75 thoughts on “Our Daily Thread 8-29-17”

  2. I awoke to a message that my FB had been hacked. Changed the password and went to two step verification log in. What exactly is it that hackers get from hacking your FB? I promise I am not that interesting. I have a few friends who are but that’s it.
    I caught up on yesterday’s posts and picked my Pigskin Picks.
    Regarding KBells, I think I have received all the checks anyone told me they were sending. I will print off our memories today and send our gift to Tim and the Kid today.
    I have heard from a reputable source that there are a lot of scams going on to help the people in Texas (I just hate the term “victim” of the hurricane). The suggestion is that if you want to donate go to the website of a reputable charity of your choice and donating there. Do not donate to anyone soliciting donations. I just don’t understand people who take advantage of others hardships to line their own pockets.
    Busy day ahead and showing property this afternoon.

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  3. All my donations are to Samaritan’s Purse and Lions.
    🙂 My club made me a Melvin Jones fellow last night.
    It’s a special award.
    I haven’t done much since I came here, but they say they checked Hendersonville and decided to make the award.

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  8. What a neat header!

    I have been awake since 4:30 a.m. Sometimes I don’t go back to sleep when I get up in the night, but most of the time I do. I spent some time looking at refrigerators at Sears Outlet online. I am not sure my brother could match those prices. That is where I have gotten all appliances except for my last dryer. I like the refrigerators with the freezer at the bottom, but may get one with a top freezer because it is what I am familiar with. It seems if I have a frozen turkey or other large item that it could be difficult to lift it out from a bottom freezer without hurting one’s back.

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  14. I received two more checks yesterday –Mr. P doesn’t check the mail and I got home late last night. There were there. I am going to the bank today to deposit.
    You have all been most generous towards the “Bells”

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  15. Happy anniversary Nancyjill! And congratulations to Chas on the award, you surely deserve it. 🙂

    I typically give to the Salvation Army, they have low administrative costs and the gospel is always part of their material aid. I like that.

    That is a remarkable photo. Nice work.

    My refrigerator (3 years old) has the bottom freezer and double french doors, it’s very cute but seems to have less inside space — I’m told that’s because the new models have thicker insulation so the interiors aren’t as roomy (my old one was 25 years old and struggling when I bought this one). My space in the kitchen is small due to overhead cabinets, so it was hard to find a refrigerator that would fit. This one barely does, it was the smallest I could find without going to a shrunken apartment size model.

    Real Estate Guy is coming over sometime today to check out my outdoor lamp post by the front stairs, the one that “electric man” declared was kaput. Real Estate Guy doesn’t believe it.

    So yesterday I had the gardener trim the bush around the post so it’s easier to access and I’ll leave the doors unlocked so REG can come and go. I may be home earlier than usual, too, as I have an afternoon assignment at the Iowa (the mayor and Navy reps formally welcoming LA Fleet Week with the first of the ships arriving as the photo backdrop). That should get me home by around 4 instead of 6:30 or 7 p.m. I’ll finish up the story from home.

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  16. Congratulations, Nancy Jill! Happy anniversary.

    Chas, I thought of you when I sent that honeybee. That’s easily one of my favorite honeybee shots. It really is more luck than skill to get a shot like that, because when you snap the picture, you don’t know exactly where in the shot the bee will end up. And usually bees caught mid-flight, the wings just disappear altogether and the photo looks weird because you have a wingless bee in mid-air. So to get that much detail on a bee in flight, and to have her pollen bags loaded, her “tongue” hanging out as she looks ahead at the flowers, her wings blurred but clearly present and in action, and to get her positioned in just the right spot to have flowers all around her but to have the background behind her just color so that all her detail will show up . . . that was a providential shot. Also, generally I prefer colored flowers to white ones, but for this shot white ones are perfect because they don’t distract from the bee–you see where she is going, but your eyes aren’t initially drawn to the flowers but to the bee. For the record, the shot didn’t come out quite that perfectly; I cropped it a bit to get it to a nice balance and zoom in a bit, but once it was cropped I really loved what I saw.

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  17. Janice, you have to lift the frozen turkey to put it in the top and you have to lift it to bring it down again. Or it could fly, but I don’t see that happening. On the bottom freezer, I was pleasantly surprised by how much more organized it is. And the drawers make it easy to find things. But my turkeys would not fit and they are not frozen.

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  18. Use your knees to lift anyway, you know that! I’ve been busy all morning on FB, all good.

    I did mindless work until past midnight last night and watched Les Miserables while doing so. I love the music but I recognize how it is deliberately used to make me feel. The storyline of everyone except Jean Val Jean is despicable, yet the music manipulates how we feel about the characters. The catchy lyrics on one song are so vulgar they taste bad coming out of my mouth.

