39 thoughts on “Our Daily Thread 3-9-16”

  2. Very nice photos, Cheryl!
    I love the bird in tall pale grasses shot!

    Not sure how this day is going to work itself out, but it is in God’s hands. The mattress and box springs are suppose to arrive today, sometime. Mary’s funeral service is at a set time. I hope they can both be coordinated so I can be there for each event.

    It was in no way intentional that a mattress and box springs is being delivered on our 31st anniversary. At least not intentional on my part. Maybe God is exercising His divine sense of humor during tax season because we can use something to laugh about right now. Delivery has been delayed for several reasons involving an old phone number among other things. I suppose you could guess that since it is a queen size bed that the Queen B will assume all authority over who sleeps where on it.

    Liked by 3 people

    Reply

  4. Chas, none of those days matter. Well, one of them does; Grandparent’s Day. Mother’s Day has usually brought more anguish into my life than joy. Last year BG was with her father and didn’t even call me on that day. Just after Father’s Day she came home to me. She will graduate from high school in a little over 2 months. Now I want to sit here and cry. Where have the years gone?

    Liked by 3 people

    Reply

  5. Delighted to report that eighteen year old son passed the math portion on the GED. His room has been clean and his attitude has improved. He mingles with the family and offers to help and pitches in frequently. You can tell he knows he is on thin ice. But passing the GED is a huge thing for him as far as confidence. So we continue to watch and he continues to work on the other portions.

    Liked by 11 people

    Reply

  6. Alas, my Hong Kong connection doesn’t appear to be panning out, so I’m unlikely to go there– the day after we expedited our passports!

    We’re expecting a ” monster storm” starting tomorrow. Good days to stay home and write.

    I’ve been totally off the writing for the last two weeks with company, really three, and really need to get back in my groove.

    Hopefully, that will happen today starting about 9:30!

    Liked by 2 people

    Reply

  7. Every day is National Men’s Day in this house! 😛
    Kim I dislike Mother’s Day more than any other….for myself….I enjoy honoring my own Mother and the Mother’s of my grandchildren…but as for me…just leave me alone….let’s just skip the obligatory platitudes and carry on… (that is why is skip town and spend the day with my own Mother….she actually demands that we gush over her 🙂 )

    Liked by 6 people

    Reply

  8. Today’s bird pics are from a walk a couple of weeks ago. At top is a mute swan (its mate was there, too, but not where I could get it in the photo). The water is two different colors because the back part is ice. Mute swans are not native to this country; they were brought over as decorative birds to swim on ponds. But they’re fairly aggressive birds–which is a problem for other birds in some places–and I imagine it’s hard to keep the wings clipped on an adult bird in your pond, so many of them have escaped to the wild and they breed there. This is a wild bird.

    The other one is a sandhill crane. I’m told there are places in the Midwest one can see the birds by the thousands in some seasons, but I’ve only seen them one or a few at a time. My first sighting was four, adults and two adult-sized chicks, since they lay two eggs. This particular bird was the only one of its kind, and it was clacking its beak (a sound that really carried) to call others to join it. We heard it from the next trail over but initially thought it was a woodpecker on a hollow tree, echoing. Then we saw the bird fly, and we went to that trail to get its photo. When they fly, they call in a loud, haunting call different from the clacking, somewhat similar to the call of Canada geese, but wilder. Their feathers start out gray (as shown), but they groom themselves with mud, and over time in some areas (including ours) their feathers get stained brown. As you can see in the photo, unless you see the bird move or you happen to see its red cap, it’s virtually impossible to see it among the grasses. I’m guessing it’s easier when the grass is green, but they’re still “earth tones” and it still wouldn’t jump out at you that there’s a bird in there. It would be pretty cool to see a huge flock someday, though, especially if they are courting.

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

  9. Watching swans glide across a pond is so peaceful….the Broadmoor in the Springs has a lake with many swans…I’ve seen them a time or two….that is a lovely photo Cheryl….

