Wednesday, August 31, 2005

Is anyone still wondering why or how something as devastating as Katrina could happen to New Orleans after reading this? It's like Sodom and Gomorrah all over again. Only our society it far more guilty, because we have the scriptures, as well historical testimony (even the pagan acknowledges history) in what has happened to all societies and cultures that become so depraved.

I have yet to read any news about the US or any of the states having called a day of prayer and fasting, that God would have mercy and prevent this disaster. Has anyone else found some?

Jode

Tuesday, August 30, 2005

Monday, August 29, 2005

James F. Put this on chat, I thought it was worth sharing. http://www.snopes.com/photos/accident/crane.asp Hope your day is going better than that. :D

Sunday, August 28, 2005

"History attests that as the more spiritual part of religion declines in any church, the more does she resort to the ceremonial part." David Steele

Saturday, August 27, 2005



The Blog of a Thousand Typos

So here we go. I'm ready, are you ready? Ready for..ready for, another boring blog..hm, need another b word. Hmm, another billowing, blundering, block-headed, boring blog. Okay, that'll do for now. As you have probably guessed already, I am either rather tired at this moment, or have been inhaling too many paint fumes, or maybe both. After all, they're both legitimate claims as I'm in an office that has recently been painted and it is 1 am :D

So, I suppose if you're checking this, you're checking to find a post about what I have been filling my days with for the last while, and not checking to find yet another old post that no longer qualifies as interesting if it ever did. Well for that person looking for a real update, this post is for you. :D (*disclaimer* just because it's new doesn't mean it's interesting and length doesn't always mean good content. :D) Yeah, I'm in a pessimistic mood and if you were in any doubt of it, right now on my left hand sits a glass that is half empty. And I consider it half empty even though it's so big it, when full, would qualify as 2 glasses.

From the fumes comment you may have picked up on my latest pastime. Yup, I've been busy painting the office/library/computer room. How is it going? It could have been better more than once, but thus far I've lived through it and am happy with the results. :D The problems? Well one would be that the second can of paint I picked up for the top 2/3 of the walls didn't match the first can of paint that had been color matched previously. I had already applied some of the first can to a couple walls and had completed them before running out, thus the walls didn't match. :D To remedy this I just repainted all of them, as I had more than enough in the new can to handle that job. So that being done, my second big prob was that under the office carpet, I believed there to be a floor of vinyl tiles as was already uncovered in my room. I investigated this by looking under the carpet in three corners, although due to a bookshelf I was inhibited to look under the forth. Amazing what decisions are made and how many wouldn't have been made the way they were, had you only known. I talked to M & B about the carpet and we all agreed that it would be preferable to have out with it, as it's too short to really clean and was getting rather nasty. Now as there are 7 shelves in here I opted to remove the carpet chunk by chunk, and then move the shelves into the empty floor space. There goes the first chunk, "oh look, floor tiles"..there goes the second chunk, "oh look, floor tiles", there goes the third chuck, "I'm sorry, WHAT?? Where did this cement come from??" So yeah, They really only tiled a few rows along the walls and gave up finishing the middle over to the forth corner, go figure.

The plan is now to pull out the tiles, although even that wasn't clear cut at first as I had to send a sample to Edmonton to be tested to make sure that it didn't contain asbestos. Thankfully the guy said there are no traces of asbestos in the tile or adhesive so it'll be on to the next step. From what I've read about removing vinyl tiles, not only will I need the strength of Hercules, but the job will also require the patience of a saint or maybe Job?. Be kind, don't bet against me. :D After a fair bit of reading I believe I know the methods that seem to work the best. So if I have the time tomorrow I shall venture to try it, and if not tomorrow I'll make the most of Monday and the following however many weeks until I'm free of it. :)

As for today, my venture was mostly in curtain making, and curtain making I did. Two curtains, which are now hanging in the window to replace the busted blinds (thanks to Tiger). One more thing down, 50 more to go. :D I also sorted the CD's, hung the whiteboard, etc, etc.

I find there are a few pluses for working in here, the biggest being the computer, meaning not only do I have music at my fingertips, but I've been able to listen to some books on sermon audio that were read by Leah awhile back. Thus far I've listed to a section from Domestical Duties, and three parts of the one on the Westminster Divines. :D So yeah, been enjoying that and realizing all the more how bad the church has had it..again and again, but also how the faithful always get back up, which is rather encouraging.

Well enough for now, I'll try to update on my progress when I've made some, and pictures shall follow after that.

Hope you have a nice Saturday,

Jode

Wednesday, August 24, 2005

Playing with dad



Playing with mom






This leads to...

This



Jealousy thy name is Geneva






Everybody ignore the camera...





A little bit of friendly competition?


