Too Right I Call It Pop

Now pass the cheese.

What American accent do you have? Your Result: The Inland North You may think you speak "Standard English straight out of the dictionary" but when you step away from the Great Lakes you get asked annoying questions like "Are you from Wisconsin?" or "Are you from Chicago?" Chances are you call carbonated drinks "pop."
The Midland
The Northeast
Philadelphia
The South
The West
Boston
North Central
What American accent do you have? Quiz Created on GoToQuiz

Doesn't seem to be showing the "percentage" lines correctly, although it did in preview. Weird. Stupid code.

Being Good Is hard To Do

I was talking yesterday with a friend about how difficult it is to lose weight. The formula's easy enough: Calories In < Calories Out. It's the implementation that's difficult.

I want something that's going to work for life, instead of being just a weight-loss "system". I want something that's going to be healthy. I want it to work, instead of "doing all the right things" for weeks on end only to find that...hey, wow, I lost a pound. Whoopdeedoo.

I want it to work without surgery. I want it to work now. I need results, doggone it. And I want to do it without having to dang near obsess about Calories, Carbohydrates, the Glycemic Index, Grams of Fiber, or Weight Watchers Points.

I want to do it with normal real food, that I can make myself, not some prepackaged expensive stuff that comes in miniscule portions with some big-name weightloss company's name stamped on it. And most of all, I want to still be able to enjoy food.

I guess that's my biggest problem, really. I enjoy food. I don't want to give up food, and I'm extremely tired of "well, if I eat this NOW, I won't have any 'extra' Points / Calories left over for that thing I wanted later." I'm tired of having to do calculations and keep records of what I eat and enter numbers into my PDA for five minutes just so I know if I can have that one snack I was eyeballing.
I'm sick of it. I'm sick of being fat, but more than that, I'm sick of trying to not be fat. Calculating and adding up numbers and worrying about if I have "enough" Points left to actually have a bag of pretzels is not normal. I don't know how I'm going to lose weight, but dangit, I'm NOT going to continue trying to do it the way I have been.
We'll come up with something, I suppose. And if we don't, well, I've been fat this long. I'm kinda used to it. It's not good for me, I know - I'd be FAR better off exercising more, eating less, and generally getting thinner and healthier. But for now, I'm just going to try to come up with something that works for me. Once I find it...I'll let you know.

Happy Fangsgiving!

OK, note for the future: Combining Thanksgiving, Christmas, and birthdays all in a 3.5-day visit is just too much. Seriously. I'm exhausted, and I didn't even do anything!

Mom got to surprise dad with his Christmas gift - a new Camcorder and tripod. She and my dad really are grateful to all my online friends that helped out and gave advice about what to look for - and what NOT to buy!

Nephew Raymond luuuuurvvvveeesss opening presents. Anyone surprised? No, I didn't think so. He LOVED his books he got from Gramma & Papa and from Aunt Kim & Uncle Kev. He wanted mommy & daddy to read "what I see in church" and "Martin Luther" and "The Creation" and "My First Catechism" and... :D

He also luuuuuurrrrrrvvvvveeeesss Kai. I was a little concerned about that one, to be honest - most 2-year-olds just aren't crazy about being around a dog that's the same size as them. And even the ones that are used to big dogs like that really aren't "good" with them - they're always sticking their fingers in his nose / eyes / ears / mouth and constantly need watching to make sure they're not torturing the poor dog. But not Ray. Nope, he knows exactly how to behave around dogs, and he was always very careful to be nice to Kai. He LOVED giving him treats and pets and hugs! Of course, that meant he also wanted to pretty much feed the entire Thanksgiving turkey to Kai, who was right there encouraging him! Kai even let Gramma know that she was not to play too rough with Ray. When he squealed because she was tickling him, Kai was right there and grred-barked at her, as if to say, "thus far. No more." Then when she stopped, he backed off and sat down and watched to make sure that Gramma and mommy were going to treat HIS human puppy well! Goodness. I really didn't expect that.

