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Bedtime Stories

It’s great to be back home in Homestead. I’ve been home for a little over 24 hours now, and I’ve used this (Satur)day to relax and return to a more normal routine.

I’m looking forward to a lot of ‘normal routine’ things during this upcoming week. I’m looking forward to serving at Life Pointe Church for 3 hours starting at 7:25 AM tomorrow (Sunday) morning. I’m looking forward to attending the 10:30 AM service right after that. I’m looking forward to blogging the ‘Life Pointe Church Sunday Morning Tossed Salad’ on here tomorrow afternoon. I’m looking forward to returning to work at 6 AM on Monday morning. I’m looking forward to the weekly staff meeting at the Life Pointe Church office suite right after work at 4 PM on Monday afternoon. I’m looking forward to a visit from the Orkin dude on Tuesday afternoon because he keeps my home bug-free. I’m looking forward to hangin’ out with my Life Group at 7 PM on Wednesday night.

I’m looking forward to all of these things and everything else in-between that makes this Life the best Life that I could ever imagine. All of these great things are possible because of my Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. He has made this Life especially for me. I am forever greatful of Him and what He did for me, and what He is doing for me. There is no-one and no-thing that is greater than Him !

This morning I didn’t get out of bed until (a SHOCKING) 9 AM !  I’ve already set my alarm clock for 6:30 AM tomorrow (Sunday) morning. Despite the late ‘getting up’ time this morning I’m gonna try to get back to bed at a reasonable time tonight (such as 10 PM). It felt so great to be back in my own bed last night. In fact it felt so great that I was in it for nearly 12 hours (from 9 PM to 9 AM) !

May each and every one of you have a safe and peaceful Saturday night, and until we hang out again here on the blog or LIVE and in-person – remember this (and turn up the volume LOUD !):

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Tuesday Night Grab Bag O’ Thoughts

You know you want it, so don’t let me be the one to deny it:

1.  On this dark and stormy Tuesday afternoon in Homestead I actually heard the following overused phrase from a coworker – ‘I think this is gonna be a really bad hurricane season. This could be the worst one yet !’ Remember when Hurricane Andrew destroyed Homestead 16 years ago this August ?  That was one of the quietest Atlantic hurricane seasons in modern history. It only takes one powerful hurricane to wreck havoc with your life as you know it. If we have an all-time record 30 named storms this season, yet none of them strike land anywhere near you then what kind of hurricane season is that ?

2.  We’re getting a lot of much-needed rain today here in Homestead. I totally dig that. We need every last drop of it and then some to pull us out of this extended drought that we’re in. We could really use at least three FEET of rain (that’s right – 36 inches) over the next three months !

3.  If you think that you haven’t seen that many mosquitoes out and about thus far this Summer then check again by this weekend. Let me know if you can feel them biting you in a few days.

4.  Last Thursday I celebrated the 23RD anniversary of my United States Air Force / Department Of Defense career. Time flies when I’m having fun !

5.  Last Friday I celebrated the 13TH anniversary of me living here in my current home here in Homestead. This is by far the best place that I have ever lived in my entire life / Life.

6.  For those of you who are new to my blog let me explain. When I refer to the last 22 months of my Life the word ‘Life’ is always capitalized. When I refer to the 39 years before that the word ‘life’ begins with a lower-case ‘l’. When I write about my ‘life / Life’ I’m referring to my previous sad, miserable, and directionless life, as well as my current Life – full of glory, joy, and purpose for I have been saved and reborn again by the Lord Jesus Christ. It’s all symbolic, but it also keeps it all in perspective.

7.  My next laptop will have at least 2 gigabytes of memory in it. My current laptop has exactly one-fourth that amount. I think that I will finally buy a brand new laptop sometime between now and the end of the year. I’m actually not looking forward to it. Once I buy that new laptop this blog may suddenly go inactive for about 3 to 5 days because it will probably take that long to transfer all of my files over from this laptop to that laptop and also install and configure various programs. There’s a lot of work involved there. If I knew that it would be really easy then I would probably already have a new laptop by now.

8.  Ela O. called me on the telephone this afternoon, and we talked for exactly 7 minutes and 29 seconds. She made me laugh hysterically, and I returned the flavour. The telephone is my least favourite electronic device that I could easily live without; however, when I see that it’s Ela on the other end (via my Caller-I.D.) I know that I should be prepared to laugh up a storm with her. She has every reason in the world to be sad and miserable, yet she is one of the happiest and most joyful women I know in my current Life. She’s got a whole lot of purpose remaining in her Life here on Earth on God’s fantastic journey !

9.  Ela tried to pull a fast one on me during that telephone conversation by telling me that I was being assigned to make coffee this Sunday morning at the Life Pointe Church Café. We have quite a few Medical Doctors and Registered Nurses that are part of our LPC family. They would be put into action and forced to go to work on their fellow brothers and sisters if I were to make coffee on Sunday morning. We would need a couple of shuttle buses to transport the victims from the movie theatre to the hospital. I stopped making coffee for the general public in 1989 – not because I made anyone sick or anything like that – but because I could. Nowadays I actually make my own instant coffee for myself on most mornings. It would probably cause irregular heartbeats for most normal healthy humans.

10.  The Sun is now shining brightly and baking the atmosphere directly above my neighbourhood. That only means one thing. Prepare now for another ferocious thunderstorm with torrential downpours in about an hour.

