by

Our Daily Thread 10-18-14

Good Morning!

Welcome to the Weekend!

On this day in 1685 King Louis XIV of France revoked the Edict of Nantes, which had established the legal toleration of the Protestant population. 

In 1892 the first long-distance telephone line between Chicago, IL, and New York City, NY, was opened. 

In 1929 The Judicial Committee of England’s Privy Council ruled that women were to be considered as persons in Canada. 

And in 1958 the first computer-arranged marriage took place on Art Linkletter’s show. 

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Quote of the Day

“It is not fit the public trusts should be lodged in the hands of any, till they are first proved and found fit for the business they are to be entrusted with.”

Matthew Henry

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Today is Chuck Berry’s birthday.

 Today is also Keith Knudsen’s.

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Anyone have a QoD?

100 thoughts on “Our Daily Thread 10-18-14”

  1. Morning all. Enjoy your Saturday.
    a quiet evening here.
    Maybe we need someone from Hawaii on here so they would be closer to my timezone, or perhaps Africa again?

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  2. Good evening Jo. I slept in today. Right up to 7:00.
    I told you this before, but I used to get up at 5:20 every morning. So, to catch up, I often slept in, to 9:00 on Saturdays. It was the only day available to catch up on sleep.
    And it worked for years.

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  4. Good morning all. Mr. P and I went to his water aerobics instructor’s 70th birthday party last night. My favorite local band was playing. The Modern Elorados . The Birthday Girl and her husband just celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary. It was so nice to see a couple who have danced together most of their lives get out and dance. There were some others it wasn’t so pleasant to watch.
    While we were there I got a message that my Mama Ruth had fallen yesterday and was in ICU with a brain bleed. In a little while I will be getting dressed and heading over to Mobile. You probably remember that her husband, Daddy Jim, died last October. She has been upset that he hasn’t been to see her. She has been confused for a long time, but it is so hard when someone you love in in pain and wants someone who can’t be there. Of course, having been in the room when my grandfather introduced my mother to his mother (who died when he was 4) in his hospital room right before he died, I am comforted and fearful that Mama R WILL tell us her husband is in the room to take her home. Again, I am here to ask you for a peaceful end, if that is what is in store, and healing if it isn’t. It certainly isn’t going to be peaceful between the two sisters when this is all said and done. I love them both. The used to tease each other about which one of them their parents loved most and my final answer was that since I was the youngest and they had to go outside the family to get me–I must be the one they loved most and the most perfect. 🙂

    On a sweeter note, my Baby Girl woke me about 1am and asked me to come get in the bed with her…she was scared. Those nights used to wear me out when she really was a baby/toddler/small child. Now it is something to savor. She fell asleep and I wrapped her in my arms and kissed her head until I fell back to sleep. She is still asleep. Mr. P is still asleep, The dogs and I have made the coffee, checked in with you and now they are resting as well.

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  5. Sorry about another lost love, Kim, but thankful for time with BG.

    We’re off to the UCLA-Cal football game today if my brother ever calls to tell me where to meet them for the tickets . . .

    Afterwards, whether I hear from him or not, we’re driving up into the Berkeley hills for dinner with one of my friends from junior high.

    It’s been amazing to me how many people from my childhood have come out of the woodwork recently to look me up! This one, though, I’ve never lost. We’d exchange letters back in the dark ages in which we happened to be reading the same book at the same time!

    None of these folks are Christians–for that reason, I meet up with them, but at this moment, I’m wondering if they might be distractions from other things?

    Who know? Go Bruins!

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  7. Michelle, people are never distractions from other things. (Not literally “never,” but as a rule, unless people outside the family are distractions from your family, then pretty much never.)

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  8. I don’t exactly know why the brown butter, but I do know this recipe was more flavorful than the other one (the other one had melted butter, but not brown butter). Since they had different amounts of other things (one had brown sugar and molasses, one just white sugar and molasses, one a lot more vanilla), it’s hard to know what the difference was . . . but I suspect that the browned butter somehow richened the flavor.

