kitchen and into that cabinet with my lysol and sponge!

A, B, C, D, E,......

I have to laugh...I read an AOL news headline which mentioned Jerry Lewis dropped the "F" bomb during the telethon. Now, I don't know what anyone else would think reading that, but the "F" word making those headlines wasn't the one that came to my mind. A certain minority group is up in arms and I'm sure there will be details at 10:00.

In my day we heard the "F" word in whispers, usually accompanied by giggles as even the explanation of the word didn't make sense to us. We absolutely knew better than to say it in front of grownups. Well, most of us did. One of my relatives asked another of my relatives what it meant and got a knuckle sandwich as an answer. Poor thing...we had to whisper and giggle the answer to that other relative at a later time. But said relative did learn not to mention it in the presence of adults again....ever!

At a party recently, I heard the word used repeatedly by people with no regard as to who was around with listening ears. Ladies, small children...didn't seem to bother anyone. I'm not so old as to feel that eons have passed since I first heard that crude term. But I was a child not so long ago and it pains me to think of how much society has changed in such a short time.

Can you imagine what the language of the streets will be when our grandchildren become parents? Get out the soap before it's too late!!

Cat ~ Without a Dictionary

Every now and again I check out an article on the AOL news that's tickled my fancy. At the end of alot of the articles there's a place to vote your opinion (like anyone in the universe really cares what I think about Britney buzzing her head). Way down below the vote is the place where cyberslugs can offer their opinion about the news item. Again...like anyone cares.

What is funnier to me than their actual comments, which often border on moronic, is their spelling. I read an article years ago about how teachers were abandoning the practice of teaching spelling as correct spelling can interfere with a young student's creative juices. At the time I thought it sounded pretty lame. After reading these posts, I'm guessing that the teachers went ahead with that plan and threw spelling books and lists out the window.

Even with that, you'd think that the writers (and I use that term in the loosest sense) would at least hit the spell check on their computers before they post their comments. I guess if spelling isn't important, why bother to correct it even if you have an "easy" button.

If u ken reed thiz think a teechur.

GREASE ~ You're the One That I Want!!

A friend sent me an email with a warning of the consequences of eating bacon grease...it has a silly picture of someone jiggling around in a fat suit. Does anyone use bacon grease anymore? That was my seasoning of choice all my life. Growing up we had a little silver can with a lid and after frying bacon for breakfast or sandwiches, the grease was never thrown out but saved like gold in the little can to be used in other foods. Seemed like a respectable way to recycle at the time and kept us from having to figure out what to do with a hot pan of grease.

We used it in pinto beans, green beans, squash fried with onions, and just about anything else we cooked in a pan. Everything got a dollop of bacon renderings which rendered the dish more than tasty. I don't ever remember hearing the words "cholesterol" or "nitrates". All I knew was that it tasted great!

When I married in 1971, one of my shower gifts was my own grease can. This one was red (my favorite color) and came with a set of salt and pepper shakers. It must have been the Cadillac of grease holders because it had a strainer. It held its coagulated treasure for nearly 20 years before developing a pinhole. I had to toss it about the same time that Mikey was diagnosed with heart disease. I thought it a curious coincidence.

Today, I still have the salt and pepper shakers, I still have Mikey, he still has heart issues, but the grease is gone. I miss my grease!

Raindrops on Roses, Whiskers on Kittens

Some things are just so enjoyable that they deserve a special place in your heart. One of those things is my Class of 66 email group. Several years ago, one of our enterprising classmates took it upon herself to start an email group of friends who had all graduated from high school together. This wasn't a small feat as our class was the largest to pass through Harlingen High at the time with around 500 students. Of course, there aren't that many who've signed up to be a part, but I think our percentage of participants would be above the norms if there was a place to figure all that out. I'd bet we have about 60 anyway. And whether they ever bother to type in a joke, opinion, or argument, they leave their names on the list. We one giant clique! Our reunions are the best...again thanks to our one special lady. We cruise together as schedules and $$$ permit. We are at the stage where we really appreciate each other's company. Maybe because we can all relax now that we're not worrying about a date for Saturday night.

Lately we've been meandering down memory lane and what a joy that's been. Remembering places we visited, restaurants that served us well, dates with someone special, teachers, hobbies, and escapades that we marvel at surviving...it's all being discussed in short snippets that make for easy reading...and easy laughter. Every class from every school should be as blessed as we are. After reading the latest posts tonite (we're on to our favorite clubs/restaurants in the Mexican border towns), I'm feeling the love. Go Cards!

Lipstuck

I am grappling with a new problem that I think has something to getting older, but I'm not sure. My lips are getting harder and harder to decorate. I don't remember having this problem even a year or so ago. I'm in the bathroom every morning in the world putting on my warpaint and when it comes to my lips, I am not doing one thing differently than I ever did. As long as I'm in the bathroom looking into my magic mirror, I look great!

Let me get out in broad daylight on the way to work and the person looking back at me in the car mirror isn't the same lady I painted up in the bathroom. My lipstick will be below my lip, up over one side of my upper lip, missing one whole little patch (upper and/or lower)...and I don't know why! I can feel my hand firmly gripping the lipstick and covering the appropriate areas. I have no idea why I wind up looking so out of whack. It's not all my makeup, just my lipstick.

I thought it might be my eyes. I just had my glasses redone and it didn't help. I look like a pathetic old lady...or a Lucille Ball wannabe. Maybe I'll think about getting them tattooed.

How Pathetic is This

I just noticed that I hadn't blogged in a month. It's not that I don't have anything to say...believe me, I have plenty to say. It does surprise me that when I get the time to sit and spin, all of the great things that have crossed my mind kept on going...right out of my pretty little head!
I vaguely remember wanting to mention something about illegal immigrants again, but it's gone. Maybe for the best. Then there was an update on my big deal that has had me under it's spell for a half a year. Finally closed, I'll get my $$$ tomorrow, and I'm not near as excited as I thought I would be. Maybe when the check hits the bank. I'll let you know if I break out in a happy dance at my desk. Then there's the grandkids, but how many times can I tell you how cute they are before you quit believing me. Just wait til I figure out how to post pictures here. The class cruise may sail without me, I haven't got my trailer for Sisters On The Fly, and my car still needs a tuneup.
I think its just summer doldrums setting in. Don't worry...something will tickle my fancy here before long. You'll be the first to know!