Category: Church

Gratitude

Rev Samaya did her thang at church yesterday, and it was a wonderful, chatty sermon on gratitude.  In gratitude for the weather gods lightening up, I actually got Jeff to examine the gas mower and get it running (after sitting idle all winter I didn’t find myself competent or comfy with doing that, and I am very glad I did the mowing yesterday because the grass was getting big enough to hide hunting cats in.  I also made meatballs.  They are quite tasty, Jeff appears to approve.

It was a restful weekend, and I’m ready for more training.  I think I’m getting my feet under me, but I should not be over confident….

Cousin Alex fed Keith and Paul yesterday, which was awesome.

I has a gladsad

My son is going to check out Edmonton for work.  I am very pleased, and also just downcast.  If he likes it he will probably be gone by the beginning of May, and if he doesn’t, he’ll be unemployed, which he has not much use for at all.

He and Paul are away so I have to do cat care tonight on the way home from work.

Time to get dressed and be off to work.  I’m dressed, it’s just the wrong clothing.

I have another homily in May, Theology at the Movies.

 

It wasn’t very good banana bread

But it all got et anyway.  It certainly wasn’t good enough for church but Jeff didn’t mind.  I took some nice bag tea into church, and Sue did too.  Soup lunch was yummy.

Yesterday was a laundry and church and mini relaxicon kinda day, with phone calls interspersed to various people.  I am woeing at the moment over various things, but I had a nice long talk with Sandy yesterday.  We were messing about with tarot again.  She asked recently for pull cards for purpose in life of various family members.  The deck was messing with me again and most of the cards were correct if reversed.  I said to the deck, are you for real???? and pulled a card she hadn’t asked for, for her.  It was the same card we pulled the last time, which had me laughing most immoderately, because that is what the deck is like.  Just at the point everything is random and screwed up, it reminds me to look harder.

Then I pulled the Hierophant for me.  (Sandra said, what you haven’t already?  I am incurious about some things.) Well well, telling me I’m an institutionally based spiritual authority less than a month after my last homily is not exactly a slap, but it was pretty funny, and got me thinking.  I know that UUism is my spiritual home but it’s annoying.  Do I set myself up in authority?  If so, what can I do to stop being like that?  I’m not a minister or even a good candidate for ministry (although given my gabbiness in the pulpit I get asked about it occasionally).

I was proud and humbled when this was read in church on Sunday. This is part of the context for the anti racism curriculum.

Brother Jerome called me!  He congratulated me on my new job.  (Woke me up from a sound sleep too, but other people are not responsible for keeping track of my goofy sleeping hours).  I forgot to tell him about how the Green Man came back into my life since he’s one of the few people who’d appreciate it.  I am so blessed in my friends, they’ve been really good to me.

Did cat coverage for Paul this weekend, Ayesha is a sweetie.

Yuck, I’ve had two spiders crawl across me in the last twenty four hours. I flung the last one onto the floor.  I hate killing them.

There is brie in the house. And fresh sourdough bread. And smoky, luscious Russian Caravan tea. I know what I’m having for breakfast!

bits and bobbles

Jeff and I are off to Thrifty’s once he wakes up.

I have been thinking about what I like in an actor.

A good actor works consistently and takes time off only when she must.  She tries different roles and treats everything about herself as a component of performance. She can differentiate between the toxic pixie dusts of celebrity and notoriety, interviews graciously, is courteous to fans and professional with coworkers.  She is judicious in her use of alcohol and drugs.  She leaves her personal life out of her work unless it helps to bring snap to the performance, recognizes and honours excellence in others, never stops learning and protects those aspects of herself which make for great performances against all comers.  She can take direction and make suggestions. She understands as much about the business of acting as she needs to.  She takes every job seriously, even the fun ones. And the only time you hear about her when you aren’t actually watching her is when she’s promoting a role; she saves the interesting stuff for the screen and stays out of the fricking tabloids. A good actor is a working actor.  A good actor balances knowing what she does best with working in a challenging role, knowing she might fail spectacularly.  A good actor is too busy working to worry about the last blazing success or ignominious turkey.

Soup lunch today.  I may bake something if I feel energetic enough.

I have decided that I am an Assam person, not a Darjeeling person.  I may blend the two teas together; that’s pretty much how they make English breakfast tea anyway.  Proper loose leaf tea is really a thing of beauty.

Were you aware that the global price of coffee is going to triple over the next five years?  If you can bring yourself to stop drinking it except as a treat you’ll be doing the planet and your wallet a favour.

The California drought is going to end.  Whether it will be enough to save the almond plantations is an open question.

 

Weigh in

I hadn’t weighed myself in a while, but my clothes were getting tighter, so I was delighted to see from the scale this morning that the weight I lost after I broke my shoulder has stayed off.  Now I’m getting ridiculous amounts of exercise, since I have to walk a minimum of 2 kilometres a day through terrain plus two sets of transit stairs just to get to work, so I expect the weight will stay off.  My hips and back are better; my knees and feet are shouting things ungodly at me.  I’m sleeping better and staying up later.

Jeff has commented that he’s getting interesting pings from various muscle groups now that he’s back exercising regularly with his new rowing machine.  One of these days I’ll check it out but I’m never wearing shoes when I’m downstairs…

Many hugs to Jeff for letting me borrow the car yesterday after my phone freaked out and I ended up being late getting out the door in consequence … I brought home some treats.

The family that ________s together…. 

