52 thoughts on “Our Daily Thread 6-1-19”

  4. Our old home had spots in the road that flooded like that, one on each side of us. One side was often impassible, but they worked hard with the area to keep the roads cleared as much as possible. (Locally we had a “drainage board.”) In my six and a half years of living there, only once did we have it impassible both ways–but it was my birthday and church was also having a retirement party for our pastor who was leaving! (Humorously, they ended up having the party in the dark when they lost electricity.)

    Our daughter was dating her now-husband, and he was determined to take her to the party, so he made it through the lower of the two puddles. But it rose farther and he couldn’t bring her back home! We ended up having to call a lady in the church and ask if she could spend the night that night–and we were all the more glad we ourselves hadn’t attended.

    I don’t miss those low spots . . .

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  5. The water is where it isn’t supposed to be.
    I hope it gets better.
    Good evening Jo.
    Good morning everyone else.
    I thought it was today, but I looked.
    It was yesterday in 1957 that I graduated from USC.

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  7. Good morning, all. The roosters and I are up. Our driveway floods like that between about November to May. Though it is often frozen.

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  8. That is the entrance to the cave complex, as Jo said. The spot is about 1/8 mile from the river. The water seeped under the highway to get there. Or else it is overflow from a normally dry creek that is full from lots of rain. And since the water has nowhere to go, due to the river being overfull, the water backs up into the grass and floods the drive. To the left, out of the picture, is a electric substation that the power company is trying to keep from getting wet. They put up sandbags and sump pumps.

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  9. Oh, and as I mentioned last night, a couple of levies breached Thursday night, flooding farm fields up north of us, lowering the river here by a foot or two.

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  14. Beautiful June Saturday morning out here. All is quiet–the high schools had graduation last night and everyone is sleeping in, except Mr. Fit and I who went to bed early and got up even earlier than usual.

    Don’t you hate it when that happens? Sleeping in sounded like a great idea for the first day of June. 🙂

    This afternoon we’ll attend an open house/thank you party for the first of our friends to be back in their new home after the fires.

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  15. Oh, I slept in the first day of June, Michelle. But if you will notice my 4:59 a.m. post, I got rather a late ending to May. At any rate, it is June, my favorite month.

    I’m determined not to go outside today, since I have a lot to do inside, and I took 6,000 photos in May. But if I get enough done on my editing, cleaning, and phone calls, who knows but that I might break that resolution. (I have VBS next week so I won’t be outside in the morning next week unless I’m up too early.)

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  16. I have to go outside to clean up after the storm yesterday.
    It’s still to wet to mess with anything now.

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  17. Saturday morning clean up here. Broom brushing in the dining room, dust flying in the living room, floor being washed in the kitchen…..

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  19. I’ll start laundry soon, fill the fountain and turn it on, tug up some weeds and probably get some new bean starts for my soggy, soggy vegetables in the gray water bed ( and we haven’t even used the gray water yet this year.)

    And other things as well, it’s nice to not have anything pressing today.

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  21. I woke up early, tossed and turned, then fell asleep again around 6:30 a.m. I think, so I got a couple hours after that. But it wasn’t the best night’s sleep I’ve had this week.

    In my lie-awake moments I did find some advice via the iPad I keep next to the bed about how to loosen a hose end that spins but remains stuck in a spigot. Seems I’m not the only one who’s had the problem. A couple of the tips were to tap on the spigot piece where it joins the hose lightly with a hammer and to move the hose end gently back and forth a few times to loosen any debris that may be caught in there. I’ll try that later this morning. I tried pliers yesterday to no avail.

    There’s lots of angst in LA this weekend as everyone braces for the new homeless numbers for 2019 (they’ll be released Tuesday morning). They’ll be significantly up over last year, we’re being told off the record (our local council office is extremely stressed, late yesterday they were trying to figure out a pre-emptive “explanatory” strike to lessen the blow and the public meltdowns locally; a lot of tax money has been and is being spent to address this issue so seeing the numbers only shoot up won’t be accepted easily or quietly).

