77 thoughts on “Our Daily Thread 10-3-16”

  2. I remember the Road Runner and Wiley Coyote. But I don’t remember no anvil.
    I remember most them running off a cliff, then running back.
    It got old after a while.
    I’m surprised that anyone else here is old enough to remember that.
    It was way back in the last century.

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  6. Morning Chas.
    I feel like I am in a pickle. Very frustrated and trying to be prayerful and not cry.
    Please pray for wisdom. Not sure what to do. Now it feels like I am being threatened if I don’t meet, they will call me on the carpet or something.
    Trying to say enough to let you all know that I am desperate for prayer, but not to say too much.

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  8. I’m praying for you Jo. But I don’t know what about. God knows.
    Is it that you don’t want to meet someone?

    TSWITW bought a coffee cup at Cracker Barrel yesterday.
    We have a set of cups we never use.
    I have a Carolina Alumni cup that is “my cup”
    She has one with Mickey Mouse ears that she doesn’t use specifically.

    So? She bought herself a coffee cup. It has a butterfly and says. “Life is fragile, handle with prayer.”
    What happened is that my sister and her “husband” came down from Maryland to visit. They stayed overnight. Elvera and I went to SS and church and came home and took them to “breakfast” as they went on their way. That’s what we were doing at Cracker Barrel. I chose that because it’s on I-40.
    When we left our house, they didn’t know if they were going to Birmingham to visit a cousin or to Monck’s Corner, SC to visit his son. When they left Cracker Barrel, they headed west on I-40 to the Smokey Mountains. That’s the way to travel.

    When I hugged and said “goodbye” to my sister, I had a feeling I would never see her again.
    She is 84 and the two of them are in bad health.
    They aren’t married. They are taking care of each other. Kurt used to be her boss at work. They were also friends. And when Kurt’s wife was dying of cancer, Vel promised his wife she would take care of him.. Sister was a widow since 1992. They need each other for different reasons. He needs someone to care for him. She needs a place to live.
    I have no idea what will happen when one of them dies.

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  9. I’m done with my book–except, as with everything to do with this story, one more bit of excitement.

    On Friday, I said to my husband, “maybe I should go to England for the week of the election and do some final hunting for photos and a little bit of genealogy, take some photos and draw the line. Done.”

    He looked at me with a patient, humor-the-wife look. “Where would you go?”

    I reeled off my list.

    “It’s a wild goose chase, but if you want a trip to England, go.”

    He didn’t really want to go, but I could take a friend.

    I agreed with him. Extravagant to go for very little chance of finding anything except maybe a photo of her house in Muswell Hill and Oxford.

    “But, Lord, where did this idea come from so late in the game?” I shook my head. I have things to do in November.

    (I always have things to do).

    On Saturday, I learned the (to me unknown) son of Biddy’s close friend Eva, is still alive and “has all his marbles at 91.” His son wrote. This morning I just learned he wants to talk to me. He is a retired Canon in the Church of England and never goes far without a copy of Utmost.

    His son, my contact, who forgot I wrote him in August, is now scanning letters and hunting in the attic for photos.

    Son suggests a phone call and mentions how tricky it is with the photos to recognize anyone.

    Husband isn’t up yet, but yesterday said, “maybe you should go to England.”

    Laughing, laughing, laughing. See why this book has been so much fun?

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  10. Chas, are you one of those people who actually went to the school whose team you enthusiastically support. I came closer than Hubby. I went to UAB which has the word “Alabama” in the name.Hubby went to Montevallo, miles from Auburn and sounds nothing like it.

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  11. KBells, I graduated from U. of South Carolina in 1857
    I got a Masters from Purdue in 1972.
    I graduated from the Naval War College in 1979. Rear Adm James Stockdale was president of the NWC at the time.
    I have also taken classes, but have no allegiance to American International College in Springfield Mass. TCU in Fort Worth, and George Washington U. in Washington. My wife took classes, off campus, from U. of Virginia. No allegiance.
    I am a Gamecock and Boilermaker. I am a fan of each because I attended their games..

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  12. If I had permission to go to England without Hubby and The Kid, I’d snap it up. Neither are History buffs and would whine through every castle and Cathedral. Go, Michelle go. In the meantime, I’m trying to figure out how to go to Sam’s’ by myself.

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  14. I’ve never attended an Alabama game. The tickets are hard to get and expensive. 70% of the state wants them. I went to one Auburn game when Hubby and I were dating. If that didn’t prove my love, what will..