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  9. If you compare two recipes for cookies, especially for chocolate chip cookies, usually they are virtually identical. The fact that these were so different in ingredients and instructions is what made me try both, and do them at the same time so that we could make a fair comparison. My husband said of both cookies that they are crisp on the outside, but one he found soft inside, one chewy inside; he’s waiting to see how they are over a day or two to state his preference. I personally was hoping the consensus would lean toward the one without the browned butter (since that recipe has two or three steps that are more work), but it seems so far to be the favorite. I may well make it two or three recipes at a time and freeze some dough, as suggested.

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  13. A close church friend of mine (now in Colorado) also appeared to be failing and not expected to live much longer — I posted details on the prayer thread.

    I’m off to visit my friend Norma this morning, she’s still in ICU but is expected to be transitioned to a regular room maybe sometime today. Her pain is lessening and every day there is more improvement as she recovers from what was a very significant surgery.

    Then I’m off to pick up my friend Carol at the assisted living place for lunch. So a full day — and I’m up very early (for a Saturday), but was told 8:30 a.m. would be a good time to arrive at the hospital. There are 3 of us kind of taking turns being with Norma right now, she’s not up to much company — but I talked to the friend who was with her late yesterday afternoon and she said she seems to be doing well, talking more, acting pretty much like her regular cheerful self again. 🙂

    I’m just so glad this ordeal is over with for her — for now, the worst of it anyway. She’s had months of non-stop tests, poking and probing, and it simply just wore her down, both physically and mentally. Now maybe she can finally get home and have some peace again.

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  16. Ugh, just saw where 3 teens were shot and wounded overnight outside the In & Out Burger in town. I’d better get myself out of here before the phone rings and I get asked to work again. …

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  18. “They” means the cookies, any smart alecks who were about to say something.

    I wondered what ones economic standing had to do with cookies being left over for a day or two. And my name is not “aleck”, but I am smart.

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  20. Nice to hear about a rich person on the blog. Now I know who to ask for money. 😉

    I will email a list of things I need to the appropriate person.

    Can’t wait to see that shiny red Ferrari drive up my driveway.

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  21. Oh, Michelle- I don’t think I’ve ever been to a game where bears were playing bears. I hope you can bear it if your team loses. I mean, I wouldn’t want any extreme sadness “bruin” in your life.

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  24. That was hard. She is so confused and didn’t know who I was. I really think she has made up her mind and wants to die.
    I don’t think I am wealthy and I don’t qualify for being poor. I used to think I was firmly middle class, but I’m not so sure about that anymore…so I am not sure what I would be called. Perhaps now I would be a “hanger on”.

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  25. I got a message from one of the team in the Gambia. They are concerned about all the talk of travel bans. Such a ban would affect their ability to travel even though Gambia is not affected by Ebola.

    Macmurray posted this link on Facebook yesterday: http://paradoxuganda.blogspot.ca/2014/10/ebola.html?m=1
    It is written by a family who went through the 2012 Ebola outbreak in Uganda. That outbreak was announced as I prepared to leave for The Gambia. Of course, I knew that Uganda was nowhere near West Africa, so there was no real risk. Nonetheless, when I got so sick in July 2013, I did consider Ebola. However, I recovered 🙂

    When a four-day old infant diagnosed with neonatal sepsis in the clinic in the fall of 2013, one of the employees came and asked me if I knew why the child bled from the nose and mouth before it died. Once again, my first thought was Ebola; but I knew that the chances of a four-day old getting it was slim. I made sure the mother was checked out, but I determined that the bleeding was probably due to the sepsis. Later, in talking to a veteran of the field, she confirmed that diagnosis was correct, as she had a child die in the same way and the post-mortem confirmed that the bleeding was due to overwhelming sepsis [septic shock, from bacterial infection or poisoning, can cause massive internal hemorrhaging].

