Good Morning!
It’s Friday!!!
On this day in 1520 Portuguese navigator Ferdinand Magellan reached the Pacific Ocean after passing through the South American strait. The strait was named after him.
In 1919 American-born Lady Astor was elected the first female member of the British Parliament.
In 1925 The Grand Ole Opry made its radio debut on station WSM.
And in 1963 President Johnson announced that Cape Canaveral would be renamed Cape Kennedy in honor of his assassinated predecessor. The name was changed back to Cape Canaveral in 1973 by a vote of residents.
______________________________________________
Quote of the Day
“The thankful receiver bears a plentiful harvest.”
William Blake
______________________________________________
Since Thanksgiving is over, it’s officially the start of the Christmas season. Yay!!!!
So the Christmas music starts now, with my personal favorite…. from Never Enough Lights
Now I realize not everyone likes it that loud, so here’s a milder version, from ThePianoGuys
______________________________________________
Wandering Views 
I’ve been to the Y and back. Still first> 😦
It’s Friday! You know what that means?
Things need to start picking up around here. Elvera was up rattling pans at 5 this a.m.
😦 They got through the fourth Day of Christmas before I could get it turned off.
Not many people working out at the Y this morning.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Is that Bosley?
LikeLike
No. I notice Bosley is mostly black.
I can’t keep the cats straight.
I can’t even keep the people straight anymore.
Helen, one of my women at the Y, is going to Florida for the winter.
Three posts already and ain’t nobody here but me.
😦
LikeLike
Mornin’ Chas. 🙂
That’s Mouse. 🙂
A very sleepy Mouse.
Off to the flea/farmers market with Cheryl and ‘Liz. 🙂
The snow is melting! 🙂
LikeLike
Good morning!
LikeLike
Some of us will be working on school work this morning, some on the upstairs portion of the feed shed. By the time these boys are done, we will have the most insulated outbuildings on the planet, but they will have kept busy and learned some skills. Others are going off to coffee with the old guys. Still others will be wandering about the house wondering what to do. I will be with the school crowd.
LikeLike
No snow here, yet. It is not yet winter, you know.
LikeLike
Forgot to tell you that I am going to a college football game today. Go NAVY beat the Jags. We have a pre-game party at Noon–Turkey and Oyster Gumbo –doesn’t sound appetizing, but who am I to complain— then we will walk over to the stadium. .
It will be in the 50’s temp wise so Weatherman P is telling me to dress warmly.
Of course I am sure you know that tomorrow is a State Holiday in Alabama.
LikeLike
It’s a state holiday in South Carolina too.
Big day. Looks like it may be Clemson’s day. I hope not.
That game used to be played on Big Thursday at the state fair in Columbia, in October. But Clemson didn’t want to come to Columbia every time and to lose to Carolina or Clemson in the middle of the football year sorta ended the season. So, like the rest, it’s the last game.
They named it the Palmetto Bowl. That’s official next year.
LikeLike
Loved the Piano Guys. Ogden Nash once wrote: “The trouble with a Kitten is that; It eventually becomes a Cat.
LikeLiked by 1 person
We had a wonderful Thanksgiving service yesterday. One of William Bradford’s descendants, 15 year old Sebastian, played the part of the town crier, ringing a bell and reciting the original call for a Thanksgiving feast. He’s been doing this since he was a little boy and now towers over me. So fun to watch them grow!
We in the choir sang three songs, lots of heart warming stories, including this one.
A pastor had a new kitten and one day that kitten escaped into the yard where it climbed a tall sapling. He couldn’t get it down, the kitten was crying and as he debated what to do–tree not sturdy enough to climb–he got a “brilliant” idea.
He tied a rope to the sapling and the other end to his car, figuring he’d inch the car slowly forward, thus bending the tree until it was low enough he could reach the crying kitten.
You know very well what happened.
At the final inching forward, the rope snapped and the kitten?
He hunted through his neighborhood and couldn’t find it. Went door to door, stopped people on the street. No kitten.
He felt bad, but left it at that.
A couple days later he ran into a neighbor and member of his congregation at the grocery store. A notorious cat hater, he couldn’t help notice she had cat food in her basket. When he asked about it, she shook her head and rolled her eyes.
“My little girl got this idea in her head she wanted a kitten and has been pleading. I kept telling her no until I finally said, ‘if God wants you to have a kitten, he’ll have to send one.'”
“Well,” she continued, “I saw this with my own eyes. My little girl marched out the door and knealt in the back yard to pray. Suddenly, through the sky, paws waving, a kitten flew and landed right in front of her.
“What else could I do? I now have a cat.”
The pastor didn’t say a word, but went home to meditate on how often God brings us things we don’t really want in wants we cannot deny . . .
