Good morning, nice to have the weekend off. I was so exhausted by the end of my 12 hour yesterday that I forgot my bag of personal nursing equipment (stethoscope, etc.) at the clinic. Sigh, don’t really want to drive the 1.5 hour round trip to retrieve it on my time off.
Ah, I thought Chas was quoting Shakespeare. Both my parents had to study Macbeth in high school and sometimes quote snatches:
“Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow,
Creeps in this petty pace from day to day,
To the last syllable of recorded time;
And all our yesterdays have lighted fools
The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle!
Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player,
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage,
And then is heard no more. It is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.”
But the above speech is made by a man who has sold his birthright for a mess of pottage, and it has turned to dust and ashes in his mouth. He became king as a result of murder and intrigue, but lost his peace of mind and his wife, and is about to be defeated in a battle for the kingdom. As a greater than Shakespeare said, “He that saves his life shall lose it.”
That is why Hebrews warns Christians to not let any root of evil defile them, lest they become like Esau and sell their eternal birthright for temporal gain, power, or pleasure. Those that do so are the seed that grows among thorns, “but the cares of the world and the deceitfulness of riches and the desires for other things enter in and choke the word, and it proves unfruitful.” (Mark 4:16)
In Macbeth’s speech, Shakespeare is drawing inspiration from a Psalm (90), that also compares our lives to a tale that is told, but one that has meaning, provided we seek the Giver of all meaning:
“Lord, thou hast been our dwelling place in all generations.
“Before the mountains were brought forth, or ever thou hadst formed the earth and the world, even from everlasting to everlasting, thou art God.
“Thou turnest man to destruction; and sayest, Return, ye children of men.
“For a thousand years in thy sight are but as yesterday when it is past, and as a watch in the night.
“Thou carriest them away as with a flood; they are as a sleep: in the morning they are like grass which groweth up.
“In the morning it flourisheth, and groweth up; in the evening it is cut down, and withereth.
“For we are consumed by thine anger, and by thy wrath are we troubled.
“Thou hast set our iniquities before thee, our secret sins in the light of thy countenance.
“For all our days are passed away in thy wrath: we spend our years as a tale that is told.
“The days of our years are threescore years and ten; and if by reason of strength they be fourscore years, yet is their strength labour and sorrow; for it is soon cut off, and we fly away.
“Who knoweth the power of thine anger? even according to thy fear, so is thy wrath.
“So teach us to number our days, that we may apply our hearts unto wisdom.
“Return, O Lord, how long? and let it repent thee concerning thy servants.
“O satisfy us early with thy mercy; that we may rejoice and be glad all our days.
“Make us glad according to the days wherein thou hast afflicted us, and the years wherein we have seen evil.
“Let thy work appear unto thy servants, and thy glory unto their children.
“And let the beauty of the Lord our God be upon us: and establish thou the work of our hands upon us; yea, the work of our hands establish thou it.”
The starting line of Macbeth’s speech, “tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow”, reminds me of a funny habit of Tiny, when she is trying to determine when something in the near future will take place. She understands the concept of tomorrow, and so Jeep’s adding tomorrows to count in how many days something will happen. For example, the day after tomorrow is, to Tiny, tomorrow’s tomorrow, while in three days is tomorrow’s tomorrow’s tomorrow. It can get a bit bewildering at any greater length of days.
Speaking of Tiny, I have a question for 6 if she is around today. Tiny has asked me for piano lessons, and I was wondering if 6 knew of some good beginners books for a four year old who is just learning her ABC’s.
D2 is having a virtual birthday party today for her 1 year old. What do people do at such an event? How can I get the cake and ice cream from 90 miles away?
That kind of reminds me of when I read books on the Holocaust and I am secretly cheering the person on to keep going because I know they are so close to being saved. They have no idea, however, and I think how difficult it must be to keep hope alive. That is true of many countries today, too, where people have lived for decades enduring crises I cannot imagine. That reminds me to be grateful for all I do have!
Cheryl, I remember several years ago seeing in the book section of a dollar store chain some very cheap editiona of the KJV. I opened to the title page and saw the words ‘Printed in China’. It was so surreal that I had to point it out to my family who was with me and they were also flabbergasted that a country to which Bibles were routinely smuggled was printing Bibles. We concluded they must do it because most of the Chinese workers wouldn’t be able to read English and since the Bible is a perennial best seller, it was good business sense to produce them. How tragic that the wider economic implications of printing cheap Bibles for Americans is leading to ignoring the plight of the Chinese. One wonders if some of the Uighur forced labourers are placed in the printing factories of Amity. There are so many other cheap, convenient goods sold here and made in China that use Uighur labor.
Cheryl, I keep forgetting to tell you about a birthday gift I got from one of my daughters. It is a small wooden easel with three by five cards to put on it. The cards each have a calendar page printed on them. Above the plain calendar numerals is a bird drawn for each month. It made me think of your photos and how you could do this. I have no idea what she paid for it, of course. I do enjoy it, however, and wanted to mention it to you.
Peter, we likely won’t see a whooping crane. They are bigger and they are white, so they are visible in a crowd of sandhills, so if they are there we should see them. The person who told us about this flock did see a whooper, but she didn’t see it up close, and they aren’t necessarily in the same place from one day to another. (She saw several last year, but she only saw them once.) Still, they are seen fairly often in the winter in various parts of southern Indiana (there is said to be a pair at another spot that my husband and I have visited three times so far and where we hope someday to actually be present at the same time as flocks of snow geese are there)–hopefully someday we will see snow geese and someday whooping cranes, but for now the flocks of sandhill cranes are amazing and a bit more reliable.
Thanks, Kathaleena. I have considering selling small framed prints and cards, and looked into the best way to distribute them if I did. Right now that is “on hold,” but it is something I’ve looked into and may do at some point. Each year I give my mother-in-law some cards for Christmas, and she always tells me about some of the people she sends them to.
Michelle, pull some ice cream out of your freezer and eat it when they’re are having cake and ice cream?
Today I get to watch a live-streamed wedding of the first baby that I ever guessed the mom was pregnant. For some reason, I have guessed when women are first pregnant (like the second or third month) before they are telling anyone. I’ve actually started writing it down because no one believes me. Any way, this mom and her husband shared youth leader duties with us and one Friday evening it suddenly dawned on me that she must be pregnant. She caught me looking at her curiously and then took me for coffee to tell me, but that it was still secret. This young man has found a young lady who is perfect for him – so thankful they both love the Lord.
Yay for a weekend. What a week. Is 2020 really over is that just an illusion (and not a very good one!)?
Our covid death rate hit a record in LA County yesterday.
