2017 October 21-24

Saturday 21 There were two events with the grandkids that we could have attended. However, we are short on gasoline and money so we’re staying home. That means that Ella could sleep in as late as she wanted.

 

I got up around 5:15 and went outside to look for meteors. I assumed from the name, Orionid meteor shower, that they would be seen around the Orion constellation. However, I didn’t see any. Ella even came out for a minute or two, looked at the sky, and announced, “I’m going back to bed.” I’ve mentioned before that once I’m awake, I’m awake and there is no sense going back to bed.

 

We spent a quiet day at home reading, playing games, napping and watching TV in the evening. It was a nice quiet day … an unplanned Sabbath. When we normally concider Sunday as our Sabbath day, it was nice to have a calm Saturday because Sunday will be jammed full of church activities.

Sunday 22 As I lay in bed trying to decide whether to get up or to lie there and get caught up on Facebook, I heard a low grumble from outside. “Thunder?” I thought. “Naw, it must be a motorcycle starting up.” Shortly thereafter, a bright light flashed through the venetian blinds followed by a clap of thunder. Then the rain and wind arrived. It didn’t last long but it dropped about 1 ½” of rain. Just yesterday, as I was sitting outside, I thought, “I should take a picture of the cracks in the ground to show how dry it has been here.” Well, it’s too late now the cracks are gone. They’ve been replaced by mud.

We arrived at church about 8:30 for the 9 o’clock service. We arrive early because there is a breakfast bar with pastries, fruits, drinks, sausage biscuits, breakfast burritos, and more. We visited with friends as they arrived and then got to our seats in the choir well before the service started. We sang “Wade in the Water” today. We sang three verses with the whole choir singing the chorus. The sopranos sang verse one, the altos verse three, and the tenors and basses sang verse four. What an amazing sounding spiritual it is and nobody could sit still during it.

Our Sunday school class is still studying the Adam Hamilton book “Moses.” We had a good discussion about it today. There are some very thoughtful folks in this class.

We stopped for gasoline and then to Parker’s Corner Store for butter and one HUGE baking potato. When we arrived home, the RV smelled great. I’d put some ribs in the crockpot yesterday about four in the afternoon. After nearly 20 hours they were fall off the bone done. The potato went into the microwave for ten minutes and lunch was ready.

We had time for a nap before returning to church for the Church Conference. We will have 8 other churches joining us for this. It is nice that we have the space to host them all in our worship center.

After the conference we went to Chicken Express to get something to eat and kill time until the Sunday night Bible study at six.

Then it was home and to bed.

 

Monday 23 I was awake and up just before my alarm went off at 5:30. I couldn’t imagine why I had an alarm set for then. I checked the calendar to see if there was someplace that we were supposed to be early in the morning. Nope. Ahh ha! I’d set it (or thought I had) for 5:30 p.m. to remind me of the Bible study last night. Opps!

 

It was 43 degrees when I woke up and we had slept with the window open. Since the alarm had called me back to the bedroom, I crawled back under the still warm comforter. I lay there and got caught up on Facebook (not much of interest … but you never know that until you scroll through it.).

Ella’s alarm went off at 7 and I decided it really was time to get out of bed again. This time I turned the furnace on to take the chill off. While I was starting the coffee Ella got up and started getting dressed. So, I started breakfast.

After breakfast we played a couple of rounds of Fast Track while waiting for time to go to the Leander Senior Center on Bagdad.

 

We had fun and had some good food. It is a shame that more people aren’t coming anymore. It used to be full (5 tables of at least 8 each) and several times they had to turn people away that had not signed up in advance. The city is going to build a new building for the Senior Center and the Headstart kids. I hope that there is still a group of seniors around to move into the new building when it’s finished.

After lunch no one stayed to play games so Ella and I came home also. We took the long-long way back. It was a nice day to drive through the hill country. Ella started her Jog Tracker after we’d been zig-zagging around a bunch of switchbacks. So this image tells only part of the story.

Tuesday 24 it was another chilly start to the day. But it is so nice to have the windows open! It is Sneezin’ Season with the pollen in the air. Soon that will lead to Cedar Fever when the cedars (actually they are junipers that people call cedars) start spraying their clouds of yellow pollen through the air. Seriously, folks, at times in looks like the valleys are covered in clouds of smoke.

After breakfast we drove to Leander and the senior center. We played games and had a decent lunch consisting of a burrito, mixed veggies, and apple crisp.

I found out that Rod, one of the new folks at the center, is a mechanic who has a “hobby” garage. I asked if he did brakes. I said to bring the truck in and he’d check to see what it would need. He was only going to inspect the brakes today so that he’d know what parts were needed. However, when he got into them, the calipers came apart and could not be reinstalled. We drove to the parts store and got everything needed to repair the front brakes. So, we got the brakes fixed today instead of tomorrow.

While Rod was working on the truck we had quite a conversation about our belief in Jesus and how that has made a difference in both of our lives. I invited him to our weekly Tuesday night prayer meetings at Cross Tracks Church.