    Like

    Reply

  11. Nancy Jill, we saw a pair of swans at a different location yesterday, and I got a couple photos that show better detail than I’ve gotten yet with a photo of a swan. But I watched them for quite a while, and really got to see why people find them mesmerizing. They’re beautiful anyway, but I hadn’t really realized that you don’t see any “effort” at all when they swim. Yesterday was the first time I got to see them in really open water, as opposed to water that has a lot of reeds in it or water that is mostly ice, so I got to watch them glide.

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

  12. Mother’s Day: I enjoy the cards from the few who choose celebrate it, and don’t worry about the rest. They all have their own love language as they say. I prefer to ignore it.

    Liked by 2 people

    Reply

  14. Nice photos, very peaceful.

    Happy anniversary Janice & Art. I’m sorry there’s a funeral & taxes & furniture deliveries to deal with.

    Every time Janice mentions tax season it reminds me I still have to find all my “stuff” (which I’m not sure I even have, some of it may need downloading from various sites this year) and make my appointment. I always aim to get it done before the end of March and always vow to do it “earlier next year.”

    It’s also property tax season, along with house insurance & car registration … Not my favorite time of year right now. 😦 😦

    And I’m feeling so tired of the work grind this week, wish I could take some time off but I can’t.

    Liked by 2 people

    Reply

  15. We have rain (nothing major) forecast for Friday and Monday, probably just scraps the from Michelle’s monster storm. NoCal continues to steal what was supposed to be our bigger portion of El Nino.

    Like

    Reply

  18. Paul finally finished our taxes last night…it is MY responsibility to ensure all the “stuff” is present and accounted for….oh how I dislike that….he can ALWAYS find something missing….then I am scrambling to find it….in the file, a drawer, a shoebox…it’s somewhere but oh so elusive…
    Happy Anniversary Janice and Art ❤

    Liked by 2 people

    Reply

  22. Donna, I need to remind you again that you should be praising for that rain. We in northern California dutifully send that water to the south. Seeing that aqueduct running down the valley is something.

    Like

    Reply

  24. Unlooked for, but welcome visit with second sibling today. I had to smile because after many years of her being rail thin and worn, she has the bloom of pregnancy. If Aji suun reads this, she will understand why I am so happy for Second. After so many years of heartache and hardship, my sibling has been given the desires of her heart, a husband and now a coming child. When I was in West Africa, I begged the Lord to take care of her, because I was deeply worried about her welfare and I got home just in time to help her prepare for her wedding.

    Happy Anniversary to Janice & Art.

    Liked by 4 people

    Reply

  26. It was a nice memorial service. They did the graveside service in the morning and the memorial later. Since Mary had been a missionary to Japan, two ladies sang Jesus Loves Me in Japanese and then the gathering joined in at the end and sang it in English. There was a lot of special music with violin playing hymns, and very nice solos. She was gifted and so are many in her family. She was our WMU leader and a lot of the girls she trained as GAs (girls missions group) are all grown and they were asked to stand. One is a Young Life missionary overseas.

    Now I am waiting for the bed delivery.

    Liked by 2 people

    Reply

  30. The bed arrived. It is giant. I think they have super sized them in the past 30 years. The mattress is extra thick, with an extra layer on top. This is the I series Serta. Is anyone familiar with it? It seemed to get good reviews. Now I need to get some other new things to fix it up right.

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

  31. Behind on reading comments again. But I’m jumping in to ask our Canadian friends about this, written by a Canadian, about Canada’s Socialism (& supposedly Socialism in general). How accurate is this depiction? (It was referring to redistribution of money, I think.)

    “[T]echnically in Socialism, the government creates bodies of citizens (ministries here in Canada I guess?) who are knowledgable on issues and where there is need and they are able to screen out people who are eligible. And the people vote about this type of process as well. So this way, services are distributed fairly. And so that it’s distributed from a perspective free of bias.

    – Yes. I live in Canada. Thanks for pointing that out. We are a Socialist Country. Just FYI, in our socialist country, if you make over $200k a year, you actually are only taxed 29% against your total income.

    – EVERYONE gets benefits in a Socialist society, not just poor people.”