Happy Thanksgiving. It’s family photo day and we’ll be off soon.
LikeLiked by 6 people
For some perspective on how long this win streak has been, the last time Clemson won in this series:
1.Miley Cyrus was still Hannah Montana;
2.George W. Bush was president;
3.”Breaking Bad”’s Walter White was just a high school chemistry teacher yet to cook anything;
4.Brett Favre was a New York Jet;
5.Chad Morris was coaching high-school football; and
6.Tiger Woods was still winning tournaments and married to Elin.
This week, when you analyze and argue about whether Deshaun Watson should and will play and whether Mike Davis will rebound from his fumble-filled last home game at Williams-Brice Stadium, remember that most likely whether Carolina continues this streak or Clemson stops the bleeding will be decided by the guys creating chaos in the trenches.
That was a comment by Todd Ellis. Former QB whose record Connor Shaw broke.
LikeLike
Great kitten story. And that Mouse is sure a good-looking teenager.
And there’s our rockin’ Carol of the Bells! Woo-hoo. It’s Christmas, alright.
It’s back to work today for me. I have to find a family to interview & write about for the unsolved cases project — my major/long story for that project is turned in, but now we all have to find families to highlight in short “vignette” stories (combined with a video and photos), so it’s really more of an online feature. But they’re due Monday and, since I’m off Monday, today’s the day.
The first case I wanted to do didn’t qualify as it fell outside the date parameters for the project (which spans 2000-10 — my case happened in 2011); the second family I’ve reached out to has yet to get back to me (and this is a particularly bad week to find and connect with people, of course). So I may just have to find a whole new family today and pray I can get it all done in a day.
Anyone going shopping?
Today is Black Friday, but the discount shopping season for Christmas is getting so diffused now (with much of it online and extending for days) that I’m not sure it holds the same meaning as it once did. Still, this is a big weekend for retailers to try to “make” their year. But our office building is next to a large mall and it’s always jam-packed on this day every year, with cars parked even in the very outer reaches of the parking lot.
Always a couple staffers who get stuck with the Black Friday assignment before dawn. One year we had a reporter, a very gifted writer, who wrote the story in the form of a long poem. He somehow made it work — and it set the standard for Black Friday creativity pretty high ever since.
LikeLike
I highly recommend Cracker Barrel pumpkin pie for breakfast.
🙂
Mouse is cute as a cat! I notice her ears look large in this photo. Bosley seems to have grown into her big ears. I was able to get two of her claws trimmed while she napped in my lap last night. Now how many times will it take to do the rest? Does anyone have any suggestions about the best way to go about claw trimming besides making a cat walk on hot coals?
LikeLike
I finished reading Michelle ‘ s story, Yuletide Bride, yesterday. It was a sweet treat for Thanksgiving. I put a question on Goodreads about the story in case anyone has a chance to respond. I still want to do a review, as time permits. I did give it a deserving five star rating.
🙂
☆☆☆☆☆
LikeLiked by 1 person
Welcome to Black Friday. And here is your weekly dose of political “humor”.
I heard part of Herman Cain’s show last week. Evidently some uniformed, racially over-sensitive caller complained about the term “Black Friday”. The poor (insert synonym for an unintelligent person here) thought it was a racial term.
LikeLike
I take Annie Oakley in for her annual check at the vet’s next week, maybe I’ll ask them to trim her nails while she’s there — but I think indoor-outdoor cats generally wear them down pretty effectively, climbing trees and fences like they do.
She loves her indoor cat-scratching posts, too. I’ve been lucky that she hasn’t been a furniture scratcher.
Meanwhile, my dogs really need grooming. …
LikeLike
This is the time of year I avoid radio. I like the Christmas hymns (well, most of them) but cannot stand the tinny-sounding, poorly written secular songs. So I put songs I like on the mp3 and listen to them. I now have my favorite cantata in mp3 (because I converted my LP version). Has anyone ever heard of the Gaither cantata “His Love … Reaching”? <a href=http://www.amazon.com/His-Love-Reaching-Celebration-Gods/dp/B0029LTADQ/ref=sr_1_1?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1417192132&sr=1-1&keywords=His+Love+Reaching+-+A+Celebration+of+God%27s+GiftIt is beautiful.
LikeLike
Oops! I forgot to close the link.
Chas- You mention how long it’s been since Clemson won the “Palmetto Bowl’? Well, imagine those of us who are awaiting Arizona’s first ever trip to the Rose Bowl. The Wildcats have been in the PAC-10 (now 12) since Carter was President and have yet to win the conference outright. They have shared the title before when there was no championship game, but both times the other team got the Rose Bowl since they had beaten the Wildcats.