PS Sorry about the lack of clear quality in the photos above. Jord and Dor's living room can be rather dark, and the cam doesn't seem to do very well in poor lighting, so a lot of the lighting is on the artificial side. :)

Saturday, August 20, 2005

Clearly, something you only find on the bottom of Canadian lakes, the litterers!

Saturday, August 13, 2005

Time exists but just on your wrists
So don't panic
Moments last and lifetimes are lost in a day
So wind your watches down, please
Cos there is no time to lose

There's part a Travis song for you (Indefinitely). I don't quote songs very often, but this one just feels so fitting lately that I couldn't resist. Although it's not really that accurate, as time exists in a lot of things. Like..grey hair, the break down of appliances, back pain, the size of kids, when they aren't kids anymore, the amount of pipe leaks in the house, the nonchalantness of present and future birthdays (at least until you get beyond the realm of secret or indifferent ages.) and yes, time tells on us in a billion different ways, with or without the watch (if anyone cares to, feel free to add to the list).

So, Edmonton. Not sure how many people in Edmonton read this, but thanks to ya'll for the wonderful hospitality you showed to us out of towners. :) Now for a little run down of the visit, if I can manage that. I know a lot has already been said by others, so I will fill in my family and my spaces in the..places..and on that basis, here we go (yes, having a lame moment). We managed to leave Thursday afternoon, after Mark got off of a half shift. The drive was good, I was in the middle row and thus didn't want to puke. :D I got to drive part of the way because Mark had been up since 5 or 6 am. And the last but not least part of the trip details, we didn't hit anything, and didn't breakdown woohoo. Upon arriving at Dor and Jord's we didn't stay up too late, as we all realized we had better save our energy.

Energy saved, and on to Friday. Friday we did something half the day (don't you love all that detail?) While we did the something, Mark ventured out for specialty beer. After the half a day was gone, Mark was still not back. That's right, Mark had a breakdown (not mental, just the van). We learned that run of the mill auto shops have no clue when it comes to dodge wiring, and that it can take them 3 times as much time to get it back together as it took to take it apart. We learned how wonderful traveling on long a weekend is, and that Dodge mechanics don't like to work on them. We learned that 8 people do not fit in a 5 seater car (Mark wasn't back yet). We learned that two trips were worth it, as Mark got back in time for the second run. We went to the Church dinner deal. I mused around, trying to find someone, and then something to talk about. It worked and I had a good time of it. I thought about attempting to play in the gym, but was already overly boiling, and not willing to break my leg or nose in a real effort. The gym was noisy, and the rain outside inviting. Listened to the wonderful music, played by several talented wonders. Got a ride with Leah, with some others to a coffee shop. Ordered a hot drink when I was already "overly boiling" and learned that although I may have been boiling, I was not bright. All that, and I burnt my tongue. :D Went to the B's, got to visit some more, and got a ride back to Dor and Jord's. Expected to find people up (Shawn and Tam were to be picked up at 10:32 pm), lights were out, and I assumed everyone must have been dreadfully bored to have retired at 12:00 am. I learned that you can hear the door from the garage into the house open, from the upstairs bedroom, and that the same is true for the other bedroom cuz out came Mark and Belinda. I then learned that they only just got back, because Tam's bag was lost and bags of 15 other people. We stayed up late talking.

Okay, that was waay too long, sorry about that. Saturday, everyone slept in or tried to; I wasn't that fortunate. At a quarter to 12:00 Mark decided to rent a van (as ours was sitting outside, undriveable until the Dodge shop reopened on Tuesday)After a couple minutes of surfing the net for rentals, Mark makes the phone call. Lessons for that moment.. on long weekends rental places close at noon, the rental place is 10 minutes away and Mark and Jord can go get out of the house really fast when there's a reason. Woohoo, a running rental van. Picnic-ho, and here we go. We came, we went, we saw, we ate, we talked, we played, we sang, we were interviewed, we packed it up, we drove it to the D's for diapers then the B's for.. for.. beer? Us women talked in the family room about fashion of course, clothing, and lots of..thought provoking..stuff. The guys in the living room talked about hard drives, now who got the better end of that stick? :P Then the C's and myself packed it up early (12:00 am or so) and went back to the D's for sleep, while the others stayed another hour and Dor or Tam fell asleep on a couch, poor gril.

The Lord's day, dahdaah. We talked all morning, went to worship, witnessed 5 baptisms, took communion, had a fellowship meal, talked, took family pictures, took random pictures, and had a Psalm sing. It was truly a splendid day, just thinking of it makes me happy. Then I got a ride with Martin and Amy to the B's, for Amy to get something..I can't remember what. :D There I got to talk a bit with Beka and Donna W. and I got to poke Stace. From there Martin, Amy and myself went back to the D's, where the D's, A's, C's and Leah were and visited till some late hour on various enjoyable topics.