Clearing out some paperwork in the home office yesterday I came across the announcement of the first coronavirus briefing I covered (Feb. 25 by city health officials). I remember the crowded room with media, everyone asking all kinds of questions about how serious this could be and what is this “thing,” anyway? Little did we know what we were in for …
++++++++++++++++++++++++
It’s still foggy here, but we’re getting more high winds, I heard one of my empty trash bins fly off the short concrete ledge from its storage niche on the driveway last night. High surf as well.
But absolutely no rain in the forecast. And it could hit 80 next weekend.
The most recently printed Bible I have is from Cambridge University Press, which, as the article Cheryl linked to notes, does not print in China. My edition says it was printed in the Netherlands. I also have a study Bible that was printed in the US, but it was printed 30 years ago.
I had the Word Weavers meeting this morning. It is such a great group similar to my Lady’s bible study group. Two of us are members of both groups. We had a great range of writings this a.m., one promotional/testimonial piece for a business, part of a children’s fantasy chapter book, a nonfiction book chapter on Christianity in Jane Austin’s times, a section from a novella written in verse, and my article about using brown craft paper for teaching Bible lessons to children. We always learn things in this group.
I have a notebook full of materials to become familiar with related to my new position on the church Direction Team.
And I got my first email and Facebook posts done in my new position as Publicist for an Atlanta Christian writer’s group.
I wonder if my brain will explode from all the new things I am stuffing into it. All’s good so far.
It got me looking to see if any of the newer printings of books I have that are not Bibles were printed in China. I tried fiction, classics, non-fiction, and reference. So far, I’ve only found one, a 75th Anniversary edition of ‘Little House on the Prairie’. All the rest are North American or UK prints.
On the news this morning in Atlanta, the report stated that Dekalb County has 8,000 Covid vaccines at the health department. Only 400 people have chosen to get them. I think that many of the black population here do not trust the vaccines. And many of the white population do not trust those who would administer it. Art said he would wait and get it through the health care provider. We went to the health department once a long time back to get out flu vaccines. I think we had to give our SSN to get it. I might be wrong about that but I remember we had to give more info there than we typically did.
I have a Super Giant Print HCSB printed in Korea, typeset in Denmark and edited in Peachtree City, GA which is near Art’s office. All that was a surprise to me.
Hello everyone. My friend M made eggs Benedict for my birthday this morning. She made the best breakfast potatoes and strawberries in balsamic vinegar. Yum. We had cranberry juice with fizzy water. Then laughed and talked for two hours. Mr P chose not to go. He went to Whataburger. 🤷♀️🤷♀️🤷♀️
When the headline and the news story don’t say the same thing. Headline and first paragraph follow:
Congresswoman Apologizes for Making an Approving Reference to Hitler
Representative Mary Miller, an Illinois Republican, had faced condemnation and calls to resign for declaring at a rally: “Hitler was right on one thing: He said, ‘Whoever has the youth, has the future.’”
Roscuro, 10:24, how exciting, Tiny asking you to teach her the piano!
Two different method series come to mind that, in my opinion, are the best options for a four-year-old: My First Piano Adventure, published by Faber and distributed by Hal Leonard; and Piano Safari.
Piano Safari is recommended from age four to around ten. MFPA carries a recommendation of ages five to six.
That said, my opinion is that MFPA is a better place for a four-year-old to begin, even though that age is younger than their age guidelines. The series — three levels: A, B, & C — proceeds very slowly, with lots and lots of reinforcement along the way. Each level has two books, “Lesson” and “Writing,” and Book A is entirely pre-staff. The Lesson books are 88 pages and the Writing books 64, so there’s lots of material.
Their pre-reading approach is to first use finger numbers only (on pages with colorful graphics that fit the lyrics); then to introduce note values accompanied by finger numbers; then to begin putting note names inside the noteheads, removing finger numbers on consecutive repeated tones.
Level B begins, after a brief review of concepts introduced in Level A, with moving directly onto the grand staff, which I find rather unusual, as a lot of methods start staff reading with a single staff and then progress to the grand staff after some landmark notes have been introduced on each single staff.
Disclosure: I am just now beginning to teach in the Level B book for the first time, so I can’t tell you my experience with teaching going immediately from pre-reading to grand staff reading, because I haven’t gotten there yet! Piano Girl is my first student I’ve moved from Book A to Book B, and she’s still in the introductory (review) unit that precedes the grand staff. So she will be my guinea pig as I try this out. 🙂
Piano Safari also has three levels, each with over 100 pages in the Repertoire book alone. These books advance more quickly, although they’re slower in Level 1 than in Levels 2 and 3, to make sure students get a good grasp of the intervals of a second and a third, both separately (with reading pieces that move by seconds and unisons only) and then combined (with pieces that use unisons, seconds, and thirds only). Fifths are introduced in the second book, and then there follow pieces with thirds and fifths, to distinguish between movement from space-to-next-space thirds compared to space-to-space-skip-a-space fifths, or line-to-next-line thirds compared to line-to-line-skip-a-line fifths.
Sorry about that eyeful of hyphens and what-not in the previous graph. 🙂 I do like that Piano Safari devotes an entire unit (a lot of times 20 or more pages in the Repertoire book) to one or a very limited number of intervals. After the thirds and fifths combination, then the next unit combined seconds, thirds, and fifths. After all that, then fourths were introduced, and later, sixths, sevenths, and octaves. Interestingly, they don’t introduce any note names in Level 1 except for the landmarks of Treble G (line 2) and Bass C (space 2). All reading at that level is done by determining the distance from the landmark or the preceding note. The names of all the rest of the notes on the grand staff and middle C are introduced early in Level 2.
By the time a student is at the end of the third level, s/he is ready for (and has already been introduced to a little of the easier) standard repertoire. My daughter 6th Arrow was my first student to complete the series, and she is a good player now, tackling music by Bach, Beethoven, and so on.
I should also point out that Piano Safari doesn’t only have reading pieces, but rote (pattern) pieces, as well (in Levels 1 and 2), that you teach by a combination of teacher demonstration and student pre-listening to audio tracks provided for the non-reading pieces. It gets kids playing in various parts of the piano compared to the limited area in the middle where they play when they are first learning to read music.
Piano Safari published their second edition in 2018, and there were some changes they made from their 2008 edition that I didn’t particularly care for. However, it seems that the students who have been hearing quality music in the home, with intricate rhythms and the like, are doing alright with the newer edition nonetheless. The ones without much of an in-home music background, though, seem to be struggling more with the 2018 edition than the same kinds of students who did the 2008 edition.