LikeLike
Janice, I finished reading The Giftwrapped Bride last night. It is my least favorite of all of them. I didn’t like the storyline of families moving west to find husbands for their daughters and the lead female character was very unlikeable for almost the entire book. My favorites so far are Yulletide Bride and The Nutcracker Bride.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I was disappointed to see that siriusxm satellite radio discontinued the pops station (except for online) — they featured the best, classical Christmas music every year, including many of the ancient church pieces. Loved listening to that station leading up to Christmas.
LikeLike
Free on Kindle at Amazon: The Christmas Bus.
LikeLike
A poem for you:
Thanksgiving over, December is coming;
Holiday tunes we soon will be humming.
Too often, though, in the decorating,
We forget the One Whom we are celebrating.
We put out our Santas, reindeer and snowmen;
But not the one thought for the King of all men.
He was born, it is true, to a poor virgin mother.
His birth was announced by angels, like no other.
“Glory to God,” the angels all shouted;
“We have seen it,” the shepherds in town touted.
As wonderful as this baby’s birth was,
The resaon He came is lost in holiday buzz.
Bethlehem’s Child grew up in Judah’s land,
Traveled around with twelve men in his band.
Some thirty years later, on Calvary’s hill, lonely,
Hanging on a tree, few witnesses there only.
He died for us all, victorious over sin!
Eternal life for all men to win!
So, modern people, celbrate as you will.
But do not forget what He did on that hill.
“Repent and believe,” his followers cried;
“It was for our sins, this lonley Man died.”
“Seek the LORD while He yet may be found;
Call upon Him while he is around.”
Then you will go to where a place he prepares
For you with Him forever; without any cares.
PSL 28 November 2014
LikeLiked by 3 people
Great poem to read while listening to the Piano Guys. Great message for today, Peter.
AJ, I appreciate the light show with that house. It reminds me somewhat of the Lazer Light Show at Stone Mountain.
LikeLike
Deals for Christians:
http://www.challies.com/resources/black-friday-cyber-monday-2014-deals-for-christians?utm_content=bufferda913&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=buffer
LikeLike
heading down to the Christmas sale at our store. They fill the back storage area with things they have brought from other places. It is the only day all year that our store is open on a Saturday.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Happy Black Friday! And happy Saturday to you, Jo. 🙂 Enjoy your time at the Christmas sale at your store — hope you find some good deals.
I enjoyed reading about all the Thanksgiving preparations and celebrations shared here the past few days. The quotes of the day yesterday and today, and Psalm 100:4 quoted on yesterday’s prayer thread, were very nice, too.
Adding my gratitude list to the many fine ones shared yesterday on what we are thankful for, these are a few ways I’ve been blessed that come to mind:
~Living in a country where we are free to choose where to worship
~Having the Word of God printed in our language
~Being blessed with God-fearing parents
~Having a husband who provides well for his family
~Having children who get along very well with each other
~Being blessed with praying friends, both locally and worldwide online
And may I say I am grateful for the gift God gave Beethoven as I sit here listening to his “Waldstein” piano sonata? One of my absolute favorites. 🙂
LikeLike
Navy win!
LikeLike
I don’t know, did Navy win?
It’s been a lotta years since I’ve nursed a baby.
(With a bottle, dummy, you know what I mean!)
😆
LikeLike
So much snow fall today that I had to postpone the baby shower, after all that work 😦
Now I have to salvage as much food as I can and transport it all to my work and we’ll have it Tuesday afternoon in the dining at the camp. At least we’ll still have it – maybe more people will be able to be there then.
And I had to cancel lunch with a new friend tomorrow – she was going to come and do a colour consult for my family room and then have lunch with me – the roads are just too bad and mine is the last to be ploughed in the RM.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I like your poem Peter L.
LikeLike
Navy did win. 42 to 40. I messed up. I was all into the game. Now my husband knows I can be Super Fan and keep up with the game. I just don’t do it when I am watching it on TV. I like bring in the stands with other fans. My friend Rob did push ups for each score.
LikeLike
My niece from Idaho–who leaves so early tomorrow we have to leave the house at 6 to get to the airport, in part because of expected heavy RAIN!–is a vet. She examined our miserable tortoiseshell cat who has been the bane of my existence since I picked her out of the humane society litter box 19 years ago (because she was so attractive).
Anyway, the good news? Perfectly healthy for a 19 year old cat.
The niece/vet suggests purchasing special food “for sensitive stomachs,” and that should help the yowling and the throwing up.
I hope so . . .
Totally fun three days. I’m exhausted. Very, very good family reunion and a wonderful time for everyone.
LikeLike
I’m full, just back from my second Thanksgiving feast.
LikeLike
in daylight savings you all were up at this time.
Alas, they sleep on….
LikeLike
Good day, Jo!
LikeLike