Kev really likes his new FM Transmitter he got for Christmas from my parents, and I'm really happy about my Shiny New Mythbusters DVD collection! :D
Mom was happy with her new crocheted bags for shopping (so she doesn't have to use paper OR plastic anymore!) and with her 6 bags of Vanilla Creme Drops we managed to find - and the new Carhartt gloves we got her.
Heather & Seth liked their Crocheted bags and homemade cookies! YUM.
Dad liked his Carhartt gloves and we completely surprised him with a scraper that attaches to a reciprocating saw. :D

Overall, the visit was a good one. Tempers and patience were starting to go on Sunday, since we were all tired from the visit (and we think Ray's teething again, so he did not have a good night, which of course means mommy & daddy didn't either) and we were all kinda bummed we had to go Back To Reality Land, but in general, I think a Good Time Was Had By All.

Well, duh. Go say thanks!

As usual, it takes a post or nudge from my sweetie to get me to think of these sort of things. I emailed everyone I know about it, but did I think to put it in my blog? Nooooo, of course not. But he did, so now I think to do it too.

Let's say thanks is a website where you can create a postcard by selecting a picture, entering your name, and either selecting a pre-fab message or creating your own. The postcard will be entered in the Queue of cards to be sent to a soldier who's serving in the US military.

Go on, go say thanks.

R-E-S-P-E-C-T

Something interesting happened after church yesterday that highlighted one of the many reasons I really like our pastor. After service, we always have "announcement time" - anyone that has something to announce that they want everyone in church to know about gets a chance to say their piece.
Usually these announcements revolve around "Hey, the youth group fundraiser items came in," or "the LWML is meeting right after service" or whatever, and we did have those kind of announcements. However, at the tail end of the announcements, a little girl in the front pew raised her hand to say her announcement. She said...something. She was pretty quiet about it, so nobody farther away than maybe 5 feet could hear her. Many adults, especially those in charge of a service or program, knowing that nobody could hear her, probably would've cut her off, or asked her to wait a second and then tell them on the way out what she had to say.

Not Pastor. He listened quietly to her announcement, and even moved a little closer to her so he could hear the whole thing. When she was done, he repeated it so that everyone could hear it, just like he would for any person who had an announcement but couldn't speak loudly enough to be heard. Again, many people (even, sadly, many pastors) would have chosen to just tell the little girl "that's a good idea" or "that's nice" and exited. But no, Pastor said that she wanted to remind everyone to wash your hands before eating, so you don't get sick, and mentioned how important the reminder was, and thanked her for reminding us.

Many people would've blown her off, or just not acknowledged her waving hand, figuring that "oh, it's a little kid, she just doesn't get it, this is for important (read: "big people") stuff." Our Pastor, though, understands and recognizes that everyone contributes "important stuff" to a church, and that everyone deserves respect, regardless of their age.

Yet another reason I really like our Pastor. I truly believe God called him to our church, and we are so blessed to have him and his family with us.

Get ready to get dirty.

Discovery Channel did an interview with Mike Rowe, of Dirty Jobs. If you haven't seen this show yet, and you get the Discovery Channel, I highly recommend it. It's an honest guy, showing how people do an honest day's work in the most filthy jobs imaginable - and every one of them contributes to the smooth workings of our lives.
If you don't have the Discovery Channel, you can at least check out the website: http://www.discovery.com/dirtyjobs

It's a great show. Mike's a great, very earthy, very funny host. Oh, and there's a pig. Sometimes.

comment from yesterday got me thinking.

So, I'm reproducing it here in today's post.

I think I see another imprecision.....

To believe something exists is really very different than believing IN something. Luther said it is not enough that someone believes God exists, or even that He sent Jesus to die on the cross and that Jesus rose again from the dead. Even Satan believes that.

Believing IN something means you are trusting in it, you are basing your life on it. It is one thing to know or believe that God exists, it is completely another thing to trust IN Him and His Word and to know that He will provide what we need, especially when we are tempted to sin.

I sincerely doubt that the person who said she didn't believe IN war would ever consider putting her trust in war. I even doubt that many soldiers put their trust IN war as a guiding idea. But they believe it exists. They make their living doing it, and they probably believe IN the cause that brings the war about.

So when we are saying "I believe IN God the Father Almighty....and the rest of the creed, we are saying far more than "there is a God and He exists" But many people aren't actually going any farther than that.

So good call!

She's right. I used the wrong definition of "believe" and this could have caused quite a bit of misinterpretation as far as the rest of what I believe, and the rest of my post. Thank you to her for correcting my definition, because I would NOT like to cause confusion over my beliefs because of it.