    I’m going up to see Carol at 1 p.m. today for an in-house visit, no road trip, so that takes a huge amount of the dread and stress off my shoulders. Her birthday is tomorrow so I have a small gift (a Lutheran prayer book from Concordia Publishing) and will bring the cookies she requested. I’ll plan to stay probably about 2 hours and then head back home.

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  22. Meanwhile, back in David Guzik’s commentary on John 10, he’s talking about Jesus as the Good Shepherd and includes this observation from James Boice:

    (Flocks, apparently, can be made up of several fold– or smaller groups.)

    v. The early Christian Bible translator Jerome, when translating his influential Latin version mistakenly translated one fold instead of one flock in this verse. His Latin Vulgate reading is the erroneous foundation for a doctrine of Roman Catholic exclusiveness.

    vi. “In Jerome’s version, Jesus seems to be saying that thee is only one organization, and the obvious deduction was that there could therefore be no salvation outside the formal organization of the Roman Church. This became official Roman teaching.” (Boice)

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  23. Guzik explains:

    b. There will be one flock: A fold of sheep is a part of the flock in its own structure or enclosure. A shepherd might separate the sheep into different groups to care for them better. There is one flock and one shepherd; but Jesus calls His sheep from more than one fold (group or structure of people).

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  24. …. Usually when there’s a road component to the Carol visits — taking her around to run errands and sightseeing, etc. — the visits wind up lasting about 5 hours.

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  25. I’m still reading through What’s in the Bible — currently in the major prophets section.

    “Look at me when I talk to you!” — the authors’ comparison of the prophets’ role to what we hear our parents say when they need to absolutely get our attention about something.

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  26. I am reading Isaiah now. Some of his prophesies are hard to follow.
    Especially about Babylon, Egypt, etc. Some of that has been fulfilled, much not so.
    It’s hard to understand what he is talking about.

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  27. Chas–I started reading Guzik’s commentaries when I got into those major prophets–Ezekiel would have been incomprehensible otherwise–and found them really insightful because he includes commentaries from church historians from the past–Matthew Henry, for example.

    By putting the times and the prophesies into context, I could understand it all so much better. And was so surprised! Wonderful.

    It’s here: https://enduringword.com/

    Guzik is the pastor of Calvary Chapel, Santa Barbara.

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  29. Groan.

    We’re trying to juggle covering (photographing) all the high school graduations going on in the next week and some of us reporters, me included, may have to shoot a couple of them.

    What?!

    Work gets stranger and stranger …

    Guess I’ll have to charge up the digital camera.

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  30. Maybe I can shoot a few Friday night high school football games next fall. …

    We have so many vacancies and cannot fill them — initially owners indicated that after the Gannett takeover drama ended (assuming we’d lose) we’d get to fill some of those spots but so far that’s clearly not happening.

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  31. Good afternoon, all. It’s a bit cooler today. I put more water out for the birds since it has been so dry. After all the rain last year, the birds may have forgotten how to look for water.

    I have been doing Bible study catch up since I was not at my church last weekend. Ephesians offers a lot to think about. For one thing, thinking about God having His chosen people, the Jews, and then later, the Gentiles are given the new covenant along with the Jews so all are on equal footing. In God’s sovereignty He is justified in doing that. But I still don’t understand why He did it that way. It seems to have caused a lot of trouble for the Jewish people to be known as God’s chosen people, much like Joseph got in all those troubles with his brothers for being Papa’s favorite. I know that God worked it all for good . . . but it takes so long. This was not in my Bible study, but I think about my friends who sometimes seem rebellious toward God because of His sovereignty and because He does not do things the way they think He should. What do you say to such people to help them understand that God is not made in their image when they say “My God would not do this or that?” The God of the Bible is not the same as the one they claim as their own god.