    I left West Africa just before the current Ebola outbreak in Guinea began in December. If I could, I would go back and help; but health, finances, and education rule that out for now. But my heart is with those who are suffering in this outbreak, or facing the possibility of it showing up in their community.

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  29. Family is off to go check out Donna’s new property. A couple of the boys plan to stay in the area. One wants to be a diesel mechanic and the other wants to be a body mechanic whatever. So they are interested in looking at some land.

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  31. It can get rather ugly if you overcook it at first. I don’t microwave it. Instead, I try to remember to thaw it for a couple of hours, then steam it with some lemon juice and water, add some salt and pepper or whatever, maybe some cheddar cheese. Today, I mixed it with baked beans, that was good.

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  32. Jo, do you have lemon pepper? drizzle some olive oil on the broccoli and season it with some lemon pepper. I sounds odd but sliced green olives work really well with broccoli

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  35. Broccoli. Very healthy for us. 🙂 I like it raw in salads, but also have had it steamed though I need to add a little cheese to make it palpable.

    Spent many hours in the ICU with Norma today — she was in a down mood when I arrived, but gradually perked up. she slept off and on, I sat in the back of the room by the window reading.

    Another friend arrived at around 1, and about 2 hours after that a doctor came in the say she was being (finally) moved into a regular room later in the day. Yay. They have been waiting for her body to kickstart enough on its own apparently.

    Norma’s rather frugal and she told the doctor “Be sure to bring my food with me” — she didn’t finish her lunch earlier in the day and had requested that the nurse save what won’t eaten & put the leftovers in a refrigerator for later.

    “Oh, I think we’ll be able to give you some new food,” the doctor replied.

    She’s pretty whipped but seems to be on the road to recovery, though it’ll likely be a long one. And her mood seemed to improve, she became more positive later in the day.

    I think I’ve mentioned how thin she’s become, I’ve worried about this for a couple years now. The surgeon actually called her malnourished and said that needs to be addressed. You can see her ribs and some of her other bones right through the skin, she must eat like a bird. She’s almost 6 feet tall but probably weighs around 100 pounds.

    So there needs to be a plan when she goes home for getting some good food into her (she lives alone and doesn’t seem to cook). Maybe she’d be willing to hire someone to come in and cook for her a few times a week? The church will bring her meals, but our guess is she’ll not want that to go on forever, she’s very independent.

    She kept complaining during the hospital meals she was given today while I was there that they were giving her “way” too much food (and, trust me, these were tiny cup portions of things). I encouraged her to think of it as medicine — these are the vitamins and nutrients that she needs to be getting into her body and that seemed to help encourage her to try to eat a bit more.

    She’s never traveled but somewhere along the way she became intrigued with Japan through watching television travelogues. The Japanese have the right idea, she told me today. They just snack on little bits of food, they don’t eat big meals like this.

    Um, big meals? A small crock of pea soup, tiny cups of pudding and custard, and a small glass of juice?

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  36. Continue to make progress on the firewood pile. The older ones want to use the hydraulic splitter but I insist upon doing it myself, though they are welcome to help me if I don’t have to hear how much quicker it would be with the splitter. It is not like I have some place to go. I have the time. And seven year old helps me. It gives us time to talk about important things, like the types of wood, and the birds, and the insects, and the bark. Today we laughed at the turkeys who flew up on the wood shed to watch us work. She stacks while i split. And today, the thirteen year old girl asked what yard work she could do so I put her to taking down the tomato garden. Then she came over and stacked bark for me. She hopes to show pigs in 4H next year so she has taken over the feeding and care of the pigs still here. I like my life.

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  38. I don’t know Cheryl — but cheese seems to help most anything. Broccoli is a bit like eating a piece of shrub from the front yard anyway.