    Like

    Reply

  32. I’m not sure if they are Serta, but I know both youngest and second siblings got Queen sized mattresses when they got married, and they were huge. I mean thick, about a foot and a half thick, without counting the box spring. The things they had to do to get those mattresses to fit into their tiny first apartments. They actually had to dismantle the stairs in one place in order to get it down the stairs (it had been got up via a window).

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

  33. Karen, I wouldn’t call Canada socialist. We have a welfare program, but then again, so does the U.S., and you don’t call yourselves socialist. We have publicly funded healthcare, but all that the federal government does is gather the money through taxes (if it weren’t taxes, we would be paying health insurance premiums – so same difference) and then distribute an allocated amount to each province. The provincial governments decide which services they will cover with that amount. When a hospital or other healthcare agency performs a service for a patient, they bill the provincial health plan if the patient is covered by that plan (surprisingly, not all who access our healthcare are covered – here, you have to be a resident of the province for six months) or the patient if the service is not covered (for example, cosmetic plastic surgery is something the province does not cover) or a private health insurance plan if the patient has one (employers frequently offer this feature). Unless one is on social assistance or has private health insurance coverage, one pays for one’s own medications – I pay out of pocket for my asthma inhalers. Regulation of healthcare professionals comes – except for a few basic legislated laws, through independent regulating bodies. The College of Nurses which I am registered with prides itself on its self-regulation. There is a federal, as well as provincial and local, public health agency; but then again, that is something the U.S. also has. With the exception of our single payer public health insurance plan, we don’t actually look a lot different in terms of social programs to you. In fact, we have no federal department of education, that is purely a provincial matter.

    Liked by 3 people

    Reply

  36. To address the commenter’s specific points:
    1) Yes, we have various ministries which screen applicants to social programs. Our welfare program is not actually a very cushy thing to be on. I recall being handed a petition by an fervent young university student when I was living in the city; it was to raise the monthly welfare allowance, which then stood at $450 per month, if I remember correctly. I didn’t sign it, since I was living on less than that by sharing an apartment (and thus the rent) and spending about $20 or less on food each week; but I had some sympathy, since it wasn’t easy for me, and there were a few times when I felt that my stomach could stand more food. The welfare program does not have food stamps – I hadn’t heard of the idea outside of WWII until I started reading World’s reports on U.S. social assistance. From what I know from friends on or applying for disability, you have to prove that you have no other assets to live on, as well as the fact that you cannot hold down a job physically, before they will approve you. No they screen pretty thoroughly. Oh sure, there are people who game the system – there always are – but not as many as popular opinion would indicate.

    2) While I do not know the specifics of tax percentages for income levels, if the idea of socialism is to render everyone on the same social strata and income level, Canada is far from that goal. We have some very, very wealthy people in our country, and several family dynasties. It is often said that the province of New Brunswick is practically owned by the Irvings, and the statement isn’t that far off the mark. In short, we have an upper, middle and lower class which is determined by education and income, not birth (unless you were born into one of those dynasties).

    3) The late Conservative government actually demonstrated this statement, by sending out a new bonus child care benefit (there was already a universal child care benefit – my mother got cheques for each of us until we turned 18: http://www.cra-arc.gc.ca/uccb/) to every single family with children under a certain age. The current Liberal Prime Minister campaign against giving the rich such a bonus and said he would keep the bonus, but only for those under a certain income level. Of course, he hasn’t had the opportunity to carry through that promise yet. The child care benefit might be the most socialist program we have got, but it is within a country’s interest to encourage its population to have children.

    Like

    Reply

  38. The problem with these newer thicker mattresses is the sheets don’t fit so well anymore. :-(. We bought mattress garters to keep the bottom sheet in place and then finally bought new sheets.

    Next problem, queen sized bottom sheets stay in place but top sheets aren’t wide enough, so we’re always tussling over the sheet– and sometimes the blanket.

    Then I started buying larger bottom sheets separately and a king size sheet and blanket for the top.

    I think we’re okay, but the mattress is so bulky, I can’t flip it by myself.

    You will be surprised to hear I haven’t broken it yet . . .

    Like

    Reply

Leave a reply to Anonymous Cancel reply