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  33. The picture is not of the Mississippi. That is behind me about 1/8 mile. This water is overflow from a creek that drains into the river. We checked this afternoon and the water covers twice as much of the road. The cave closed today again, so Mrs L and I helped a young couple load a small moving van, along with several friends. Then since they couldn’t fit everything, I volunteered our minivan and drove the extra down to where they are moving, about 2 hours away (near St. Louis). I figured the Lord gave me an extra day off, so I might as well put it to good use.

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  35. Thanks for the clarification, Peter.

    Just had to scramble to fix a mistake in one of my stories (made by editor was he fiddled with it!), but thankfully it all got fixed in time before print deadline — and I was able to fix it in the online version. Technology is good.

    Company would never buy me a high-end camera, but they’d loan one to me. … Then I’d have to figure out how to work it, it’s been ages since I’ve had to use a fully manual 135 mm camera (is that what they still even call them???)

    ____________________

    Ok, so I got Carol’s bangs cut.

    “I look like Martin Luther,” she declared.

    And she did. But she insisted she wanted short-short-short bangs. Looks also like I just put a bowl on her head to cut. But it’s so much better than that long hair she had, and the gray is silvery so it looks like highlights. Her hair is very soft and thin, kinda hard to cut the bangs as it kept slipping out of my hand, but I managed. I told her “it’ll grow” in case she decides she doesn’t like it, but she said that she does.

    Saw a homeless person camped in front of their facility today, that’s a first. Her old place in Hollywood, not far away, always had homeless around — the tents lined the fwy overpass around the corner from her.

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  36. Spigot is still not cooperating. I tried pliers, tapped it with a hammer but haven’t yet tried the WD40 … Wondering if the threads are just gone inside?

    Meanwhile, seems that Puppy Gambit from next door was out last night and was apparently the culprit who dragged the new, light-weight hose across the front yard. The new hose is black with orange stripes so kind of looks like a snake.

    Liked by 2 people

  37. When I turned on my computer this morning, this appeared on my screen:

    Life is not a fairy tale
    If you lose your shoe at midnight,
    you’re drunk

    I know where it came from. An e-mail I got about a week ago. But I don’t know why it should appear suddenly in my screen. I deleted it. No harm done.
    Just curious.

    Good morning anyhow.
    Good evening Jo.
    It’s Sunday. I need to get ready for church & ss.

    Liked by 2 people

  39. Morning! Sun shining and a tad bit chilly in the forest. Heading to church in a bit. They are having a cycling event today and it creates horrific driving on our two lane roads. And of course they are the only access roads available to us…makes people mad once a year…some cyclists obey the rules of the roads but the ones not obeying cause much angst and dangerous situations…7000 cyclists on the road! Happy Sunday!! 🚲 💥

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  40. Good morning and another beautiful day it is. Short sleeve weather for morning chores. Nice to have the grass mowed yesterday so I did not get quite so wet this morning.

    Daughter is delighted to see the beans are coming up.

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  41. Martin Luther was cute in the movie.

    I remember being stuck on a Sunday morning in the former city I lived in when I realized all the streets leading out of my neighborhood were blocked off for a marathon. I turned around and went home — there was an old Baptist church across the street so I went there that morning. 🙂

    LA’s annual marathon also in on Sunday mornings, I suppose organizers figure it’s a day when the fewest people will be inconvenienced. Just us church goers …

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  43. We had the marathon deal in Turin, Italy. The church sent out a notice letting people know what roads were open and what closed for the marathons or bike races or whatever. In Frankfurt, Germany, the notices were about riots and demonstrations thirty plus years ago. In Athens, Greece, it was anarchist action or strikes. I much prefer the marathons.

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  44. Good afternoon. We had a good church service with the main sermon on Micah, the passage about what God expects of man: act justly, love mercy, and walk humbly with the Lord. Then in the Life Group we were back in Ephesians. There were only four of us and the others were in their twenties and thirties. At first I was afraid my age would make me feel out of place but it really didn’t because of their spiritual maturity. The class was great. I am feeling better about church than I have in a long time. Being with these young people reminded me of hanging out with Wesley.