    So the 3 teens shot late last night happened after the bit homecoming football game a few blocks from my house and featured two teams that are intense rivals. I guess some 500 kids had gathered at the In ‘n Out Burger after the game and some other kid drove by, said something (police said it was gang related) and shot 3 of them. One is in critical condition but they’re all expected to survive. No suspect arrested yet but the kid was described as Latino & wearing a red hoodie.

    My editor texted me about covering it last night but I missed the text — thankfully I’d already gone to bed (though I do remember the phone chirping by my bedside).

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  41. Wow, Norma sure does sound very thin, Donna. I hope she’ll be able to gain weight and build up some reserves. It’s encouraging that she has progressed to moving out of the ICU, though.

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  43. 6 arrows, yes, for the past couple years I’ve noticed her becoming just thinner and thinner. She’s always been tall and thin, that’s her natural build. But she’s just way, way too thin now. I’ve wondered if her doctors have ever mentioned it to her, sometimes I’m afraid everyone’s so overly focused on the obesity problems in our country that they overlook those whose health is compromised by being underweight ?

    But I’m glad the surgeon has pointed it out.

    Maybe a grocery home delivery system might help, too (Amazon or stores that offer deliveries) — so she at least gets some fresh produce, which I doubt she normally buys.

    I’ve suggested smoothies as a way to get some more nutrition (she doesn’t have a blender, but that would be easy enough to supply) — you can throw so many good things in those, including fresh or frozen fruits, vegetables, juice, yogurt, milk, protein powder. And it might be easier for her to drink one of those than eating the comparable amount in unblended foods.

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  44. Donna, I wonder about that, too, whether obesity is so much on everyone’s minds, that underweight is overlooked. I asked my doctor about whether he thought my weight was too low for my height and build (I’m 5’8″ and small-boned, and from charts I’ve seen, a woman of that build would ideally weigh something like 128-139, I think it said), but when I saw my doctor about a year and a half ago, I was around 115. He wasn’t concerned by that, as long as I felt well, and I have been healthier in the last five years since eliminating gluten from my diet than I ever was before. I hardly ever get sick anymore.

    But it still is kind of worrisome to me to be that low (actually lower yet now), because I see all kinds of women around me getting cancer, and I’m afraid that if I ever got that, I wouldn’t have any reserves to battle it. I feel mostly pretty good, but I can see from recent pictures of myself that I look a lot worse than I did when I weighed about 15 or 20 pounds more than I do now.

    A friend of mine at church, a cancer survivor, asks me nearly every week how I’m feeling. I know she worries about me, but her face lights up when I have good news for her (I’ve gained five pounds so far this year, and the middle digit of my weight is no longer a zero).

    But there’s always this little, gnawing voice in the back of mind saying that something must be wrong to be that low, even though I’ve almost always been thin, and that feeling good is maybe not enough.

    Maybe I should run it by my doctor again, although I’d rather spend money on food than an office visit, and my doctor probably wouldn’t think my present weight is a problem, anyway, since nothing else has fundamentally changed, I don’t think. (My doctor’s pretty skinny, too, so that might be a factor in his not having been too concerned in the past.)

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  46. I’m told that as the surgeon was mentioning the weight issue to a couple of Norma’s friends following the surgery, he said something to them like “You’re thin, you’re almost skinny — but she’s malnourished.”

    Her one friend told me today she thought her normal weight was around 125-130. So she’s always been rail thin, but not like she’s been in the past couple years. And watching her pick at her food today (and hearing her complain about how much food it was) made me realize she must be eating next to nothing at home, too.

    I think sometimes older people who live alone can fall into that as their appetite declines. So they wind up eating a few crackers — maybe a frozen dinner on a big day — and not thinking too much about it. I’m thinking it’s also maybe related to avoiding too many grocery store trips. I’m sure that becomes more difficult, especially with lots of heavy bags. But she’s pretty resistant to help. Still, I’m hoping there will be enough help offered during this long recovery time that she’ll become more accustomed to accepting it in the future.

