As time goes by

It is nearly October now, so summer is gone, as is our 20th yearly( and possibly last) summer visit to the Del.

Another sign of time passing is the retirement of long time local new anchor Kent Shocknek.  I have been watching him since the 80's when he anchored the early morning news on NBC.  I watched him every morning before work and getting the girls to school. I was watching when he was covering the Challenger launch . I will never forget sharing his so human yet under control reaction when it exploded and the realization sunk in that all were lost .  Likewise his ducking under his desk during an earthquake  and earning a joking nickname after-Shocknek.  Human and relatable.

He always seemed so genuine.  His goodbye tonight (from CBS/KCAL where he has been for the last several years) was humble and heartfelt.   One thing that really got to me was that he is a year and half younger than me!  Oh to be able to retire so young!  Godspeed to him. With him go my best wishes and not a little envy.

July the 4th and where the hell did the year go?

I am telling you, folks, that a sure sign that you are getting well along in years is that the years fly by. It is the 4th of July in less than half an hour, and I swear it was just April five minutes ago.  It is only 6 weeks to my vacation at my beloved Del, and it will be Christmas a  nanosecond later.

Work is very busy, and often fast paced, and complicated, but doable and I seem to be doing ok at it as well.  If being needed and depended on is job security, the secure I am.  The days do not drag, that is for sure.
My tomatoes are in, I just pulled that last avocado  from this year's crop of of the tree, and Wimbledon is nearly to finals weekend. .It is summer full on, and it snuck up on me.

It is another sign of age that you repeat yourself .  Look at my blog of 7/6/11 entitled "Summer already?  "

Ask, and ye shall receive

Just when I  start thinking that my  believing that everything will work out somehow, some day has been stretched to its farthest reach......something happens to bolster my faith.  I have been stressed about work, about being thought inadequate, about expenses coming up, and finding a way to deal with it all without imploding.   For my prayer request, I put down "peace of mind".

Work was a zoo today, but I got what I needed of get done , done.  I worked how to handle at least one of the expenses I was concerned about.  Then, at the end of a very long day, I got an email about an old stock plan from work. It is paying out this week, and it  more than I had hoped. And it will cover the bulk of what I was worried about.  Knock knock, who 's there? . Answer to your prayer, ma'am.

I am going to try to give up worry for Lent.

Happy 2014

Happy New Year.  First let me state that this year will likely be better than the last, in that my job (although altered) is secure for the immediate future.  No more sense of impending doom, and all that. 

However, let me also go on the record as saying that some experiences should be recorded under be careful what you wish for.  And also under never say never. It can come back to bite you in the butt. It isn't fatal, but also not a lot of fun. And being middle-aged doesn't keep you safe from the experience.  Sigh. 

Sometimes real life sucks.  

I guess that happily ever after is the fairy tale that it usually concludes.  There is happily, and there is ever after.  However, ever after will do, as long as it is happily more often than not. 

On being "Godless" and by whose definition.

I work with churches for a living, and so attend many a gathering of same.   I was recently at a pastor's conference, at which a panel of four pastors gave their thoughts and advice to their colleagues.  One firmly espoused that the only right way to teach your flock was to lead them through the Bible from Genesis forward, book by book, chapter by chapter, not by thematically,   but only word for word.   Another dared to suggest , almost apologetically,  that while that was a solid idea, Jesus was a great storyteller, and taught often by example and by story.  The other resisted anything other than a literal word for word slogging through.  He mentioned having recently come from a trip to Australia and New Zealand , and referenced them as being Godless because (spoken in a outraged voice) "they teach evolution as fact!"

I am taken back that God and evolution cannot co-exist, and that only a literal belief in Adam and Eve and a 7 day creation story is considered Christian by this pastor.  My belief that Christ lived and died for me and fellow believers is what I think makes me a Christian. It is what he asked of us in the New Testament. I rather thought that Christ's life and death and resurrection in the New Testament was the point.  I don't recall Jesus spending a lot of time on such details of the Old Testament books. In fact he thought that many  spent way too much time on details of law, as opposed to simply doing what what right, and what he asked of us.  To put  him above all others, and to love our  neighbors as ourselves, feeding the poor.

I am taken back not so much by this pastor's  rejection  of evolution, but his discounting of the Christianity of any who would accept it.   It pains me that many of those who consider themselves the fiercest and most loyal of Christ's followers feel they only can be so by the judging the beliefs of other followers to be less authentic.

Classiest driver in OC

I have had my share of (figuratively speaking) run-ins with other drivers. It is usually I who is annoyed or outraged  by the way my fellow sharers of the road go about their daily commutes. Speedily zig zagging , sans use of turn signal , darting in and out of traffic, risking (our) life and limb in pursuit of one more car length, all while certain that the patch of asphalt in question is their personal possession. When cut off I have been known to honk or swear. However, I was taken by surprise today. I was driving in the second to fastest lane, and  although going 70 , I noticed that the traffic behind me was catching up, so I signaled and went to move to the right. Just before I changed lanes, a tall white  SUV passed me  on my right. As it passed, I saw, framed in the driver's window, a raised male forearm with extended middle finger.  I was truly surprised, as I really don't know what I did. He ( the arm looked male) wasn't the car that had been behind me, I waited for him to pass before, making  my lane change, so I don't know what the offense was. Maybe he felt I was holding up general progress. Hard to say. But  what is not hard to say, is that there not a shred of civility left on those roads. Lord save me from them.

Lindsay , sweetheart, go AWAY!

As I once ranted about Charlie Sheen's own ranting and legal issues: Lindsay Lohan, heed my words. Shut up, sit down and go away! Do not go out partying with your friends , do not drive a car, and for the good Lord's sake, have somebody stuff a sock in your uselessly enabling mother's mouth. You are not misunderstood, you are train wreck. You are , at best, and unintentionally , an object lesson in how not to live a life. Or how to blow a promising career.

I beg of you, take a loooong vacation. So long that the press forgets who you are, or so long that your comeback is a shot on Dancing With The Stars. If Andy Dick can do it, so can you. But please, take your time. I am waiting breathlessly for the day when the press does not consider you newsworthy.  Because I am sick of hearing about you. Really , really, really.