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  45. (Part 1) Feeling somewhat upset today over something that has happened. On Rants and Raves, I wrote about X not dropping off The Boy until almost an hour and a half later than needed (Nightingale and he had to get to the Crossover Camp to set up, and were an hour or so late). But that was the short version.

    There’s the longer, more confused version that includes me missing a text from X saying he was on his way, and him leaving after waiting a while at the top of the lane for supposedly 20 minutes (during which he did not try texting me again or calling me). When I saw another text, labelled “Just now” (that the text had just come in), I went out there and he was gone. He then kept The Boy for a while longer before finally bringing him back.

    X being X, he has twisted the story into being my fault (nothing is ever his fault in any way). I made the mistake of trying to defend myself being late going out by saying I had missed the first text, and he twisted that into my saying I missed both texts, and then saying I had not told Nightingale the whole story, and she had “sworn” at his mom in a text (because she referred to X’s story as “bull____”). (I told you this was long and confusing.) When he texted me that part, I knew well enough not to try to explain any further, and wished I hadn’t tried to explain earlier (about missing the first text).

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  46. (Part 2) X’s Mom gets irritated by having to be a third party in all of this, and got mad at Nightingale, telling her she didn’t want to do it anymore, and telling her to cancel the protective order. Nightingale replied that there was a good reason that the court put the protective order in effect for the rest of his life.

    Then this afternoon, I mentioned that text from X twisting that text of mine. Nightingale hit the roof, yelling at me (anything involving X causes her much inner stress) that I should know better by now than to try to explain myself to him, and that now he will make it seem that she was lying to his mom (when she told her that I’d gone out after the second text).

    She then declared that I was no longer going to be the other third party (fourth party?). (My role was small, not as much involved in the planning of visits as X’s Mom was, but needed for knowing when he would be here to pick up or drop off The Boy.) So she took my phone, and blocked his number. She says it is up to him to figure out how to arrange the visits, and she doesn’t want me involved anymore. If neither I nor his mom are helping, that is his own fault.

    (To be continued.)

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  48. (Part 3.) Now I am concerned that her keeping X from contacting me could look bad for her in court. I don’t want to dump all this on the prayer thread, but please pray for wisdom for her – that if putting X’s number back on my phone, and allowing me to still be a third party, is the right thing to do, she will see that and do it. Her point is that the protective order is in effect, and part of it was to not harass me, either, as a third party contact.

    And please pray that this case will come out in Nightingale’s favor, and not his. That sounds petty or vindictive, I know, but that is really not the way I mean it.

    X has gotten away with so much in his life. He sold pot as a teen, but since he was a juvenile, he got a slap on the wrist. He has had two or three DUIs, but in two different states. If they were all in one, he would have gone to jail. There was another brush with the law a few years ago that was again not taken seriously.

    Then there is the reason for the protective order. As you may remember, he came up the side steps so Hubby and I wouldn’t hear. He ripped her glasses off her face and threw them across the room, put his hands around her neck and choked her, and threatened to shoot her in the head. All of this in front of their then-five year old son (who needed therapy for a while after that). And for all that, he merely got probation for a year. 😦

    Nightingale has tried to do everything right, as much as possible with the protective order in effect. She does the hard work with raising this little boy. So again, please pray she will have favor in the judge’s eyes, the judge will see through X’s attempts to get her in trouble, and the case will go her way. Thank you.

    The next court date isn’t until the 17th of this month, so I will probably re-post this right before then.

    Liked by 1 person

  49. Kizzie, Nightingale is right to be protecting you. You are very important to her and to her son. the guy can work out something that complies or he is out of compliance.

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  50. Mumsee – My concern is that the court may think she is throwing roadblocks in his way. I hope they see it as you do, and not as he may present it. But yeah, he got himself into this predicament, so it is on him to make it work somehow.

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