I would think Tiny, though, would do well whichever piano series you choose to do with her. The fact that she’s already had a piano in the house that I’m sure she has heard played and probably has been given opportunity to play herself, I’m guessing, is a HUGE benefit when embarking on lessons.
I’ll give you some links in the next comments, where you can read more about My First Piano Adventure and Piano Safari — if you haven’t had your fill yet with this looooong comment! — and see some sample pages.
Roscuro, if you’re interested in reading more about the philosophy behind the Piano Safari method and want some practical teaching tips for that method (and, really, some of them would apply to any method), here is a page on their site with links to several essays I’ve enjoyed reading and found useful and/or good food for thought:
It’s too busy for me to read much or comment on weekdays anymore, as things are extremely busy. I want to say, though, that I’m so sorry to have heard about those tragic deaths recently of which some of you spoke: Kathaleena, Kare, RKessler. All of those families who lost loved ones have been in my prayers since I found out.
RK, I hope you and Miguel fare well with covid. You are in my prayers, also.
6, thanks for the info. I have been teaching Tiny a little, just impromptu lessons. About a year ago, she asked to learn ‘Twinkle, twinkle’ and so first I used an echo method, where she would play each note after I played it. Then, later, I started pointing to the key she should play and tell her how many times to play it. But I noticed she always used just her index finger to play notes, so when she asked this morning, I started to show her how to use each finger to play notes separately. I can make up impromptu lessons for individual issues, but feel daunted by all the teaching of keys, and rhythm, and reading of music.
When I started lessons, I spent three years in a group learning program called Music for Young Children, and we learned all the theory so very practically. When later I studied for my music theory exams, I had already been introduced to concepts such as the circle of fifths. Looking back, it seemed effortless and organic to me, but it must have been hard work for our teacher. I would like Tiny to learn all that just as organically.
I started three new students this week. One is the sister of a girl I’ve been teaching at home the last couple of years. Mom emailed me Tuesday morning asking if I had an openings for L’s little sister, and I actually did (because of that boy who quit at the end of November). So eight hours after the initial inquiry, I had a new student sitting on my bench, taking her first piano lesson. 🙂 Quickest turn-around ever from first-time contact to new student enrollment!
Then yesterday, I met two new students — brothers — at the studio where I also work. They and their parents and other sibling moved here from Tennessee, and were super excited to get started. Younger boy is 10, almost 11, and studied for six months, but hadn’t had any lessons since April of last year. Older boy is 12 and has never studied piano but decided he wanted to. (And his twin brother decided he didn’t want to learn piano.)
Both boys did very well at their first lessons yesterday. I emailed their grandmother in Ohio, who is paying for the lessons and requested periodic updates on how they’re doing, to let her know what we did at their first lessons and how well they did, and how sweet and mannerly they are. Grandma replied that they were so excited after their lessons, that they decided to FaceTime with her and Grandpa and play the music I’d introduced to them yesterday. She kindly told me I got rave reviews from the boys. 🙂 They had also remarked to her how very tall I was, lol! I’m 5’8″ and was wearing 2-inch heels instead of my flat shoes (the former is warmer in the winter), so I suppose that contributed to my appearing quite tall.
These three new students this week now bring my student numbers to 27. I did lose another one, though, besides the one in November, at the end of last year. One who had just started in September. Oh, well, you win some, you lose some. My methods and style aren’t for everyone, and that’s okay. I’m really blessed to have the students I have, no matter how long they stay. God is good, and gives many delightful and precious gifts.
Roscuro, I’ve got two siblings studying with me who had previously attended music programs that sound like what you’re describing in Music for Young Children. The older child, a boy, is 7 and started in the group program at something like age 5. The younger, a girl, is 5, and was in it from birth. She is FLYING through My First Piano Adventure Book A now. Her sense of rhythm and so much is really natural to her from all those years of mom-and-baby music together classes. It’s really exciting to see how being exposed to music in an organic way paves the way for deeper understanding of the underlying fundamentals of music.
It was a big night for Annie Oakley, I’d ordered a box of he mixed Temptations cat treats from Amazon a few days ago and broke open her favorite flavor, dairy, and mixed it in with her regular dry food.
Got some grocery shopping done at Sprouts, there was a line just to get into the store. I decided to double up on some things like milk and OJ to avoid so many repeated trips for the basics.
The ‘pottery’ includes the hammered copper pieces purchase in Mexico SO many years ago, and some more recent pieces from a Made-in-Mexico dish set I purchased.
DJ, I am mostly out early so I don’t see many people. I have not heard the numbers lately. But I did hear there are four cases in the nearby retirement home that has not had any before. We have several church members living there.
Morning! Oh how I wish ya’ll could be here in this forest this morning. A fresh five inches of snow on the ground, the pines are dressed in fluffy sparkling flakes. The air is fresh and the sounds of snow blowers abound 😊 ⛄️ “tis a good day
Good morning! The city pastor preached a word of encouragement today from Paul’s prayer for the believers in Colossians (1:3-6):
“We always thank God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, when we pray for you, for we have heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love you have for all the saints because of the hope reserved for you in heaven. You have already heard about this hope in the message of truth, the gospel that has come to you. It is bearing fruit and growing all over the world, just as it has among you since the day you heard it and recognized God’s grace in the truth.”
He did it as an encouragement, as our province goes through another lockdown, as the situation is beginning to overwhelm hospitals, and churches can only meet online right now. Many churches in the province have adapted, a handful are talking of civil disobedience and making it onto the news. The city pastor made it clear that their pastoral staff are in agreement that this is not a time for civil disobedience, but he also made no condemnation of churches who felt differently. The city church did meet in person through the summer and autumn, following the restrictions on numbers, and no outbreaks occured, but they are again complying with the total lockdown procedures.
Part of the pastor’s sermon was on the deceit of Isaac, Jacob, and Laban, since we are as a church reading through Genesis right now. I had been reading about that earlier and thinking about the deceit on the individual/family level and how there is now so much deceit on a grand scale level. Good to see how God brought Esau and Jacob back together for reconciliation in God’s timing and way. God transforms hearts ♡
Something went wonky with my page…it’s all green and I can scarcely read the text now. I have been messin’ with my browser and server…that’s what I get for going and messin’ with stuff!
Janice I suppose I can understand how she would say that…it is a disrespect of God isn’t it? Taking the l life of another into your own hands and ending that life? I too had never heard it used in that way but..yes…I see it….
I get so nervous when there is something that I have set a certain way, and can’t remember how I got it that way, and then someone decides to change something. No!!!
I think she was thinking of abortion being blasphemy from the point of view that the life taken carries in it the image of God so taking that life is a total disrespect of that precious image He endows each person with from conception forward.