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Annoyances Blogging Bugs Commerce Food God Life People Shopping Weather

Tuesday Night Grab Bag O’ Thoughts

You waited 168 hours for this ?  Let’s see if it was all worth it.

1.  Last week was the biggest week in history for this blog. Nowadays we are averaging more than double the amount of unique hits to this blog in a typical Monday to Sunday week than we were less than 3 months ago. Today (Tuesday) became the biggest Tuesday ever in the history of this blog before I even turned on my computer this afternoon !  THANK YOU FRIENDS !

2.  Speaking of friends Pastor Travis called me ‘clueless’ in his blog today, and it’s the nicest complement I’ve received all day. I’ll accept the complement because I did a much better job late last night before I went to sleep talking all about Trav to God. Trav is one of the most sensible persons that I have ever met in my entire life / Life.

3.  Paul – There’s no need to be jealous. The person that was going to take me out to Lunch for my birthday today fell ill and had to postpone it, so I ended up eating ‘grocery store grub’ from Publix. Actually it was rather decent tasty – chicken tenders, macaroni and cheese, and juicy corn. YUM !

4.  Yesterday (Monday) I went to Panda Express (spur-of-the-moment decision) for Lunch and I received poor service. As usual they had little to no selection of foods available to choose from for the various entrees. I completed and submitted a survey online stating my dissatisfaction with their Lunch service and product. We’ll see if it gets any better in future visits. If the customer service and the food selection doesn’t improve then I’ll just stop going there.

5.  Speaking of the Atlanta Bread Company in Homestead I have received no follow-up communication from Corporate Headquarters in Smyrna Georgia as of yet – more than 80 hours after the fact. Apparently they have no Assimilation / Follow-Up Director.

6.  I was extremely shy as a kid. I didn’t talk a lot. The reason why is because when I did talk nobody was listening and nobody cared to listen. I pretty much lived through a sad and miserable childhood. My little brother was one of the first persons in my entire life that actually listened to what I had to say and was genuinely interested. If it weren’t for my little brother then I may not be here today.

7.  One of the highlights of my day is looking out my personal hurricane-proof window at work that faces due east and watching the sun rise above the horizon. I adore the daylight. I adore chasing it. It’s morning again !

8.  I spent close to 45 minutes at Office Max yesterday and I only spent $8.75 (including tax). The fact of the matter is that I could have spent 3 hours browsing around in that store and $500 or more on quality office merchandise. But I showed real restraint in there. I’m a member of the Christian Conservative Coalition. Yeah – I’m one of those wackos – and PROUD of it !

9.  When Staples opens its doors for business later this year over at the MASSIVE new Homestead Pavilion shopping, dining, and entertainment complex I may hang out there like I own the place !  I’m crazy about office supplies like that.

10.  Exactly 5 months ago this morning – on January 03RD 2008 – Homestead was shivering just a few degrees above the freezing mark. It was in the 30s outside for 8 hours, and in the 40s for an additional 8 hours. It was our coldest morning in nearly 12 years !  I just wanted to remind you of that now that we’re clearly in the bug-infested hot and humid summertime rainy season.

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Annoyances Bugs Commerce Computers Driving Food Humor Shopping Weather

Saturday Morning Shenanigans

B U G S – The bugs are back in town here in Homestead due to all of the recent heavy rains. You may be thinking to yourself, ‘Hey – Wait a minute. I live in Homestead. It hasn’t rained since March !’  You may also be thinking to yourself, ‘No doubt. I thought the sky was caving in on us yesterday afternoon. My yard turned into a giant lake !  My new patio furniture was thrown by the funnel cloud into the canal !’ There is rain all around us. Some of us have received a lot of it this past week, and some of us are still living in a dust bowl. Pretty soon all of us will get a lot of rain, and the bugs will flock to Homestead on their Summer break. Get ready to be eaten alive by little itsy-bitsy teeny-weeny mouths with glow-in-the-dark green eyes.

G A S – I filled-up my car this morning with not quite 11 gallons of gas at Chevron on Useless-One at Campbell Drive at the remarkable price of $4.059 per gallon. That’s about 15 to 20 cents per gallon higher than every other gas station in the general vicinity of that Chevron, but I am kinda sorta semi-loyal to Chevron, and I really wanted to use my fresh new Chevron-Texaco credit card this morning for the first time. $4.059 may seem outrageous to a majority of whining and complaining Americans, but $4.059 for the equivalent of a gallon of gas anywhere in Europe is known as ‘the good old days of the 1990s’.

J A V A – Speaking of items that we Americans love to spend a lot of money on – Starbucks in Homestead – not to be confused with Starbucks in Florida City – is OPEN for BUSINESS !  OK calm down Travis. The drive-thru is open for business. The inside of the joint is apparently not quite ready for customer utilization, so you’ll just have to wait a little while longer to sit inside for hours on your wireless Apple Mac.

One final item of interest – Many of the mega-stores and restaurants at the first phase of the Homestead Pavilion shopping, dining, and entertainment complex at Campbell Drive and the Turnpike are expected to make their grand openings between the middle of October and the middle of November – just in time for the NASCAR Championship Series at the Homestead-Miami Speedway and of course the Christmas 2008 shopping season.