In one of those bizarre coincidences, I mentioned the cave of Chauvet in my last homily, and until she broke her ankle, our speaker this Sunday was to be a woman taking as her text Werner Herzog’s unbelievably amazing Cave of Forgotten Dreams.  Since she can’t do it, we’re subbing in three church members talking about their creative paths, and I helped one of them since he was being put to it on short notice and he said he was feeling apprehensive and I gave him some advice.  He appeared happy to get it (my enthusiasm is a substitute for skill sometimes) and I await with pleasure how he will deal with the creative challenge of a minihom. So I would have enjoyed the booked homily and will definitely enjoy the substitute homily, and that’s pretty much how she goes at church.  Which reminds me, I should scare up a ride.

Benedict Cumberbatch will be taking on Hamlet in 2015, live somewhere in England.  Sigh.

Currently watching: Archer Vice (interesting, but no longer quite as funny), Rick and Morty (most recent show? the last two minutes took me to an unanticipated height of awesome), Justified (Boyd Crowder, how you do blow things up!), Downton Abbey, NCIS, NCIS Body Count, CSI, Person of Interest, Castle, plus the occasional Frontline and 60 Minutes.  I’ve pretty much given up on White Collar, mostly because those whackdoodles at Netflix don’t appear to want to stream it to my profile, and Jeff’s burned out on Burn Notice (ha!) although I still want to finish the show.  Person of Interest continues to be the show that Jeff and I are most likely to halt on the PVR so we can talk about the issues they are raising.  It’s a show that demands close attention and thought, and Root walked the dog Bear last episode.

Jeff is trying to get caught up on March Madness, otherwise known as the Squeaky Squeaky show from the sound of all those basketball shoes squeaking on those nice wood floors.

I wonder if two zone bus passes are available yet?  I’ll need one of those.  I do think longingly of getting a car, but I’ll be better off in at at least three ways without one.

Happy Friday to you all!  The port strike is over, although the drivers are still plenty choked.

 

Payday!

They pay up to date.  Amazing.  I love working for a small company.

The commute does not have any stinky people on it, on the basis of three days’ worth, although somewhere around Fraser somebody gets on who smells so strong of dank (in the marijuana sense of the word) that my eyes pop open and I wanna yell, “Where’s the party!?”

I have made a listless and ineffectual stab at the laundry.  Right now I want to write. (and I did, 250 words).

I’m doing coffee in church tomorrow with Sue.  I am bringing cheese and crackers.

Art as Spirituality MP3

After a late breakfast cooked by the birthday boy D, I got a ride back in to town where I was supPOSED to meet up with Keith and Paul and Katie, but Katie bailed because she was sick.  So I got to hug my son and listen to his tales of Australia.

Luc pointed out the MP3 is on line now.

I was supposed to get Naan last night for Jeff but the new Desi Turku restaurant is not open Sunday.

What I did today

I did no writing.  I practiced my mandolin a bit – I’m working on two songs at once, always inconvenient as my head ends up buzzing with everything I can hear and can’t sing all at once.  I delivered a children’s story and a homily at church.  Katie did me the honour of joining us.

It was well received.  I had no fewer than three current or former ministers in the congregation, so you can imagine how hard I had to brush up my toes.

I went for a 2.5 k walk in Oakalla (Deer Lake Park) with Paul.  And now I’m contemplating supper and the long awaited finale of True Detective. Paul and I drank tea on the back deck afterwards, and laughed like drains about one thing and another, and I got to look at his Australia pictures, some of which were quite entertaining and interesting.

Ralph Greer, one of the best and kindest and wisest men I ever knew, passed away Friday.  His funeral is next weekend.

I will take my ease for the rest of my Sunday – tomorrow will bring its own interesting events.

My day so far

Cooking supper for breakfast – pork chops, oven baked potatoes and fresh steamed green beans.

Calling Sue and begging for a lift for church as there was a foot of snow on the ground.

Going to church.  It was about Israel being mean to the Palestinians.

Hanging around after church until my ride was ready and talking to people I love.

Buying fair trade organic chocolate, because, that’s part of what we do at Beacon.

Rob W gave me a ride home, but we DIVAGATED.  First we went to Renaissance Books, where I bought a cd and some books about First Nations, including a book by an activist I follow on twitter who really kicks ass, and a Buddy Wasisname album with Peggy Gordon on it.  Then Rob threatened to take me to lunch but we played quick draw mcdebit card and I won.  I had Putin, whoops, Poutine and Montreal Smoked Meat, and Vic from the SOAP hall dropped by and we had a lovely long chat, and he told me about this.   Which is about a crazy local woodturner.  Also I saw Kat, Katie’s old roommate and tattooist.

Now I’m trying to make word count.  It’s not going well!  I did work on my Homilies book instead thanks to mOm.

 

Quick post

Made word count this morning. I am very dependent on my mOm’s encouragement.  Managed to make my way through the death scene without imploding.

Anti racism workshop today.

My meal at IHOP was so grisly I didn’t have to pay for it.

True Detective, a new HBO show, is very good.  Matthew McConaughey is REVELATORY.  Who knew he could act!???? Not the same dude as Sahara, that’s for sure.

mud mud glorious mud

I still can’t believe I slept through church yesterday.  Honestly, I got up when church was already over.  I was just so TIRED.  I guess the February blahs are doing their thing, finally. The hell of it is, I feel cheerful most of the time.  Not a big smiley face Hi How Are You kind of cheerful, just, I’m doing okay and enjoying life, thanks.  Also, wearing pirate clothes to church always cheers me up.

I did make word count yesterday.  Only 70 thousand more words to go! April 15th is my current deadline for a first draft.

Did I mention I had a phone interview on Friday?  I am still looking hard for work, but it’s hard when the work isn’t looking hard for me.

And here’s a muddy pangolin.