Years ago, email did not have the auto-saving feature it now has. I would be in the midst of a long email (which is how I kept in touch with some friends), and Hubby would insist that he had to do something on my computer or laptop right then and there. I would ask him to wait until I finished the email, but nope, he tended to be impatient, so he wanted to do it right at that moment.
So he would open another tab and do whatever he had to do, and at least a few times, the computer then froze, or some other glitch happened, meaning he had to shut it down for a bit. My long, but unfinished, email would be gone. 😦
It’s funny to look back on now, but Hubby’s impatience could be frustrating. We went through a period of time when he would try to finish my sentences because he didn’t want to take time to listen to what I was trying to say. But he would finish them wrong, so I would start again, He would interject again, and again be wrong. And he might even try a third time, and for a third time be wrong. Then he would get mad at me for taking so long to say what I was trying to say. 😀 (That may have been when he was drinking, which did have a bad effect on his attitudes.)
I can see it coming from the point of God is Creator of all life…and who are we to take that life away at will? I had a client at a Pregnancy Center in FL in the 80’s who stated to me after watching “Window to the Womb” that she knew “it” was a baby. But, she could not let her boyfriend know he was not the father…therefore she was going to “kill it”…and she did. I was sick and cried for the next week…she was the first client I had met with since opening up the center…
Janice, on your friend’s description, all sin is blasphemy, because our commiting sin is a defiance of the authority of God in our lives. But it is not the unforgivable blasphemy against the Holy Spirit, which is the rejection of the salvation of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.
I miss church. I miss seeing and talking to friends (even just people I don’t know) face to face. I think I’m losing my social skills. Sigh.
I also really want to go see my grand babies. K’s mom says they are just so tired right now. She had stopped by to drop off some supper for them. But husband’s sinus surgery is on Wednesday, and Alberta has extended their restrictions, so we wait.
Kare (2:50) I miss in-person church too. I sometimes think about how wonderful it will be when we all (or most of us) can finally return. Will we all just sit in our “usual” spots? Or will those have been overtaken by some of those more daring souls who have turned up throughout this whole time despite the pandemic. (btw, our pastor and his wife are currently recovering from covid, there were some pretty real risks in doing that despite how it was too often downplayed in the early days.)
I have not really used MeWe yet, but thought I would give it a trial. I think it could be useful for groups that want to chat outside of Facebook. So far that is the main use I have determined. I wanted to be on there in case any of my groups get off of Facebook such as a Bible study group. With the climate like it is these days, one never knows if Bible study may be banned for the supposed hate speech it contains.
Mumsee’s birthday?
Happy Birthday, Young Lady!!! You get younger with each young’un that you spend time with. Be careful not to get so young that you vanish before our eyes!
Not really interested in a new social media platform Still haven’t joined Twitter or Instagram. I only went on FB in 2014 because it was the only way of keeping in some form of contact (mostly watching posts scroll by) with widespread friends and family who had all been on there for years before me. I grew up without social media and do not need it to exist, and I certainly do not need to be an echo chamber for my political and religious views – my family alone holds wildly different positions to me on things but they are still family. If FB kicks Christians off, which I do not find at all likely at this juncture seeing as there are tens of thousands of churches with profiles on FB and millions of church members, all of whom are an important source of ad revenue, we can still write letters, telephone each other, and when all this pandemic is over, which it will be eventually, see each other in person. The early church didn’t even have telephones or a regular mail service, and they still managed to establish a church that survived hundreds of years of state persecution by Rome.
Why thank you, Janice, but my birthday is in Sept still. DJ was referring to my facebook page which I hear is filled with good birthday wishes i have never seen unless somebody forwards them to me. Never recovered my password when I changed devices.
And I can tell Alexa to play Jim Brickman music on Pandora radio 😛
That little guy is amazing…just boggles the brain at such a gifting imparted to him by our Creator…
Wandering Views 
Good morning! Off soon to find sandhill cranes (and maybe a whooping crane as well).
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Tomorrow
and Tomorrow
And Tomorrow
Creeps in this steady pace
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Good morning, nice to have the weekend off. I was so exhausted by the end of my 12 hour yesterday that I forgot my bag of personal nursing equipment (stethoscope, etc.) at the clinic. Sigh, don’t really want to drive the 1.5 hour round trip to retrieve it on my time off.
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Ah, I thought Chas was quoting Shakespeare. Both my parents had to study Macbeth in high school and sometimes quote snatches:
“Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow,
Creeps in this petty pace from day to day,
To the last syllable of recorded time;
And all our yesterdays have lighted fools
The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle!
Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player,
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage,
And then is heard no more. It is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.”
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But the above speech is made by a man who has sold his birthright for a mess of pottage, and it has turned to dust and ashes in his mouth. He became king as a result of murder and intrigue, but lost his peace of mind and his wife, and is about to be defeated in a battle for the kingdom. As a greater than Shakespeare said, “He that saves his life shall lose it.”
That is why Hebrews warns Christians to not let any root of evil defile them, lest they become like Esau and sell their eternal birthright for temporal gain, power, or pleasure. Those that do so are the seed that grows among thorns, “but the cares of the world and the deceitfulness of riches and the desires for other things enter in and choke the word, and it proves unfruitful.” (Mark 4:16)
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In Macbeth’s speech, Shakespeare is drawing inspiration from a Psalm (90), that also compares our lives to a tale that is told, but one that has meaning, provided we seek the Giver of all meaning:
“Lord, thou hast been our dwelling place in all generations.
“Before the mountains were brought forth, or ever thou hadst formed the earth and the world, even from everlasting to everlasting, thou art God.
“Thou turnest man to destruction; and sayest, Return, ye children of men.
“For a thousand years in thy sight are but as yesterday when it is past, and as a watch in the night.
“Thou carriest them away as with a flood; they are as a sleep: in the morning they are like grass which groweth up.
“In the morning it flourisheth, and groweth up; in the evening it is cut down, and withereth.
“For we are consumed by thine anger, and by thy wrath are we troubled.
“Thou hast set our iniquities before thee, our secret sins in the light of thy countenance.
“For all our days are passed away in thy wrath: we spend our years as a tale that is told.
“The days of our years are threescore years and ten; and if by reason of strength they be fourscore years, yet is their strength labour and sorrow; for it is soon cut off, and we fly away.
“Who knoweth the power of thine anger? even according to thy fear, so is thy wrath.
“So teach us to number our days, that we may apply our hearts unto wisdom.
“Return, O Lord, how long? and let it repent thee concerning thy servants.
“O satisfy us early with thy mercy; that we may rejoice and be glad all our days.