I believe in God. That means I put my faith in God. I do not put my faith for salvation in war.
However, I do believe that war is sometimes necessary. War, in and of itself, is a bad guiding idea, as she said. However, to steal a quote from another friend of mine:
"People are free because rough men stand ready to do violence on their behalf."

To all those people who have stood ready, who are standing ready, and who will stand ready to do violence on my behalf, so I may remain free...

Thank you.

What I believe - and what I realized

I believe a lot of things. For example, I believe that people use the English language very imprecisely. I heard someone on the radio this morning saying she "doesn't believe in war." Oh really? It exists, and I know lots of people that can prove it. I believe in war - I know it exists. I think she meant she doesn't believe that waging (or fighting in a) war is moral - but I can't be sure what she really meant, because she didn't use the language precisely.

I "believe in" war - I know it exists. Likewise, I BELIEVE IN God. I know He exists. I BELIEVE that I am a sinner, a "lost and condemned creature", as Martin Luther said, and that nothing I do can EVER pay the debt of sin I owe. I believe that everything I do is tainted by sin, and therefore it will NEVER be good enough, on my own, to make up for my sin. I believe that I sin every day, and even if I could start to make up for the sin I do, I have so much sin and evil in me, and commit more sin every day that I don't even realize I'm doing, that there's no way I could ever catch up. I also believe that God loves me, and wants me to be with Him forever. But, because of my sin, I - by myself - cannot join Him.
But here's the best part. I also believe that God sent His only Son to earth to pay for my sin. I believe that Jesus was both God and Man, that He died on the cross to pay for - not his OWN sin, for He had none - but for MINE. For every single person that ever was, and ever would be. Our sins are paid for. Covered. And nothing I did, nothing I can do, EVER came into play. He did it all on His own, without any input from me, without any help from me.
I believe that, because of this incredible gift of love that Christ gave me, I am washed clean of sin. ALL my sin is gone in God's eyes, because of Christ's sacrifice. Because of this, I can come to God as one of His own beloved children, and He will give me what I need, and what is best for me. He always hears my prayers - not because I deserve to have Him listen, not because I'm a "good person" (because nobody can EVER be good enough for God on their own), but because His Son made me His own.

I believe that Christ shares His body and blood with us every time we participate in the Lord's Supper. I believe that He gives His life to us every time we partake of His body and blood. I believe that He is truly present, that His body and His blood are really, physically present at every Holy Communion. The Jews in the Old Testament were forbidden from eating or drinking the blood of animals they killed, because that blood contained the very LIFE of the animal. That was not theirs to eat - they were only to eat the meat, not the life. Christ gives us his LIFE, and shares his life with us when we eat his Body and drink his Blood. I believe it's not a symbol, or a representation of Him - be3cause it's not a symbolic life! We're not going to "symbolically" go to heaven with Him - we are going to live with Him.

I believe that participating in the Lord's Supper with fellow Christians shows that we share the same beliefs. I believe if we do NOT share the beliefs of the people we are with, that we should not attend Communion with them. See that word "union" in there? If I'm not IN UNION WITH the people around me, I SHOULD NOT pretend I am by attending Communion with them. I SHOULD NOT lie to them, and possibly even myself. I will, instead, pray with them, sing along with them, and participate in the aspects of worship we DO agree on.

I realized this weekend that another of my "beliefs" was very wrong. I tend to think of "the mission field" as Somewhere Else. It involves leaving home and going to people in a far-away place, with a different culture, different habits, and probably a different language than I have. It likely involves a passport and lots of vaccinations. Missionaries are specially-trained people who have to learn a lot, including new languages, and spend years in a culture they didn't grow up in, teaching people who never met them before about the Gospel.
Guess what?
That's not the ONLY mission field out there, and the specially-trained people aren't the only missionaries. We all are missionaries. Everywhere is a mission field. Home, family, friends, co-workers, and neighbors are all a mission field. Sometimes it's a "small" task, and sometimes it is a decades-long mission to share Christ with a single friend, relative, or co-worker. It always involves lots of prayer, lots of patience, and sometimes, lots of grief.
We don't always see the "payoff", but that's the way mission work is, sometimes.