Monday was a lovely day. We slept in, and then arranged for us girls to go shopping on White Ave. while the guys were to go over to the B's to visit and go hard drive shopping. We got dropped of at Lush, and worked our way down the ave, visiting the eye catching stores, and learned that some nice looking stores are run by losers who don't want to open on a long weekend, haha. We stopped for lunch at Opa! (Greek food place),B and Dor had Lamb shish kabobs, with salad and pita bread while Tam and I had awesome gyros. From there we walked up the other side of the street, and came across a guy offering gelato (Italian ice cream) samples. We fell for it, and ended up by having to buy some, which we didn't regret in the least. After that side of the ave, we went to Chapters to call Mark and wait for him to pick us up, but they were out hard drive shopping and forgot to take the cell. So we waited for them to get the message from Fran, it worked, only took over an hour. Yes, it was lovely time in the sun, although we were missing Manda, then it would have been perfect. Went to the B's again, had pizza and visited, and dled on Greg's hard drive. Leah and Irene joined us, and brought some girly drinks, which the guys then proceeded to drink, haha.

Tuesday was a nice kick-back day. The van got into the shop, and was fixed in no time. The guys and Belinda went out book hunting, while Tam, Dor and I went out hairstylist hunting. We learned that on the Tuesday after a long weekend most hair places only have 1 person working, 2 customers in line, and at least 1 hour for waiting. But after checking at 5 or so places, we found 2 people on staff and one idle. :D Snip, snip, there goes the hair. My hairdresser was a hag and believe me, that's putting it nicely, but at least she was able to use a pair of scissors. :D Tam and Dor's hairdresser was a pregnant smoker, poor baby. Cleaned, packed, had an early birthday party for Dorry, ate ice-cream cake, watched a movie, talked, and then slept.

Wednesday we traveled home, all was smooth. I drove from Edmonton to Jasper, stopped by a gorge, went to a lake, can't remember the name of either of them but they were really nice. I have a pic of the lake, but I forgot to take the cam at the gorge..pity as it was very cool. Tam was drove from Jasper, while I slept for a couple hours and all was smooth, that is until a couple miles outside of Mackenzie.
Tam saw it, but didn't know what to do, "do I honk, will that scare it into the road" etc. obviously there wasn't a lot of time for thought or speech. In the van Tam said She said "A deer, Shawn a.." (there for something else too, but it happened so fast. In the car Mark said, "a deer!" We saw this stupid creature leap onto the road, right in front of Shawn's car, Shawn braked and swerved. The car hit, the deer flipped and Calvin who noticed something must have happened was wondering why they were stopping "who what where, why?". We pulled over as fast as we safely could, pulled out and went to see if everyone was alright. They were safe, we were relieved, the car was..wrecked. After Shawn had hit it, he had the presence of mind to pull the car over to the side of the road before it died. And a good thing, cuz it wouldn't restart. Mark and Shawn got a ride back to Mackenzie with a nice passerby, while we girls + Calvin drop back in the van. We learned that Mackenzie cops go home early, but that they have a phone outside their building that will connect you to them at home. I believe I already related what happened with the G's, so we all got home at 12:00 or there abouts.

The rest of the visit summed up. Thursday I woke up with a jerk, I ran around like nut..Shawn was wondering what cracked. I had slept through my alarm and was late to pick up milk. Shawn who was armed, or rather eyed with a good prescription drop me to pick it up, as my glasses aren't up to date. Friday Mark was pulled back into work a day early, Tam and I took on 4 sewing projects, we sewed, Uncle Steven and Aunt Lovella and crew stopped in for the night. They left in the morning, there was a BBQ at Cheryl G's, I sewed, Tam and I sewed, we went and played pool with the G boys, and we sewed. Lord's day we had worship and a fellowship meal, stayed up late, packed, cut fabric and slept, Monday they were off to breakfast at the S's and then to Edmonton.

That is where my tale ends off and it's back to the Saturday grind. Sorry about the length of this book, but there was a lot that happened, even in the short version form.

Have a blessed Lord's day ya'll. :)

Jode

The Lake

Willena, these are for you. Hope they're clear enough to see. If there is any photo in there that you would like alone, just let me know.


Friday, August 12, 2005


As some of you may know, yesterday was the 23rd birthday of my beautiful sister Dorry, so I thought I'd post this today. Better late than never? :)

Thursday, August 11, 2005

Cheryl and James at the shower. Yes, I did receive approval, but only remembered to ask for it thanks to Willena. So on that note, thanks Willena. :D

Wednesday, August 10, 2005

Tuesday, August 09, 2005

A real blog entry coming soon to a blog near you..but until then, isn't he cute!?

Saturday, August 06, 2005

The sky




The car