“Make us glad according to the days wherein thou hast afflicted us, and the years wherein we have seen evil.
“Let thy work appear unto thy servants, and thy glory unto their children.
“And let the beauty of the Lord our God be upon us: and establish thou the work of our hands upon us; yea, the work of our hands establish thou it.”
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Phos, Chas did get that from Shakespeare
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Life is but a shadow,
a poor player
Who struts and frets his hour upon the stage
And then, is heard no more.
I won’t quote the res, it gets worse.
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Cheryl – I’m looking forward to any pictures you get of whooping cranes, don’t get whooping cough.
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The starting line of Macbeth’s speech, “tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow”, reminds me of a funny habit of Tiny, when she is trying to determine when something in the near future will take place. She understands the concept of tomorrow, and so Jeep’s adding tomorrows to count in how many days something will happen. For example, the day after tomorrow is, to Tiny, tomorrow’s tomorrow, while in three days is tomorrow’s tomorrow’s tomorrow. It can get a bit bewildering at any greater length of days.
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*keeps, not Jeep’s. Autocorrect c’est stupide.
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Morning! Oh I like the lamp and pottery…and the kitty! Is that the lovely wood/glass cupboard you were speaking of the other day Dj?
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Speaking of Tiny, I have a question for 6 if she is around today. Tiny has asked me for piano lessons, and I was wondering if 6 knew of some good beginners books for a four year old who is just learning her ABC’s.
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Good morning. Is that lamp approved for outdoor use?
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That pottery looks vulnerable to me!
Is it insured?
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D2 is having a virtual birthday party today for her 1 year old. What do people do at such an event? How can I get the cake and ice cream from 90 miles away?
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Oh, for the time when (if ever) such things are behind us, Peter!
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We didn’t get to go to see cranes after all. Hopefully Monday.
Chinese printing and Bibles, and the problem for Chinese and American Christians: https://www.firstthings.com/web-exclusives/2020/12/chinas-threat-to-the-bible
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That kind of reminds me of when I read books on the Holocaust and I am secretly cheering the person on to keep going because I know they are so close to being saved. They have no idea, however, and I think how difficult it must be to keep hope alive. That is true of many countries today, too, where people have lived for decades enduring crises I cannot imagine. That reminds me to be grateful for all I do have!
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Cheryl, I remember several years ago seeing in the book section of a dollar store chain some very cheap editiona of the KJV. I opened to the title page and saw the words ‘Printed in China’. It was so surreal that I had to point it out to my family who was with me and they were also flabbergasted that a country to which Bibles were routinely smuggled was printing Bibles. We concluded they must do it because most of the Chinese workers wouldn’t be able to read English and since the Bible is a perennial best seller, it was good business sense to produce them. How tragic that the wider economic implications of printing cheap Bibles for Americans is leading to ignoring the plight of the Chinese. One wonders if some of the Uighur forced labourers are placed in the printing factories of Amity. There are so many other cheap, convenient goods sold here and made in China that use Uighur labor.
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Cheryl, I keep forgetting to tell you about a birthday gift I got from one of my daughters. It is a small wooden easel with three by five cards to put on it. The cards each have a calendar page printed on them. Above the plain calendar numerals is a bird drawn for each month. It made me think of your photos and how you could do this. I have no idea what she paid for it, of course. I do enjoy it, however, and wanted to mention it to you.
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Peter, we likely won’t see a whooping crane. They are bigger and they are white, so they are visible in a crowd of sandhills, so if they are there we should see them. The person who told us about this flock did see a whooper, but she didn’t see it up close, and they aren’t necessarily in the same place from one day to another. (She saw several last year, but she only saw them once.) Still, they are seen fairly often in the winter in various parts of southern Indiana (there is said to be a pair at another spot that my husband and I have visited three times so far and where we hope someday to actually be present at the same time as flocks of snow geese are there)–hopefully someday we will see snow geese and someday whooping cranes, but for now the flocks of sandhill cranes are amazing and a bit more reliable.
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Thanks, Kathaleena. I have considering selling small framed prints and cards, and looked into the best way to distribute them if I did. Right now that is “on hold,” but it is something I’ve looked into and may do at some point. Each year I give my mother-in-law some cards for Christmas, and she always tells me about some of the people she sends them to.
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Yes, that’s the cabinet — shelves with glass doors (and old-looking latches and hinges) on top, but vertical open “slots” along the bottom.
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Michelle, pull some ice cream out of your freezer and eat it when they’re are having cake and ice cream?
Today I get to watch a live-streamed wedding of the first baby that I ever guessed the mom was pregnant. For some reason, I have guessed when women are first pregnant (like the second or third month) before they are telling anyone. I’ve actually started writing it down because no one believes me. Any way, this mom and her husband shared youth leader duties with us and one Friday evening it suddenly dawned on me that she must be pregnant. She caught me looking at her curiously and then took me for coffee to tell me, but that it was still secret. This young man has found a young lady who is perfect for him – so thankful they both love the Lord.
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Yay for a weekend. What a week. Is 2020 really over is that just an illusion (and not a very good one!)?
Our covid death rate hit a record in LA County yesterday.
Clearing out some paperwork in the home office yesterday I came across the announcement of the first coronavirus briefing I covered (Feb. 25 by city health officials). I remember the crowded room with media, everyone asking all kinds of questions about how serious this could be and what is this “thing,” anyway? Little did we know what we were in for …
++++++++++++++++++++++++
It’s still foggy here, but we’re getting more high winds, I heard one of my empty trash bins fly off the short concrete ledge from its storage niche on the driveway last night. High surf as well.
But absolutely no rain in the forecast. And it could hit 80 next weekend.
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Thanks for the card, Michelle. It made me cry.
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Morning all. Had a wonderful time doing Bible study. Reminding me to be faithful.
Oh, please pray. lots to do and I got a text from out pastor today asking me to give a testimony in each of the services tomorrow.
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Bibles printed in China? So are those Christians boycotting anything made in China boycotting the Bible too? Oh, the irony!
I just checked- the bilingual Bible I use was printed in the US.
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Is Michelle “attending” a virtual birthday party as well?
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I’ll be on 80 going past your on-ramp tomorrow, Jo, so sorry I won’t be able to see you. 😦
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The most recently printed Bible I have is from Cambridge University Press, which, as the article Cheryl linked to notes, does not print in China. My edition says it was printed in the Netherlands. I also have a study Bible that was printed in the US, but it was printed 30 years ago.
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I had the Word Weavers meeting this morning. It is such a great group similar to my Lady’s bible study group. Two of us are members of both groups. We had a great range of writings this a.m., one promotional/testimonial piece for a business, part of a children’s fantasy chapter book, a nonfiction book chapter on Christianity in Jane Austin’s times, a section from a novella written in verse, and my article about using brown craft paper for teaching Bible lessons to children. We always learn things in this group.
