This week....

This week I would like to be the owner of a big 5 bay car wash. 

I just visited one to wash the muck and grime of 2 weeks worth of nastiness off of the Taurus.  OK, reality check, it was filthy before the blizzard hit, but it was beyond filthy this morning.  Here is why... 

A month ago I gave Jacob a $20 bill and told him to go to Wal-Mart Market and get a bag of Pedigree for the dogs.  I got home and he had, instead, gone to his store, Warehouse Market, and gotten a big (bigger than big) bag of dog food, an off brand, for less than the medium bag of Pedigree.  The dogs ate it one night.  The next night they ate half of it.  The next night they vomited all over the house.  After that they literally went on a hunger strike.  So we caved in and bought Pedigree for them and had the HUGE bag of gross dog food left.  What to do?  I can't bring myself to throw it in the trash.  Kim said he would take it to Mohawk and feed the birds with it.  Didn't happen.  We had a blizzard instead. So during round 3 of our Snowstravaganza he decided to feed the starving birds in the front yard with the terrible dog food.  How did they thank us?  You guessed it.  My car got poop bombed.  It all looks just like that dog food, too.  Thanks Birds, thanks Kim.  Oh, and yes, thanks Jacob!

just a thought...

"You’ve equated God’s silence with his absence. He isn’t speaking in your relationship with a friend. He isn’t showing up in your marriage. He isn’t leading in what is next for your career. He is silent and feels absent.

But God’s silence is not God’s absence. God’s hiddenness is not abandonment.

You are not alone. No matter how silent God is for you right now…He is not absent."

Justin Davis

Emily shared this with me today...  Thanks Em.

*Sigh*

It is one of "those" days.  Work has not gone well today.  I feel unappreciated and well, just spent.  Don't you hate to be compared to someone else and found to be lacking?  I feel like I have value of my own.  Not like anyone else.  SHE is not my yardstick.  I measure myself elsewhere.  I resent someone using her against me.  We are friends, she and I.  When you smack me with her, it hurts us both.  So measure me on my own merits and demerits, please.  Not against her.

OK, moving on...

I was thinking today about my Grams.  She is 89, soon to be 90.  She made me who I am, second only to God.  She is fading.  Like a picture from an old album.  She used to be bright, sharp and colorful.  Now I see confusion, fear, and apathy.  She has mentally surrendered... to what?  I don't know.  I do wish I had captured more from her before she faded.  We did not take the time, and she did not like to talk about her feelings very much.  Mostly, she would answer your questions, and now and then start talking.  But mostly she listened.  I wonder what I did not hear.    What did I miss?

Wow!  What a depressing post.  I hope you had a better day than me!
    

It feels great!

I am so glad to be back on the treadmill.  As much as I hate exercise, I feel so much better about myself when I am exercising!  It makes no sense because I am no thinner today than I was on Sunday, but for some reason I feel skinnier!  And I feel sore too.  Maybe that is it.  I hurt every time I stand up, sit down, or walk around the room.  The pain reminds me that I feel it because I earned it on the treadmill.  I like that feeling.  Sometimes pain is good.  I am not setting any records for time, but I am increasing my speed by .1 each night, so in a few weeks, I will be right back where I was 6 weeks ago.  Hopefully next week I can resume my weight lifting, too.

Projects...  I want to start a bunch of them.  I am currently working on a little camera bag for Rhonda's mother in law.  I need to wrap it up since it is a birthday gift, and her bday is in February!  Yikes!  I want to make some more dish cloths.  It has been a while since I knitted those.  My aunt wants me to make a baby afghan for her great grandson.  But she has to buy more yarn, and some circular needles.  I also want to make a headband ear warmer thingy.  My friend Adriene has one.  I found a pattern.  I tried to start one, but it rejected me.  :o(  I will keep trying.  It will not defeat me!

Have a great day!     


    

Just a Short Note

Tonight I am going back to the gym for the first time since my surgery.  I have not been in 6 weeks!  Yikes!  I have to go back, I am feeling like I have lost my weight loss momentum. I suspect I have gained some of my 22 pounds back.  Panic! 

Not sure how this will work.  I am not used to be physically limited.  I like to compete with myself and get a better "time" on the treadmill.  I guess I just need to set the pace tonight.  A modest pace.  Then work at getting better every night. 

I hope you are all having a wonderful day!  I will try to update tomorrow about how this went.

Hiding

My sister posted recently on her blog ("Working on it"  See sidebar for link) a remark about how people hide behind a smile.  I have to admit that I do that a lot.  Does everyone?  Are we lying with our smiles?  I have been taught to put a good foot forward.  I have been told that a smile makes you prettier.  Keep a stiff upper lip (what the heck does that mean?).  Buck up.  Suck it up.  So I do.  I know I have a lot to hide, but never thought much that other people were doing the same.  What is going on behind your smile?  Are all those smiles hiding pain and secrets like mine does? 

So what is better?  Do we let our expressions mirror our feelings?  That would not be good either.  I can't walk around and display my every feeling on my face.  That would not be a good thing.  It would wear everyone out, and I would look like a train wreck!  But I also want to be honest.  I don't like to think that my smile is a lie!

I have arrived at this conclusion after a few days of mulling it around in the space between my ears.  I have to start the day with a smile.  I have to buck up.  The smile is not so much about my circumstance, or my feelings.  It is about my joy.  Not happiness, joy.  I have joy regardless of my circumstance.  So my smile is not a lie.  It is a choice.  I chose to smile regardless of my circumstance.  If you dig a little deeper, there is a lot more going on, of course, than what the smile might tell you.  And maybe if we are good enough friends, I can share some of it with you.  I chose to smile because I have joy in my heart from the peace my Savior has provided.  I MIGHT have a lot of embarrasing problems that I keep a secret, well, cuz they are ridiculous and embarrasing!  But I know that my problems are here and now.  God is more than big enough to fix them.  Maybe He will chose to fix them, or maybe I will just have to live with them.  But I have a reward waiting.  Bigger and better than my problems.  So I will smile.  I will be joyful.            

Hello New Year!

I am so glad you are here, 2011!  The old one was REALLY old!  I hope you will be nicer to me than 2010 was, too.  I guess it was mostly my fault, but that year was a real pain!  I plan to be good, work hard, be diligent, worship faithfully and fully, and try to be the person God wants me to be.  I have a picture of her, in my mind.  I will focus on that snapshot and try to become her.  She is smart, focused and tidy.  She balances her checkbook, she saves money, she serves her God and her family and friends.  She goes to the gym and work out 4 times a week.  I hope you (2011) like this girl as much as I do.  Be kind to her, she will need your assistance!

Borrowing Aunt Mary's laptop today to visit the cyber world.  I needed a fix!  Will probably go back to work one week from tomorrow, or maybe on Tuesday instead of Monday.  I missed my blog!