We don't have the luxury of waiting till "the right time", either. Who knows what will happen? The people of Noah's time sure didn't expect 40 days & nights of solid rain when that first storm started - and by the time they realized they were in trouble, it was too late.
Christ's coming will be the same way - once He has come, it's too late for that talk with your neighbor, your co-worker, your friend. Once He comes, it's too late to believe, as well. Sorry, time's up.

So...we need to share our beliefs with others, and we need to do it every day. I don't know how God's going to use me today, but use me He shall, and I'll try to be ready for Him, and do what He wants me to do.

And a BIG thank-you to our Pastor for helping me to clarify and realize all of this.

Totally and completely irrelevant

Yup, so I just decided I wanted to post something, but I have nothing to post about. So here I am, being a complete attention-ho, and posting just because I can, just to give visitors something to slog through before they get to the cool stuff, like Guy Fawkes Day (and really, who doesn't like holidays celebrating explody things? Only that sorta celebrates the non-explosion of Parliament, which I'm sure the Brits are fairly happy about, and they celebrate by making fireworks explode. No, I don't understand it either, but as far as I'm concerned, any excuse to make things go BOOM is good, so I'm all for it. Well. SAFELY, anyway. I mean, y'know, not if the BOOMS are pointed at people and intended to hurt them. That's bad.)

In other news, it smells like someone's computer just caught fire. Great Caesar's ghost that's nasty. Ooooh, hey, that sounds like someone's using a portable fire extinguisher.
Y'know, you'd think, with odors like that, and stuff, that the fire alarm would go off or something, don'tcha? Ah. Turns out the foam insulation on a water-cooler / water-heater just caught on fire. Exciting. Emergency numbers have been dialed.
Wow, burning styrofoam stinks.
I mean really stinks.

But at least nothing went boom. Which could, in fact, be bad OR good, depending on the way you look at it. And it's a good thing that it happened now instead of, say, 12 hours from now. THAT would've been messy, because nobody would've been here to notice the smoke, and wouldn't have unplugged the water dispenser, and wouldn't have put out the fire. So it would've kept burning until it caught the wallboard on fire, most likely, and then the sprinklers would've gone off and my computer and shiny new flatpanel monitor would've gotten wet and probably fried.

But still, that was nasty.

Happy Guy Fawkes Day

Don't blow anything up. Especially Parliament.

TAG!

I've been tagged by The Rebellious Pastor's Wife, to participate in a...game? Thought exercise? Meh. Internet...thingy, called the "Blue Tea Meme".

Rules:
It was started by a lady who has a blog called Blue Tea. (Thus the name!)
According to the original poster, the rules for this meme are: “Devise a list of 5-10 courses you would take to fix your life. It’s more fun to be in classes with friends, so include one class from the person who tagged you that you’d also like to take. Tag five.”

Hrm.

She mentions Woodworking and Home Repairs. Yeah, I like that one. Sign me up for that.

And car repairs. I sure wouldn't mind knowing what the heck is wrong with my car and how to fix it. I might still send it to the guys in the shop, but hey, at least I'd know what they're doing to it.

But as for the rest...wow. fixing my life is a pretty tall order. It's pretty borken, some days. And I'm pretty sure some of the stuff I'd like to know will never be on a Curriculum -- ANYWHERE -- I'll have to think about it. I mean, I seriously doubt that anyone's ever going to offer a class in "How to Remove Highly Annoying And Incredibly Stupid People From The Gene Pool Forever", ya know? How about I work on finding a couple classes that might be potentially useful to me somewhere down the road, instead?

Like...Cooking, maybe. I can follow a recipe, but the actual Art Of Cooking is sadly beyond my grasp, I think. My sweetie has done wonders in teaching me as much as he has so that I actually can, and do actual real live cooking now, but I'd still like to know more.

If we could branch out into some rather Unorthodox classes, I'd also like to learn how to...um. How to put this so it won't gross people out completely. {think}

How to hunt, how to field-dress, and how to do what's necessary to get the meat from the animal into my freezer. How's that? So...um...Hunting Lessons?

More outdoors stuff:
Plant & Tree identification, and uses for the varying plants & trees. Herbal lore, medical uses, other applications.

Fauna: Identifying animals from their tracks, scat, and calls, especially Owls and other birds.

I guess that's all for now.

Um. Who to tag. WildStrawberry, Captain Spaulding, and Kylee.