I have a notebook full of materials to become familiar with related to my new position on the church Direction Team.
And I got my first email and Facebook posts done in my new position as Publicist for an Atlanta Christian writer’s group.
I wonder if my brain will explode from all the new things I am stuffing into it. All’s good so far.
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Well, I just looked at my Bible, ESV printed by Crossway and it was printed in China. Sigh.
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I own Bibles printed in China.
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It got me looking to see if any of the newer printings of books I have that are not Bibles were printed in China. I tried fiction, classics, non-fiction, and reference. So far, I’ve only found one, a 75th Anniversary edition of ‘Little House on the Prairie’. All the rest are North American or UK prints.
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The story behind the release of the Pentagon Papers, now that the reporter is dead (he agreed to be interviewed on the condition the story not be released until his death): https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/07/us/pentagon-papers-neil-sheehan.html
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On the news this morning in Atlanta, the report stated that Dekalb County has 8,000 Covid vaccines at the health department. Only 400 people have chosen to get them. I think that many of the black population here do not trust the vaccines. And many of the white population do not trust those who would administer it. Art said he would wait and get it through the health care provider. We went to the health department once a long time back to get out flu vaccines. I think we had to give our SSN to get it. I might be wrong about that but I remember we had to give more info there than we typically did.
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I have a Super Giant Print HCSB printed in Korea, typeset in Denmark and edited in Peachtree City, GA which is near Art’s office. All that was a surprise to me.
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Hello everyone. My friend M made eggs Benedict for my birthday this morning. She made the best breakfast potatoes and strawberries in balsamic vinegar. Yum. We had cranberry juice with fizzy water. Then laughed and talked for two hours. Mr P chose not to go. He went to Whataburger. 🤷♀️🤷♀️🤷♀️
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The Chinese evidentially like to buy “American”…all that land in Oklahoma and Texas. They like Jamaica as well…they are getting closer and closer 😳
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When the headline and the news story don’t say the same thing. Headline and first paragraph follow:
Congresswoman Apologizes for Making an Approving Reference to Hitler
Representative Mary Miller, an Illinois Republican, had faced condemnation and calls to resign for declaring at a rally: “Hitler was right on one thing: He said, ‘Whoever has the youth, has the future.’”
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Roscuro, 10:24, how exciting, Tiny asking you to teach her the piano!
Two different method series come to mind that, in my opinion, are the best options for a four-year-old: My First Piano Adventure, published by Faber and distributed by Hal Leonard; and Piano Safari.
Piano Safari is recommended from age four to around ten. MFPA carries a recommendation of ages five to six.
That said, my opinion is that MFPA is a better place for a four-year-old to begin, even though that age is younger than their age guidelines. The series — three levels: A, B, & C — proceeds very slowly, with lots and lots of reinforcement along the way. Each level has two books, “Lesson” and “Writing,” and Book A is entirely pre-staff. The Lesson books are 88 pages and the Writing books 64, so there’s lots of material.
Their pre-reading approach is to first use finger numbers only (on pages with colorful graphics that fit the lyrics); then to introduce note values accompanied by finger numbers; then to begin putting note names inside the noteheads, removing finger numbers on consecutive repeated tones.
Level B begins, after a brief review of concepts introduced in Level A, with moving directly onto the grand staff, which I find rather unusual, as a lot of methods start staff reading with a single staff and then progress to the grand staff after some landmark notes have been introduced on each single staff.
Disclosure: I am just now beginning to teach in the Level B book for the first time, so I can’t tell you my experience with teaching going immediately from pre-reading to grand staff reading, because I haven’t gotten there yet! Piano Girl is my first student I’ve moved from Book A to Book B, and she’s still in the introductory (review) unit that precedes the grand staff. So she will be my guinea pig as I try this out. 🙂
Piano Safari also has three levels, each with over 100 pages in the Repertoire book alone. These books advance more quickly, although they’re slower in Level 1 than in Levels 2 and 3, to make sure students get a good grasp of the intervals of a second and a third, both separately (with reading pieces that move by seconds and unisons only) and then combined (with pieces that use unisons, seconds, and thirds only). Fifths are introduced in the second book, and then there follow pieces with thirds and fifths, to distinguish between movement from space-to-next-space thirds compared to space-to-space-skip-a-space fifths, or line-to-next-line thirds compared to line-to-line-skip-a-line fifths.
Sorry about that eyeful of hyphens and what-not in the previous graph. 🙂 I do like that Piano Safari devotes an entire unit (a lot of times 20 or more pages in the Repertoire book) to one or a very limited number of intervals. After the thirds and fifths combination, then the next unit combined seconds, thirds, and fifths. After all that, then fourths were introduced, and later, sixths, sevenths, and octaves. Interestingly, they don’t introduce any note names in Level 1 except for the landmarks of Treble G (line 2) and Bass C (space 2). All reading at that level is done by determining the distance from the landmark or the preceding note. The names of all the rest of the notes on the grand staff and middle C are introduced early in Level 2.
By the time a student is at the end of the third level, s/he is ready for (and has already been introduced to a little of the easier) standard repertoire. My daughter 6th Arrow was my first student to complete the series, and she is a good player now, tackling music by Bach, Beethoven, and so on.
I should also point out that Piano Safari doesn’t only have reading pieces, but rote (pattern) pieces, as well (in Levels 1 and 2), that you teach by a combination of teacher demonstration and student pre-listening to audio tracks provided for the non-reading pieces. It gets kids playing in various parts of the piano compared to the limited area in the middle where they play when they are first learning to read music.
Piano Safari published their second edition in 2018, and there were some changes they made from their 2008 edition that I didn’t particularly care for. However, it seems that the students who have been hearing quality music in the home, with intricate rhythms and the like, are doing alright with the newer edition nonetheless. The ones without much of an in-home music background, though, seem to be struggling more with the 2018 edition than the same kinds of students who did the 2008 edition.
I would think Tiny, though, would do well whichever piano series you choose to do with her. The fact that she’s already had a piano in the house that I’m sure she has heard played and probably has been given opportunity to play herself, I’m guessing, is a HUGE benefit when embarking on lessons.
I’ll give you some links in the next comments, where you can read more about My First Piano Adventure and Piano Safari — if you haven’t had your fill yet with this looooong comment! — and see some sample pages.