    I do think this recovery will be a long road (in part due to her weight). Oh, and her other friend told me today that it would be really great if they could set her up with a nutritionist and dietician, so maybe that will happen before she leaves the hospital and rehab.

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  48. I’ve had a friend or two offer me the same. 😉

    A nutritionist or dietician for Norma would probably be a good idea, although we frugal people can sometimes be a little stubborn about spending more money to pay for those services, as valuable as they may be. 🙂

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  53. Glad you had a good time, Rickyweaver.

    Morning, Chas. Happy Birthday to Elvera! I hope y’all have a lovely day together today!

    Well–we’ve had a great time together! We’ve talked incessantly. We stayed in our jammies yesterday until 1:00, ate lunch, talked more til six, then headed into town for dinner. We stayed up til midnight last night, talking. This trip has been good for my soul. I wish we lived closer to each other.

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  55. I think it is easy to eat improperly when you are alone. Especially, if you do not like to cook. Food can seem overwhelmingly expensive, too, for someone on a fixed income.

    Then there is the problem of alcohol with some older people. They tend to drink their calories and thus, end up undernourished.

    The type of body you are born with, though, determines a lot. As long as you are eating WELL and feeling good, I would not worry about it.

    We are all so encouraged towards ‘normal’ these days. Too much, IMO.

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  56. Norma’s a retired public school teacher & is, of course, also on Medicare now — I do think she has good medical coverage. So I’m hoping that a nutritionist, on the recommendation of her doctors, would be approved and covered (though maybe not with ongoing consultations, but at least with a few up front before she leaves the rehab to get her started in taking better care of herself). Especially when people become sick, it’s so important to have some “reserves” — she’s got nothing extra to draw on (and I’m sure she will have lost even more weight after this lengthy hospital stay).

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  57. She wanted to go to Cracker Barrel, so that’s where we went.
    They sell stuff there that you see nowhere else.
    I didn’t know they still made Goo Goo’s and Moon Pies.
    They had a letter to Santa that said, ” Santa, for Christmas this year, I want a large bank account and a thin figure. And don’t reverse it like you did last year.”

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  64. I am able to be back on here. For some reason Web Guard, a T- Mobile feature, would not give access to the blog. My son said Web Guard gets over reactive at times.

    Husband is still doing okay. I am very tired. We got up at 5 a.m. to get son to the airport. I went back to bed after that and woke up around noon. No church today for me unless I go for the evening.

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  65. How about Meals on Wheels, Donna? My dad had it for awhile, so I know it was (once) available in your town. He was always afraid he wouldn’t get enough to eat once my mother died, and while he went out to lunch most days and made his own egg for breakfast, somehow dinner didn’t seem possible.

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  66. Had a terrific time at the football game. Wonderful seats, the great band wars (I actually marched up the hill behind the Cal band, my husband laughing, because it’s so much fun), fun conversation.

    UCLA clinched the game with 51 seconds to go with an interception on the 2 yard line! A UCLA grad sat behind me, and we high-fived each other, otherwise I tried to be polite. 36-34. I love a high scoring game.

    Only problem was, I was so bushed from all day at the stadium, I fell asleep at dinner with friends at 8:30. I’m still pretty tired . . .

    After we take down the beans, pumpkin and cucumber fines and trellis today, I’m just going to sit and read!

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  67. Did pick up a copy of White Christmas Brides at Walmart yesterday. It’s four of these 12 Brides of Christmas stories combined into a package for Walmart this Christmas.

    If you want to read any of these 12 Brides of Christmas stories and have an ereader, but the four for 99 cents for your ereader. Much more economical.

    My story is The Yuletide Bride and while you can pre-order it now (thank you, Kim), it won’t be released to you ebook until November 4.

    I’m trying to work up some publicity now. For those who haven’t seen this on FB, here’s the video I made about trying to play the bagpipes (just like a character in my story):

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  69. The happy hubs just sent a message that they had docked the boat. He spent the day Gulf fishing. They caught two and lost two, but said it was a great day to be on the water.