    Yet, underneath it all is grace. Some of the lines were so poignant and grace-filled that my eyes teared up. I’ve seen this many times but the contrast between vulgar and grace always makes me squirm. When I’m not feeling cynical about musical manipulation!

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  21. Chas–I assume that verse is fulfilled when Peter, James and John went with Jesus up on the mountain and saw Jesus transfigured before them. They also heard directly from God. The verse may be like many of the prophesies and have more than one meaning.

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  22. Michelle, it has been years and years since I wrote press releases, but I did so for an internship for several months back a quarter century ago–got one book on Oprah. So if you want to run it by anyone for some feedback, you do have one friend with a little bit of experience.

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  24. One of the world’s great inventions is the hole and strap in the back of baseball caps so that women can wear them. 😆

    Kathleena, I have heard that explanation before.
    Also, that the Holy Spirit came.
    None of them seem to be the answer.
    It could be that one of the disciples didn’t die. Like Enoch and Elijah. But we don’t know that.

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  27. Happy Anniversary, Nancy and hubby. (I know his name but don’t know if Nancy wants it published here).

    Chas- Mark 9:1 must to refer to the transfiguration, since it was a prelude to Jesus coming in power. As far as we know, all the apostles died eventually. James’ death is recorded in Acts. Tradition holds that Peter was crucified upside down. John died while in exile on Patmos.

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  28. Congratulations to:

    NancyJill and hubby on your 42nd anniversary. 🙂

    Chas on your award designation.

    Kim and Mr. P on the new grandbaby on the way.

    I thought of you all yesterday, traveling to see 2nd Arrow in the hospital, when we stopped for lunch and saw in a parking lot numerous vehicles with license plates from areas where some of you live: Texas, Indiana, Tennessee, Missouri, Pennsylvania, Connecticut.

    I always enjoy summer as a good time to see lots of different license plates, and probably would have seen many more if I’d been paying attention to traffic during those many hours of riding in the car yesterday, but I decided to read Scripture throughout most of our travel time. I read the first 26 chapters of Isaiah from the KJV, and 14 chapters from First and Second Corinthians in both the KJV and ESV. (I’ve been reading the NT this year from both versions to compare them.)

    I don’t think I’ve ever read that many chapters (54, essentially) in one day, as my mind tends to wander after maybe a half hour of reading while at home, thinking about other things that should get done. Yesterday was a great opportunity to read for an extended period, and I’m thankful that God gave me the circumstances and attention I needed to read throughout all the hours of travel while there was still daylight. (Though I do wish my daughter wouldn’t have been sick and in the hospital, the event that prompted the trip.) A blessing to read many comforting scriptures, nonetheless, during that time, which spoke to me in various ways and brought much peace.

    Praising God for His goodness.

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  29. Refrigerators — ours is a refrigerator only, no freezer with it. I like it that way. With a big family, it is nice to have more room for refrigerated items and not have to go to the store as often. Our freezer is a stand-alone, which works well.

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  31. We are into Day 3 of H-Baby 3. Grandpa is planning how to turn one of the bedrooms into a nursery. He wonders if we need a changing table. He is sure we need a car seat. He can’t wait to find out what it is so he can start buying clothes. …and the list goes on….
    I have explained that the Mommy isn’t going to want the baby to be away from her for extended periods. (Although I have suggested that I pick up the baby on Monday afternoons and return it on Friday mornings 😉 ). I have also explained that a “pack and play” with a crib insert will be just fine because chances are that if H3 spends the night with us it will be in our room so the Grandpa can keep watch all night.

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  32. I have heard him on the phone with Youngest Son telling him that the new mommy to be can only gain 25 pounds and doesn’t need to use this as an excuse to eat a bunch of junk and that they need to start walking for exercise so that she will be in good shape, and I don’t know what all else was said.
    I had to tell him that she has an OB and an endocrinologist (she has they same thyroid issue as BG) and they are both aware of the pregnancy and monitoring her. God love him, he means well, but if my father in law had been telling my husband what all I needed to do I would have been upset. I had to put a stop to all of his questions Sunday. Some would have made me a little uncomfortable. Some things in laws aren’t meant to know. 🙂

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  35. Re: Mark 9:1 – The Mormons believe the apostle John never died. A Lutheran satirist made a hilarious reference to that belief in this little film clip:

    Some might insist that there is some backing for the belief that John never died, such as the fact there isn’t a tradition of his martyrdom or death, or that cryptic statement Jesus made when Peter asked him about John’s fate. The apostle John’s own commentary on Jesus’ answer to Peter, however, shows that John himself doubted that was what Jesus meant:

    ‘So this report spread to the brothers that this disciple would not die. “Yet Jesus did not tell him that he would not die, but, “If I want him to remain until I come, what is that to you?” (John 21:23).