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My First Piano Adventure info:
https://www.sheetmusicplus.com/series/my-first-piano-adventure/1303514
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Piano Safari home page:
https://pianosafari.com/
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Roscuro, if you’re interested in reading more about the philosophy behind the Piano Safari method and want some practical teaching tips for that method (and, really, some of them would apply to any method), here is a page on their site with links to several essays I’ve enjoyed reading and found useful and/or good food for thought:
https://pianosafari.com/our-philosophy/#miniessays
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Hello all. Happy New Year!
It’s too busy for me to read much or comment on weekdays anymore, as things are extremely busy. I want to say, though, that I’m so sorry to have heard about those tragic deaths recently of which some of you spoke: Kathaleena, Kare, RKessler. All of those families who lost loved ones have been in my prayers since I found out.
RK, I hope you and Miguel fare well with covid. You are in my prayers, also.
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6, thanks for the info. I have been teaching Tiny a little, just impromptu lessons. About a year ago, she asked to learn ‘Twinkle, twinkle’ and so first I used an echo method, where she would play each note after I played it. Then, later, I started pointing to the key she should play and tell her how many times to play it. But I noticed she always used just her index finger to play notes, so when she asked this morning, I started to show her how to use each finger to play notes separately. I can make up impromptu lessons for individual issues, but feel daunted by all the teaching of keys, and rhythm, and reading of music.
When I started lessons, I spent three years in a group learning program called Music for Young Children, and we learned all the theory so very practically. When later I studied for my music theory exams, I had already been introduced to concepts such as the circle of fifths. Looking back, it seemed effortless and organic to me, but it must have been hard work for our teacher. I would like Tiny to learn all that just as organically.
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I started three new students this week. One is the sister of a girl I’ve been teaching at home the last couple of years. Mom emailed me Tuesday morning asking if I had an openings for L’s little sister, and I actually did (because of that boy who quit at the end of November). So eight hours after the initial inquiry, I had a new student sitting on my bench, taking her first piano lesson. 🙂 Quickest turn-around ever from first-time contact to new student enrollment!
Then yesterday, I met two new students — brothers — at the studio where I also work. They and their parents and other sibling moved here from Tennessee, and were super excited to get started. Younger boy is 10, almost 11, and studied for six months, but hadn’t had any lessons since April of last year. Older boy is 12 and has never studied piano but decided he wanted to. (And his twin brother decided he didn’t want to learn piano.)
Both boys did very well at their first lessons yesterday. I emailed their grandmother in Ohio, who is paying for the lessons and requested periodic updates on how they’re doing, to let her know what we did at their first lessons and how well they did, and how sweet and mannerly they are. Grandma replied that they were so excited after their lessons, that they decided to FaceTime with her and Grandpa and play the music I’d introduced to them yesterday. She kindly told me I got rave reviews from the boys. 🙂 They had also remarked to her how very tall I was, lol! I’m 5’8″ and was wearing 2-inch heels instead of my flat shoes (the former is warmer in the winter), so I suppose that contributed to my appearing quite tall.
These three new students this week now bring my student numbers to 27. I did lose another one, though, besides the one in November, at the end of last year. One who had just started in September. Oh, well, you win some, you lose some. My methods and style aren’t for everyone, and that’s okay. I’m really blessed to have the students I have, no matter how long they stay. God is good, and gives many delightful and precious gifts.
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Roscuro, I’ve got two siblings studying with me who had previously attended music programs that sound like what you’re describing in Music for Young Children. The older child, a boy, is 7 and started in the group program at something like age 5. The younger, a girl, is 5, and was in it from birth. She is FLYING through My First Piano Adventure Book A now. Her sense of rhythm and so much is really natural to her from all those years of mom-and-baby music together classes. It’s really exciting to see how being exposed to music in an organic way paves the way for deeper understanding of the underlying fundamentals of music.
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It was a big night for Annie Oakley, I’d ordered a box of he mixed Temptations cat treats from Amazon a few days ago and broke open her favorite flavor, dairy, and mixed it in with her regular dry food.
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Got some grocery shopping done at Sprouts, there was a line just to get into the store. I decided to double up on some things like milk and OJ to avoid so many repeated trips for the basics.
Janice, are things settling down in GA at all?
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AJ, yes, we’re long familiar with “Temptations” treats (not a fave with the vet, but you do what you gotta do, right?).
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Still.
There she is.
Sitting on the table.
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The ‘pottery’ includes the hammered copper pieces purchase in Mexico SO many years ago, and some more recent pieces from a Made-in-Mexico dish set I purchased.
Trust me, my eyes were on her.
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El Gato
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Still remember when I was walking my former 2 dogs in a former neighborhood, when two guys passed and said “Dos Perros!”
That became their nickname for me and my boyfriend at the time who heard the tale 2nd hand.
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DJ, I am mostly out early so I don’t see many people. I have not heard the numbers lately. But I did hear there are four cases in the nearby retirement home that has not had any before. We have several church members living there.
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Good morning. Granddaughter is not happy this morning. Not particularly unhappy, just not happy.
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The tomb was empty.
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So is this room.
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I am here Mumsee. I just don’t have anything to add to the conversation.
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Morning all. May God use me this morning as I share a testimony in both services
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Chas?
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Morning! Oh how I wish ya’ll could be here in this forest this morning. A fresh five inches of snow on the ground, the pines are dressed in fluffy sparkling flakes. The air is fresh and the sounds of snow blowers abound 😊 ⛄️ “tis a good day
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Good morning! The city pastor preached a word of encouragement today from Paul’s prayer for the believers in Colossians (1:3-6):
“We always thank God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, when we pray for you, for we have heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love you have for all the saints because of the hope reserved for you in heaven. You have already heard about this hope in the message of truth, the gospel that has come to you. It is bearing fruit and growing all over the world, just as it has among you since the day you heard it and recognized God’s grace in the truth.”
He did it as an encouragement, as our province goes through another lockdown, as the situation is beginning to overwhelm hospitals, and churches can only meet online right now. Many churches in the province have adapted, a handful are talking of civil disobedience and making it onto the news. The city pastor made it clear that their pastoral staff are in agreement that this is not a time for civil disobedience, but he also made no condemnation of churches who felt differently. The city church did meet in person through the summer and autumn, following the restrictions on numbers, and no outbreaks occured, but they are again complying with the total lockdown procedures.
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It surely is quiet around here.
Nothing going on here either.
That’s good.
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On the news this a.m. the report on Covid said that the number of deaths had gone back up to the Sept. numbers.
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Hi Chas. Good to see you.
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A friend recently said that she believes that abortion is a form of blasphemy. I had not heard it described like that before. Any thoughts?