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  70. Thanks anyhow Kim. You had me watching that twice.
    The guy is correct in that RC Cola and Moon Pie go together perfectly.
    However, Nobody drinks Coke or Pepsi with a Moon Pie if RC is around.
    And no drink tastes better from a can.
    Guy has to be a Yankee.

    When I opened the link, I thought he was going to sing the song about “RC Cola and a Moon Pie, & singing Maple on the Hill” (“Maple on the Hill” is an old country/blue grass favorite from eons ago.)

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  72. All right, another mama initiation moment behind me. Just had my first session as passenger with a daughter-with-a-permit behind the wheel. She did well; she has been going with my husband for a while, but today it was my turn. (He was busy with computer issues for the other kid.)

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  73. Cheryl: My eldest is fifteen. She is going to take drivers ed. online in the Spring. Then, we will commence with the driving. In Texas, they must document 30 driving hours with mom or dad. I’m dreading it. She is allowed to drive the Polaris at the ranch and does pretty well–but traffic is fierce and drivers are aggressive in Houston.

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  74. But, I must admit, I can’t wait for her to have a license. I’m so tired of being her chauffeur. We will get her a used car for her birthday next September–so it won’t be too much longer–hooray!!! Then she can take herself to all her riding lessons… That’s what I’m most excited about not having to do.

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  75. I’m waiting for the dishwasher to finish so I can turn off the water and head home. I had a fabulous time with Shawna. But, my little one misses me and I’m ready to see my family again.

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  76. Cheryl- I survived four 15 year olds learning to drive.

    Michelle- Bagpipes? I’ll have to watch that video at school where the download speed is fast enough for videos.

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  78. Chas, Cracker Barrel is one of the restaurants I miss when we are home. I love their French toast with blackberry sauce. It is too much too eat with the eggs and bacon, but I usually have someone around who will take one or two off my plate. 🙂

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  79. michelle, I was thinking about Meals on Wheels also, I’m sure a few of us will be brainstorming this at some point when it’s closer for her to come home.

    I found a cute picture frame today at Tuesday Morning (anyone have those stores where they are?) — Maybe 1-2 years ago I’d snapped a photo of Norma’s orange cat sitting outside her house. I was in the Jeep waiting for Norma to come out (we were on our way to church) when Sunshine (the cat’s name) struck such a cute pose, sitting right next to her bright red geraniums and a red wooden lawn chair in the garden. So I sent it to CVS last night and picked up the prints after church today (I wasn’t sure if it would look better as a 4×6 or a 5×7 — the smaller one is better, it was my phone camera with a zoom so it’s not the sharpest shot ever taken).

    But now that she’s in a regular hospital room, I figured it might be nice to bring a photo of her beloved cat so she can have something from home in a way.

    Happy Birthday Elvera!

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  82. Peter, Congratulations on your football prediction victory. TRW was pleased with his 2nd place finish. We are at Reagan National awaiting our flight to Dallas. We love Virginia but there is no place like home.

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  83. Good thoughts in your 9:49, Kathaleena. I do mostly feel pretty good, and I try to eat well, but slip up once in a while. 😉

    Enjoyed the bagpipes video, Michelle. 😉

    Cheryl, it was not too long ago I had the same mama-initiation into the world of passenger with a driver with a permit. My husband had always been the one to take 1st and 2nd Arrows out to practice, but he’s more busy now than he was in those days, and 3rd Arrow, our latest driver with a permit, has an organization where she volunteers once a week, which meets during hubby’s work hours, so I now have the opportunity to ride with her. Kind of interesting, since her volunteer opportunity is in a city that is about five times as large as the town in which we live, and we’re often rolling into town between 4:00 and 4:30, when a lot of people are leaving work. Leaving town a little before 6:00 pm is not nearly as bad, traffic-wise.