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  15. Lots of chatter here for so early! I am thankful it is another Monday morning, and Art is sleeping late. I know he will soon be in the office working on extensions due on the 15th, but for today he is here, and I am here. Maybe I will start going back into the office soon, too. One day when Miss Bosley is older and more settled, she could go to the office with us as long as she stays clear of Max, the Mini-Pin dog. People entering the office would surely mistake it for a veterinary clinic! 🙂

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  18. I don’t know how I forgot that I graduated from Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in 2962. Elvera says, “Then how come you don’t know nothing?”
    I keep encountering things I don’t know.
    For instance, I don’t know how to pick winners in a football pool.

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  19. I hope the trip to England works out for you in continuing your research, Michelle! That is wonderful 🙂

    Donna, it was so interesting to hear how you got connected with Carol. You could write a story for Guideposts or something to share that. I have heard of such things, such sacrificial Christian giving, but not known of anyone who personally followed through on it for so many years.

    Jo, I will earnestly pray for your peace and settlement of whatever the issue may be. May you feel the bubbling up of the joy of the Lord despite the distress you feel. May you recognize opportunity to give Him glory through this trial and refining.

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  22. I usually proof read before I hit “enter”, but don’t catch everything. I know everyone understands typos and usually don’t correct them unless it makes a difference.
    For instance, sister’s husband died in 1982, not 1992 like I said. I didn’t correct it because it makes no practical difference.

    I came here to say,: I am reading Luke 15, the Prodigal Son. You know, of course, that the parable is really about the older son. But preaching is about the younger. I remember that a radio preacher in Virginia, commenting on the father, said, “And his father drank his coffee at the door.” I picture that every time I read this. “Maybe today.”
    You don’t know it, but after my original sign on comments here, I usually go for breakfast. When I return, I usually have my coffee with me. I drink juice with my breakfast and have my coffee while I’m chatting. And then I plan my day.

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  23. Michelle, there is so little real information on Biddy, you are making this trip for all of us so that we can know her better. That fellow sounds like one of the last who can give you personal information.
    Yes, I am up late.
    Goodnight, Chas. 🙂

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  24. Tickets to the Carolina and Purdue games were “free” too. We paid for them when we registered. They didn’t ask us if we wanted them.

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  28. Chas, I of all people, should not make comments about typos. I knew what happened, but it made me think of that film title, “Back to the Future.” I had never seen anything that lined up so well with that title. You might not know of that movie so I hope I did not hit on a sensitive area with my comment. If I did I apologize.

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  29. Chas, the last time I saw my sister-in-law, we both knew she was dying, and when I hugged her goodbye we held each other a long time. Neither of us said anything, but we both knew “that was it.” The last time I saw my brother-in-law, he was young and healthy, 45 years old. He and my sister had decided a couple of years before that men should only hug men, women only women, unless they were “immediate family.” So if I had been his actual sister, he could have hugged me, but as his sister-in-law, he stopped hugging me, didn’t even hug me on my wedding day. My husband and I drove down to see them a year and a half after we married, stayed about 24 hours. Two or three months later he was dead. We had no clue. But as we were walking out the door, he suddenly hugged me. My sister had him say something to her a couple months later that scared her, making her wonder if he knew he was dying, and I can’t help but wonder if that hug to me was the same thing–he knew, or suspected, he would never see me again on this earth, and the concept that I wasn’t close enough family to hug suddenly seemed as silly as it was. (They were married 17 years, had dated for four. I’d come to be mother’s helper for each of their five children, their house fire, and more. I was a sister to him and not just to her.) Whether he knew or not, I’m glad for that spontaneous final hug.

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  31. Art and I saw rwo Japanese animated movies, Spirited Away and Only Yesterday. Now the movie Only Yesterday is my absolute favorite animated movie. It is based more on realism than the typical animated film, has beautiful landscape scenes, and is meant for an older audience, middle school and up since the main character is twenty-seven and keeps going back in her mind to what happened when she was a fifth grade student. It is an older movie, but wonderful. Spirited Away is great, too, and probably more well known of the two. It is much more based on fantasy and appeals to younger as well as older people.

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  32. Someone has asked to meet with me on Skype. I have never used Skype. I’m thinking it is easy to set up and free to use? The person does not live too far away so I may suggest meeting part way between us. She is someone, another attendee, I met at the writer’s conference.

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  33. Bosses Day is October 17th. Does anyone have plans to do anything special?

    Miss Bosley is our household boss. I may try to think of a special treat for her.

    Again this a.m. she threw up a bit of her food. It was near the basket filled with dirty clothes, etc., to be washed. Art saw Miss Bosley go to the basket and retrieve a cloth dinner napkin (I think someone had knocked it down from our linen closet since I don’t use them), and she took the napkin and covered her throw up like a fine lady would do. Art was very amused. She is such good comic relief.