    John is often called the most mystical of the apostles, but he had both feet firmly on the ground in not expecting his fate to be any different than any other human’s. His levelheaded, matter-of-fact commentary – which is the more striking when you consider that he, out of all the apostles except perhaps Paul, saw more about the supernatural world and the future than anyone – is an example for us all not to get tangled up in profitless speculation as false teachers do (I Timothy 6:3-5).

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  36. Grandbaby fever. 🙂

    Just heard from Real Estate Guy who says, voila!, there is now light in my outdoor light post next to the steps, I just need to buy a new top piece, we can keep the existing pole. Yay.

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  38. This is GBH #3. The other two will be 5 and 3 in November, but they live in Maryland. This one will be closer at only 45 minutes away.
    I told you they gave him a framed ultrasound picture for his birthday. He cried. At first he suggested to them there are so few surprises in life that maybe they will want to wait until the baby is born to find out what it is but now he is planning on finding out himself so that he can start buying clothes. He plans to buy big boxes of diapers each time he goes to Sam’s.
    My suggestion was to let their friends give them baby showers and after all that was over we could take them shopping to get whatever they didn’t get at showers. That is what my mother in law did for me.
    I have assured him this is all we need.

    https://www.walmart.com/ip/Graco-Pack-n-Play-Playard-Snuggle-Suite-Pierce/43222848?wmlspartner=wlpa&adid=22222222227031351879&wl0=&wl1=g&wl2=c&wl3=53411771312&wl4=aud-310687321802:pla-111811428992&wl5=9012939&wl6=&wl7=&wl8=&wl9=pla&wl10=8175035&wl11=online&wl12=43222848&wl13=&veh=sem

    I am laughing at him and behind his back but the truth is that this is one of the things I love about him. How many other grandfathers would be this involved this soon?

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  41. Kim, yes, we’re back in business.

    Our A/C has been out in the newsroom all of yesterday and most of today (though yesterday wasn’t bad, nice cool breeze coming in through open doors — being at the coast has its advantages). They finally got it back up and running this afternoon, thankfully.

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  42. The post is rather short, wood (currently painted white which is peeling). I hope we can work with that. It will, of course, get painted.

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  47. A good news story: http://www.macleans.ca/society/health/the-story-behind-a-vegetative-patients-shocking-recovery/

    “I don’t really know what happened,” Juan Torres, a 21-year-old from the Toronto suburb of Oakville, tells Maclean’s. “But, one day, I just woke up.”

    That Torres is speaking at all is astounding. Early one morning in July 2013, Torres, then 19, was discovered by his mother, face-down and unconscious on his bedroom floor, after choking on vomit in the night. He was left profoundly brain-damaged, and his doctors diagnosed him as vegetative: unable to speak, to eat, to deliberately control his movements, to follow basic commands. Vegetative patients retain their reflexes, and might grind their teeth or grimace; their eyes rove about the room but won’t fix on anything. They don’t demonstrate a glimmer of consciousness and can live that way for years, spending their days in hospitals, long-term-care facilities, or at home, unless families decide to end life support. The doctors who treated Torres didn’t think he’d be any different; they expected his status to be permanent, his mother says.

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  53. Sonna, I like it. I usually type my name Dinna on the phone.

    Sonna-Dinna, my alter ego.

    Kim, we may have trouble, Real Estate Guy is at Home Depot to report there are 2 post lights in stock. He knows how particular I am about what they look like. I don’t think he’s buying, just informing me. He and Driveway Guy & other menfolk think I’m picky, which I am — my choices aren’t necessarily more expensive, but I do have ‘a look’ I’m usually wanting.

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  56. Kim – My mom & dad had an extra bedroom that became a special bedroom for the “three beautiful granddaughters” (my two daughters & my niece) to share. The girls loved spending the night there together.

    Unfortunately, after Dad had his right arm amputated, it became more difficult to keep up the work on their large house & the large yard, so they sold their house, & moved into the “condo” my brother & SIL owned & rented out. (It was half of a duplex.) The girls would still stay over at times, but they didn’t have their own special room anymore. Of course, they enjoyed being with their grandparents, & each other, anyway.

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  57. I’m laughing and loving Mr. P’s excitement. Maybe a baby IS what he’s needed all along . . .

    Without an engineering genius in the house, I’m fighting with the printer. I’ve had to warn it Mr. Fix It is returning home tonight and I’m telling.

    Printer doesn’t care.