    Peter (5:41), I thought the header picture looked like a Midwestern scene, too.

    Donna, that sounds like a nice photo of Norma’s cat that I’ll bet she’ll appreciate having in her hospital room.

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  85. Today’s sermon was based on Moses and the burning bush and the names of God. I did not realize that when LORD is typed all caps in the Bible it has a different meaning than Lord and God. I didn’t even realize that sometimes LORD is in all caps and sometimes not – unobservant? Yes, I am.

    God – Elohim – Strong Creator God
    LORD – YHWH (Yahweh/Jehovah) – Self-existent One who reveals Himself to us
    Lord – Adonai – The master of a slave or headship

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  86. Our sermon today was on the parable of the man with two sons who were to work in the vineyard, the one in which one son initially refused, but then repented and went, and the other said he would but then did not. (Matthew 21:28-32) I appreciated how the pastor also examined the wider context of the chapter, in which Jesus had been addressing the religious leaders in the temple, who were challenging Jesus’ authority (verse 23).

    Lots of good points on how we are sometimes so concerned with presenting just the right image, but fail to look into our own hearts or care about obedience.

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  87. The best part about sitting in the passenger seat is the full aerobic workout your heart gets . . . Like Peter, I survived it four times, but I’m not sure how!

    In LA, Ann, my brother took the kids out on the freeway at 7am Sunday mornings–the only time they are relatively empty.

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  88. I’m reading a book I just got from the library on Friday. It is called Growing Up Social: Raising Relational Kids in a Screen-driven World. Lots of good thoughts on facilitating healthy relationships, especially within the family, without a dependence on tech.

    It’s a good read at this time, as we recently made the move to cut back on the children’s screen time. (You may recall I asked your opinion on a gradual reduction vs. a cold-turkey reduction.)

    Anyway, we cut back quite significantly, and things went quite well for a while. Then I let my guard down, and things started heading back to where they were. So I’m redoubling my efforts, and reading this book is a good motivator, and has lots of wonderful ideas and encouragement to increase face time and enhance relationships, deepening them by being intentional and attentive.

    I think (no, I know) I need this book as much as the children do.

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  89. Trying to catch up on this weekend’s comments (I don’t read them all at once, though), but I’m popping in to ask our California friends a question.

    Just saw a poster on Facebook saying…

    “California Raises Taxes on the Rich.
    5th Highest Job Growth, & First Budget Surplus in a Decade.”

    How accurate is that?

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  92. Good Sunday evening….
    Paul and I took a mini get a way Friday and returned yesterday evening. We went to Leadville…the weather is so amazing in CO right now. We hiked a bit, visited the terribly overpriced antique shoppe, sat at our favorite coffee shoppe in the morning, had dinner at the popular local restaurant down from the hotel, then visited with our favorite artist/sculptor, Ted…he is 88 and never ever runs out of new stories to tell…what a delightful man..always a treat to sit and chat with him.
    We stay in a “downtown” hotel built in 1886 …a step back in time for certain when you cross the threshold! But, it is good to be home.
    Church was good…fellowship (and food…it is a Baptist church after all) afterwards at our SS teacher’s home…a good day.
    We have a Tuesday Morning here…much to my husband’s dismay. It happens to be right next to the antique shoppe where I once worked…so when I go there…I must stop in to see what my friends have gotten in at the antique shoppe…!
    Happy Birthday to Elvera…

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  93. Winding down for the night, I was sitting in a recliner in our basement family room, alone in the dark, except for the light from the computer screen from about 15 feet behind me, where the live stream from Classical MPR was playing softly a lovely, peaceful work I’d never heard before.

    If you’re here with insomnia tonight, or you just want to listen to a soothing piece of music for clarinet and piano, this is for you.

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  98. Karen, he is saying that jobs are probably “growing” less, that there are fewer of them. That post fits Democrat talking points to a tee, but it doesn’t match up with the reality of how things work, or what we hear from California.

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