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  35. KBells @ 9:29 doesn’t know many people! 😆

    I turned on the heat for the first time this morning. I didn’t really need it but it was 62 outside and I wanted to be sure it worked. 72 in here.
    I don’t know where the furnace is in this house! Judging from the piping, I presume it is UNCER THE HOUSE!~. That should be ok, except when it needs work. I have had to add after market humidifier to every house I’ve ever owned, starting with the first one I bought in 1965. (That date is correct.) I will itch all winter without it. No problems in the past. I can see a big problem here.
    We’ll see.
    I see where I change the furnace filter. It isn’t at the furnace. It wasn’t in Hendersonville either. I had three filters there, only one here.

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  37. My heater is under the house and it hasn’t had to be turned on yet (although it’s finally getting down into the low 60s at night, thankfully). It’s so hard to sleep well when it’s warm and barely cools off from the day.

    I’m trying to get a second wind of enthusiasm for the things I’m trying to get done to the house, but it’s hard. And it’s October already. My link to finding affordable, reliable labor has a new job and seems no longer very available, which is understandable. Jobs come first and I don’t want to bug him.

    Beautiful header photo!

    And running away to England for the election week sounds like the perfect plan, Michelle. 🙂

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  39. Our furnace has been on for a while now…my daughter was visiting yesterday and she was freezing…she says it is much colder here than it is in town…as she snuggles under a heavy furry blanket on the sofa!! 🙂
    The trees up in the mountains are in their full Autumn glory……we are going to spend a couple days hiking and take in all the beauty while it lasts!

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  40. Michelle doesn’t need to answer this one. 🙂 But does anyone have any experience with stackable washer/dryer units — or with those new one-machine-does-it-all versions?

    I have space issues and will be replacing my 30+ year old washer/dryer at some point, trying to figure out how to make more room in the laundry alcove. If I go stackable, I would have room to do a vertical storage unit next to it (as opposed to the 2-shelf horizontal arrangement I have now).

    Also, I have a gas dryer & most of these new sets are electric dryers. Being single, I don’t do a ton of laundry — maybe 1-2 loads a week, usually just one. Sounds like electric might be more expensive to operate, but that’s mostly for those with a lot of laundry needs, I think?

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  41. Speaking of the election. I watched a video on some Irish people commenting on the debate. They were pretty snide about it and and I’m like, “How long has it been since you all were blowing each other up over politics”.

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  42. Everyone I know who has had a stackable washer/dryer–which does not include me–has liked them very much. Cost of gas will continue to go down in the US for the rest of your lifetime, says the guy who just returned from an energy conference.

    (Note: none of this information is mine, so you’re safe.)

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  43. I had a stackable once, about thirty years ago. Seemed fine to me. Took up little space. I understand ours are stackable but are not stacked, they are big.

    If space is a concern, you could take a washboard down into the canyon, there is probably a creek down there somewhere. And then a string across the backyard would dry them.

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  44. The header photo is a monarch, the one I saw a little while before the viceroy that was a header one day last week, when I saw the two butterflies back to back and could judge that yes, the viceroy is smaller in addition to having the curved line on its hindwings. I don’t remember what flower this one is on, but I think it is an interesting variety. It starts out with petals and then loses them over time, so it just has those knobby center pieces after a while. (Can you tell I’m not a botanist?)

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  45. We have used a stackable at our timeshare. It seems to work fine for small loads. I typically do larger loads at home, but a stackable would probably be good for us at this stage. Sometimes carrying heavy loads of wet clothes out to the dryer is a strain on weak and sometimes hurting joints.

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  48. Good afternoon, or morning or evening, as the case may be.

    Old business from Friday night:

    And here I thought we were talking about a seventh arrow.

    I guess my post did make it sound like a hint in that direction, especially with the “we won’t know for sure for maybe another week or two…” part. 😉

    I’m about 99.9% sure there won’t be any more bio arrows. (Although there is Sarah to consider…)

    Adoptive arrows someday? Probably not, but I won’t entirely rule that out…

    I wonder if the dog parks in our neck of the woods are as cold as the ones in LA.

    I wonder that, too. 🙂 I might just get us a dog, take him/her to a local dog park, then plan a road trip to LA. DJ can take us to her dog park, and we can chat about Cowboy, Tess and Arrow Family Dog as we huddle in our parkas or bask in the sun or whatever conditions we might find. 😉

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  49. DJ do you mean full size washer/dry that the dryer can be stacked on top of the washer? We have front loader full size washer/dryer and in the old house they were stacked in our laundry closet which gave us handy space next to them for hamper, shelves for detergent and such. I have a laundry room in this house so they are now side by side.
    We once rented a ranch house in Oregon for a week and they had one of those one unit types…I cannot recall the make of it, but did it ever work nicely. You didn’t have to do small loads either…the drum of the washer was quite roomy as was the one in the dryer. I used it about three times while there and was convinced I would one day get one of those units!