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Part of the pastor’s sermon was on the deceit of Isaac, Jacob, and Laban, since we are as a church reading through Genesis right now. I had been reading about that earlier and thinking about the deceit on the individual/family level and how there is now so much deceit on a grand scale level. Good to see how God brought Esau and Jacob back together for reconciliation in God’s timing and way. God transforms hearts ♡
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I had a text and photo from Waco this a.m. showing the beautiful snow they received.
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Our covid numbers remain sky high and not (yet) peaking, apparently.
Sunny here.
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Our sermon today will be “God for Us” (Rom. 8:31-39)
Another fill-in for the pulpit this morning. I’m missing our pastor, especially right now.
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Something went wonky with my page…it’s all green and I can scarcely read the text now. I have been messin’ with my browser and server…that’s what I get for going and messin’ with stuff!
Janice I suppose I can understand how she would say that…it is a disrespect of God isn’t it? Taking the l life of another into your own hands and ending that life? I too had never heard it used in that way but..yes…I see it….
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NancyJill – My advice? Don’t mess with stuff! 😀
I get so nervous when there is something that I have set a certain way, and can’t remember how I got it that way, and then someone decides to change something. No!!!
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Well I done messed with it and I have no idea how to set it to rights….I guess I’m stuck with a green background…and I shall squint!! 😛
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Closing in on 100 ♡
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Oh…so I went back over to Google to log in and it’s not green…it’s a conspiracy!! 😂
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I think she was thinking of abortion being blasphemy from the point of view that the life taken carries in it the image of God so taking that life is a total disrespect of that precious image He endows each person with from conception forward.
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Years ago, email did not have the auto-saving feature it now has. I would be in the midst of a long email (which is how I kept in touch with some friends), and Hubby would insist that he had to do something on my computer or laptop right then and there. I would ask him to wait until I finished the email, but nope, he tended to be impatient, so he wanted to do it right at that moment.
So he would open another tab and do whatever he had to do, and at least a few times, the computer then froze, or some other glitch happened, meaning he had to shut it down for a bit. My long, but unfinished, email would be gone. 😦
It’s funny to look back on now, but Hubby’s impatience could be frustrating. We went through a period of time when he would try to finish my sentences because he didn’t want to take time to listen to what I was trying to say. But he would finish them wrong, so I would start again, He would interject again, and again be wrong. And he might even try a third time, and for a third time be wrong. Then he would get mad at me for taking so long to say what I was trying to say. 😀 (That may have been when he was drinking, which did have a bad effect on his attitudes.)
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I can see it coming from the point of God is Creator of all life…and who are we to take that life away at will? I had a client at a Pregnancy Center in FL in the 80’s who stated to me after watching “Window to the Womb” that she knew “it” was a baby. But, she could not let her boyfriend know he was not the father…therefore she was going to “kill it”…and she did. I was sick and cried for the next week…she was the first client I had met with since opening up the center…
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Janice, on your friend’s description, all sin is blasphemy, because our commiting sin is a defiance of the authority of God in our lives. But it is not the unforgivable blasphemy against the Holy Spirit, which is the rejection of the salvation of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.
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I miss church. I miss seeing and talking to friends (even just people I don’t know) face to face. I think I’m losing my social skills. Sigh.
I also really want to go see my grand babies. K’s mom says they are just so tired right now. She had stopped by to drop off some supper for them. But husband’s sinus surgery is on Wednesday, and Alberta has extended their restrictions, so we wait.
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15 more to 100!
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Is anyone else here planning to set up a MeWe account?
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I did and didn’t like it so I canceled it🥴
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Kare (2:50) I miss in-person church too. I sometimes think about how wonderful it will be when we all (or most of us) can finally return. Will we all just sit in our “usual” spots? Or will those have been overtaken by some of those more daring souls who have turned up throughout this whole time despite the pandemic. (btw, our pastor and his wife are currently recovering from covid, there were some pretty real risks in doing that despite how it was too often downplayed in the early days.)
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How does one delete facebook account?
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Never mind, he figured it out. I suppose I should ask for a password reset so I can delete mine but nothing on there of importance that I am aware of.
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Mrs L set up a MeWe. I don’t know if she likes it or not.
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I looked at MeWe when Google+ went away, but didn’t set up an account. It looked confusing.
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All our birthday wishes to you, mumsee 🙂
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I have not really used MeWe yet, but thought I would give it a trial. I think it could be useful for groups that want to chat outside of Facebook. So far that is the main use I have determined. I wanted to be on there in case any of my groups get off of Facebook such as a Bible study group. With the climate like it is these days, one never knows if Bible study may be banned for the supposed hate speech it contains.
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Mumsee’s birthday?
Happy Birthday, Young Lady!!! You get younger with each young’un that you spend time with. Be careful not to get so young that you vanish before our eyes!
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I am partly through the church policy and procedures manual. I am using a highlighter to mark things I want to inquire about during orientation.
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3 more posts to 100! Go for it, someone else, please!
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Hi Janice.
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How are you all doing this fine Sunday afternoon?
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Could this be 100?
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Yup!
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Not really interested in a new social media platform Still haven’t joined Twitter or Instagram. I only went on FB in 2014 because it was the only way of keeping in some form of contact (mostly watching posts scroll by) with widespread friends and family who had all been on there for years before me. I grew up without social media and do not need it to exist, and I certainly do not need to be an echo chamber for my political and religious views – my family alone holds wildly different positions to me on things but they are still family. If FB kicks Christians off, which I do not find at all likely at this juncture seeing as there are tens of thousands of churches with profiles on FB and millions of church members, all of whom are an important source of ad revenue, we can still write letters, telephone each other, and when all this pandemic is over, which it will be eventually, see each other in person. The early church didn’t even have telephones or a regular mail service, and they still managed to establish a church that survived hundreds of years of state persecution by Rome.
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Why thank you, Janice, but my birthday is in Sept still. DJ was referring to my facebook page which I hear is filled with good birthday wishes i have never seen unless somebody forwards them to me. Never recovered my password when I changed devices.
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There are several years’ worth of birthday wishes on your FB page mumsee 🙂
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Kind of like a tree falling in the forest when no one is there
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Here is something that may have been posted before, but it is fun news. For those who love piano!
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Amazing! I can play Twinkle Twinkle, if I have a book.
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I can play CDs in my CD player!
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And I can tell Alexa to play Jim Brickman music on Pandora radio 😛
That little guy is amazing…just boggles the brain at such a gifting imparted to him by our Creator…
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I must confess, I hate Alexa. Now they have Echo too. Never in my house. I don’t want a machine listening to me.
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Such fun, I just sent Mumsee a friend request!
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It’s Monday.
And the cat is still on the table.
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And mumsee will probably never see it.
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