    Mr. Fix It probably doesn’t either. 😦

    Returning, now, to pen and ink.

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  59. I look forward to the day we can anticipate our own grandchild.

    For years I looked forward to my sister having a daughter. I even bought a beautiful velvet dress that I couldn’t resist, knowing she would have a daughter one day. She had three sons over several years, and the dress wasn’t something I saw every day, so when she finally had a girl I didn’t know where it was, but I knew it wasn’t a newborn size or anything, so I didn’t worry about it. Then when I found it I saw that it was 9 months (I’d been thinking it was 18 months or two years). I took it to her, and my sister put it on for a photo, but it didn’t really fit any more. (It wasn’t a dress but a long blouse at that point.) Oh well.

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  60. I’m not sure what kind of frog that is, since they overlap in colors and such. But through the years I’ve found many different insects on the wild milkweed, and that day I was quite pleased to find a small frog.

    It would be a hard scene to paint, though–greens are hard to match, and there are a lot of different ones in that picture!

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  62. Happy Anniversary to Mr. & Mrs. Jones
    (Or something like that). 🕯🕯Two candles lit the unity candle quite a long time ago. That unity candle has an inextinguishable wick!
    Blessings on y’all from Atlanta. ❤

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  63. I can see how the French door refrigerators would have less interior space. I think they would be confusing to Art when he wanted to find something. I need to try to keep the style that he is familiar with as much as possible.

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  65. You know, I’m pretty sure we had a fridge-only fridge when I was a child, too. I didn’t know they still made them. I know we had a full-size upright freezer in “the store shed” (off the carport), but whether we had a separate freezer in the house or had to go to the shed for anything frozen, I don’t remember. As an adult I’ve usually had a fridge/freezer plus a separate small upright freezer (which are hard to find), and we now have a full-size upright in our garage. IN the house we have my first side-by-side, and I don’t really like it (not enough fridge space–considering we have a separate freezer, in the house we need fridge space more than freezer space)–but I’ll tell you it’s a whole lot easier now that the kids have moved out! Younger daughter in particular was buying a lot of her own food, and when fridge space is at a premium it gets crowded quickly.

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  66. Thank you so much for the congrats! We took a drive to St. Elmo and Salida. Had lunch and searched a couple antique shops (Paul bought a sweet antique slag glass lamp for me 🙂) and then we stopped in St. Elmo to drop off a couple things to our friends who have a B and B there. Long day of driving but oh so fun. Onward and upward. Trying to catch up with Chas and Elvera!❤️

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  67. Hubby & I don’t go out together very often. Our “thing” is to have dinner & watch a TV show together. Or maybe a movie (at home) on a Sunday afternoon every now & then. It may sound boring, but it’s what we enjoy.

    But we sometimes have these little mini-dates (which I once referred to as “raisins”, although I know that raisins are not small dates 🙂 ) when he has to drive me to an appointment of some kind (doctor, dentist, etc.). We’ll stop for a coffee & some kind of yummy baked good, or maybe pick something up for lunch or dinner.

    Tomorrow, after his appointment with the oncologist, Hubby wants us to have an ice cream at our favorite ice cream place in the town where the office is located. We’ll either be celebrating our relief at some good news or sadly enjoying our ice cream as we consider the bad news.

    I’m hoping for the former, of course. 🙂

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  69. Even if the news isn’t great, today’s treatments are really quite amazing and there’s always a way forward — with hope. Even when my dad had cancer in the 1960s, I remember we would rebound with each setback and there was always more time (and treatments then weren’t very promising!).

    One of my former colleagues’ mother was diagnosed with brain cancer several years ago and she’s still plugging. Pretty amazing, really. It becomes the “new reality” and God gives us the strength to deal with that, though it does take some processing.

    Praying all is well tomorrow, Kizzie. 🙂

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  71. Kim, haha – I think I made him happy by finding a $40 fixture at Home Depot that I told him really wasn’t “so bad.” 🙂 But I’ll buy my own, looking I think for “California Mission” style, and will NEVER tell him if I paid more than $40 for it. 🙂

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  72. REG did, however, remove old top from the fixture and neatly cap off the wires — not to mention he confirmed that there WAS indeed still power there (which Electric Man denied).

    I really do appreciate all he’s done for me, he’s smart and very experienced having done so much of his own work on houses; and I need to figure out a gift when this is all behind us (since he seems unwilling to take money from me).

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  73. And the dogs know and like him — I can leave the house unlocked when he comes and know all’s well. 🙂 (although one of my neighbors was giving him grief today about using ‘roofers’ — they’re really much more than that — to do my foundation work — best I can do with what I have; “I try”)

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