Be Thankful!

I am thankful for so many things - too many to list at the moment but I will be recounting them on the airplane as I go visit my long lost child I haven't seen in 3 months. Yay!

Be thankful! Happy Thanksgiving.

Is that all there is?

In the morning with the kids we usually read from a devotion book written by a guy from back home. My husband and I often get a chuckle from his familiar midwestern and ethnic perspective. Allow me to share a portion of that to make a point about my shopping trip yesterday.

He writes:

People think the Great Plains, where I live, are flat, but they aren 't. Actually, we've got rolling hills - lots of them, enough so that the quiet quilt of land undulates like the sea. In fact, the first white folks here thougfht of the prairies as an ocean of grass.

When they came, there were no trees. The highest point on the landscape, almost inevitably, became their churches. Seen from a distance, a tall church in the middle of a huddle of buildings would have looked as if the entire town were pointing to God. I like that.

Then along came business. Soon enough, the tallest buildings weren't churches but grain silos, big and usually white. They towered over the churches. In a way, you might say that what the people aimed at, or so it looked, was storing up grain. Business may have become the strongest institution of society.

Today however, the highest features on the horizon are communication towers. It's as if business isn't the heart of things anymore; media is.

He went on to talk about media, marketing and what captures our heart's desire.

This was perfectly played out for me yesterday when I dropped into an electronics store for a small part and realized I should be thinking ahead to Christmas and gift buying. Like any mom my motiviation is to find something that will delight my son or daughter and let them know how much they mean to me.

So I'm looking at all great new gadgets on the shelf and I realize that all the hype over these products centers around downloading songs, internet broadcasts, sports channels, movies and on and on. And I wonder - why in the world would I want to pay all this money to just alienate them further from real human to human interaction with the people who love them. I mean, really, is that all there is?

Wouldn't a new set of Rook cards really go much further in enriching the parent child relationship? No, you say, that's not gonna rack up points with them when their friends ask what they got for Christmas. Alas, I'm doomed to buy an i-present! Well, that just gets a big Bah humbug from me.

To top it off, it took me another 24 hours to catch up to this cultural phenomenon: As I walked out the door I noticed several young people with sleeping bags and grocery sacks piled up around them under the cover of the building. I'm thinking, my, I didn't realize this town had such a homeless problem. Then later on the other side of town, I see more young people, sleeping bags, even a lounge chair near the store entrance and you could tell they had spent the night. I'm wondering if it's time to get down to that soup kitchen and roll up our sleeves to help this epidemic of poor people.

Finally, today on the news I GET IT. The latest release of a very popular and limited (of course) electronic game goes on sale today. Some crazy young man paid his friend $200 to spend the night for him and hold his place in line. And another on the news actually broke into a fist fight and the police were called in - all over who could be the first one into the store. Homeless, indeed!!

Bah Bah Humbug - I need serious help with my Christmas spirit here.

I'm a Winner

Woo Hoo! I am so surprised that I won, I would like to thank ... What? That's not necessary? I feel like a celebrity to be referenced on Mary's blog, owlhaven.wordpress.com, and win her Golden Keyboard award. She has such a cool site - I have just started reading it.



I only know her through her little sis. I still remember the first time I met Sophie at a Denny's several years ago. The whole purpose of the meeting at a restaurant was to make sure that my daughter hadn't met some scary person on the internet. But, of course, she was Mary's sister and every bit a sweetheart!

So I suppose that means I might have more than my usual 2 visitors. So if you are new to my blog, let me just say that I am new to my blog. Maybe I can stick with it this time.

New Things

So a word about my new links. These are pretty random - I will admit. However, in reference to the last post about cruising and in light of (or in dark of) the dreary weather we've been having I thought you might enjoy knowing that the sun is shining somewhere.

First of all, a confession: I am a webcam junkie. Like today, when my son was travelling over 1 of 2 passes to his new job I had all the possible routes tracked with road cams. I just have to know how it is going in case he takes that road. And I always check 2 or 3 area webcams of my midwest daughter's college location. So I often know before I get her little *musical tone* message that "it's snowing!". Kind of a nosy little habit I suppose. I seriously made a parent suggestion at my other daughter's college that they put a webcam pointed right at the commons. You know, I have to be sure they're eating properly!

So my favorite webcam is the first one listed. This is the cruise line that we took on our one and only such trip. It was from beginning to end - wonderful. Now, you have to understand that cameras are not always that entertaining - staring at the ocean horizon can be a bit boring, even if you imagine the warm tropical breezes blowing in your hair. But if you know their schedule like me, you will know that right about now the Diamond will be pulling into the first port we visited. Wednesday is usually good at sunset and the sail away party. AND on Thursday at about 1:30 pm you get an amazing view of Lands End if the weather is good. Click on the Island to extend your day of sunshine, very good tactic when that 4:30 sunset hits us!

Or how about watching Old Faithful erupt? Didn't I tell you this would be good?

Surprising direction

Driven forward my the least amount of encouragement I am back once more.

I just have to report that there have been several encouragements lately to reflect upon. First off, my daughter is speeding along in clearing up her eye problem. Many hands were laid in prayer over this pretty frightening condition she developed this fall. We are very thankful. I also discovered there are several vitamin formulas on the shelf that promote the health of the eye so she has started taking those so hopefully no more vitreal hemorrhages for her. Driver's training is only 1 year away afterall.

Secondly, I have been facing sort of the "decision of the decade" regarding software for my company. I won't bore you with the geeky details, but just let me say that I feel like the more I research trying to find a good replacement the less options there seem to be. At least good options that were the kind I was envisioning magically dropping in my lap at a price that would leave some profit for maybe another cruise or something? Or maybe finding people who would work for almost nothing and develop a solution I design that would meet the needs of many and thereby make me rich and famous.

So, no answers of that magnitude have surfaced. However, yesterday, after praying about this yet again and then continuing to put one foot in front of the other and seize the day (go Leanne!) I suddenly had a Duh Theorem moment. By the end of the day I had figured out and tested a solution that was no small breakthrough, by nerd standards anyway. It will be faster, allow us some upgrades and eliminate some sharing errors.

I still cannot retire under this scenario, but maybe I am not really ready for that just yet! See previous post.