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  51. I met Neville Marriner in the 80’s while in college. He came and spoke to our music department staff and students while I was a music major. I wish I had been more of the classical music fan then that I am now. Though I’d had lots of years of classical music training by then, I was still heavily influenced by my favorite type of music in those years — rock. I did not appreciate the privilege of meeting him then as I would have now in my post-college years. There are lots of questions I would have wanted to ask him, now that I know a lot more about him and have a much deeper appreciation of the kind of work he did.

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  52. From the Amadeus soundtrack, a piece we sang in college choir after the movie came out, a movie which was all the rage in the music department at that time. 🙂

    This piece, and the one following, are from Mozart’s Requiem.

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  53. Oops, looks like it’s going to start at the beginning of the 20-piece playlist. “Confutatis” and “Lacrimosa” are the songs we sang in college, and they are 18th and 19th on this playlist. In the meanwhile, enjoy the symphony. 🙂

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  54. Let’s call this Music Monday — better than ordinary Monday, right? 😉

    This Saturday night is the duet concert in which I’m performing. I am excited, as always! Third Arrow and I are playing four short duets — brief arrangements of some famous tunes like Liszt’s Hungarian Rhapsody No. 2, the theme from E.T., and Hava Nagila, followed by a duet written by a local friend of mine who is a composer. We have invited her to the concert, and she said she will try to get there. That would be so much fun to have her there in the audience!

    Then another friend of mine (the show organizer) and I are going to close the concert with Debussy’s Petite Suite. Wonderful work, but very easy to get one’s hands tied up in the other’s, as you’ll see if you watch this excellent performance I’m linking below.

    I play the high part (closest to the camera) on the first two movements, and the low part on the third and fourth movements. We have a great time playing this piece, and are hoping for as clean and exciting a performance as the one here:

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  59. I think so, too, Cheryl. 🙂 My friend had the music, and that is the one we gravitated toward most when we got together to look at our combined duet repertoire.

    I realized a bit ago I probably made it sound like the duo in the video were going to get their hands tied up in each other’s: “…very easy to get one’s hands tied up in the other’s, as you’ll see if you watch this excellent performance I’m linking…”

    For those who watched the video, obviously you see that that didn’t happen, LOL! You can pray it doesn’t happen this Saturday night in a small Midwestern town, either. 🙂

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  62. In college I attended one volleyball game (intramural, I think), one soccer game, and one WNBA exhibition game on our campus.

    I went to a lot more musical events than that, even though I wasn’t a music major, have never learned an instrument, and barely read music. But there is so much good music in Chicago, much of it free, that it’s wise to take advantage of opportunities. And I’m thankful now that in my years in Chicago (student days and the next 10 years) I saw a lot of musical events (of all calibres, up to a string quartet on Stradivarius instruments) and a lot of plays. I probably won’t ever have such cultural opportunities again, and my budget was limited when I did have them, but I saw a decent number of good things while I could.

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  64. Cheryl, if you live close to .W. Lafayette, you can attend cultural events at Purdue.
    They have several during the school year. Anyone, with money, can attend. I attended almost all of them because I needed to get away from books for a while..
    A lady once made an explanation to me, to wit: “Schools located in large towns permit the town to provide entertainment. Schools located in small towns provide the entertainment for the town. “

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  65. The new header photo is three pearl crescent butterflies. The middle one is in flight; I’m not sure about the others. They were flitting around each other, presumably looking to mate, and I thought it was pretty cool to have three butterflies of the same species right together. (I have occasionally gotten more than that in one photo, but rarely.) I had the camera in action mode to try to get the best shot possible.

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  67. I shared this on the political thread, but for those who don’t ‘go there’:

    🙂 “The doctrine of total depravity and years of country music have prepared me for this 2016 campaign season.” — Russell Moore

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  68. So the tree fairy visited my house while I was at work today.

    I drove home to find a brand new tree planted in my parking strip along the curb. It was dark when I got home so I can’t tell what kind it is, it looks every-greeny to me though.

    A tree for that spot was on my want-to-do list (the city has been providing them for free, but not planting them for you from what I understood so I was going to have to ask my gardeners to do it). I never asked for a tree, but am grateful it’s there. 🙂

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  70. And that’s not all.

    I received a post card from the widely (and justly) hated LA Department of Water & Power that they’ll be bringing us free LED bulbs in the next few days.

    And I got a check for $7.79 from AT&T for overcharges on my cell phone.

    Woohoo.

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  71. We had this story today:

    “San Bernardino City Hall closed due to elevated earthquake risk”

    Very odd, someone asked if they’d be closed until we have an earthquake.

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  77. Thanks so much. I think that I am ready for school.
    Since the last long email I got called me her friend and told me all the reasons I had to meet individually then said if I didn’t meet HR would be called in, I am feeling a little stressed.
    Thursday 1pm, which west coast would be Wednesday 8pm

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