Odds and Ends

Okay, Camp Bandina and the Colorado vacation are now in the past. It's time to get back into the daily routine - whatever that is.

This is the last week for Kayla and Lance to be with us. They'll be heading back to Lubbock and Texas Tech this Saturday. It was fun having them here for the last few months and we'll sure miss them. I think it was a productive summer for both of them. Kayla picked up some good experience during her externship and Lance had the opportunity to make some money working for Jeff Simmons. I understand that they'll be back to attend the Joseph show the first weekend in October, and we'll also see them at a wedding in Dallas the following weekend.

Over the last few days I've had some good conversations with Thom Besso and his group regarding a Benefits Director position with a major hospital organization in Houston. I'm hoping to find out about an interview in the next few days.

This morning I put the finishing touches on my Life of Joseph curriculum for the Sunday morning adult Bible classes at FCCC. As I mentioned before, this will be a five week series of lessons - starting September 13th - that will cover chapters 15 through 50 of Genesis. I'm looking forward to teaching again.

Vicki is very excited about the sudden progress of her home redecorating project. This morning she brought home the new bedding - comforter, pillows, etc. - for the master bedroom. The new couch and love seat are also in, and will be delivered next week after the painters are finished with the master bedroom, the master bath, and the study. In addition, the fabric for recovering two of the living room chairs also arrived today. We still need to make some decisions on some new rugs, which will certainly be the most difficult part of the entire process. The last time we bought rugs we made at least three trips between the rug place and home with every rug, and those rugs are heavy! It's one thing to pick out furniture (which is easy) and another thing to find the perfect rug to match that furniture.

I'll finish with a short rant and then a movie review.

My rant involves people who smoke while being eligible for food stamps. On our trip to Colorado we frequented the Westcliffe Super Market on several occasions. During one of our visits we got stuck in a check out line behind two women who were paying for their purchases using a combination of food stamps, cash, and personal checks. I'm not exaggerating when I say that it took them at least fifteen minutes to check out. This would have annoyed me under the best of circumstances, but on this particular trip I had a case of altitude sickness and the accompanying headache, dizziness, etc. When we finally made it out of the store into the parking lot there were the food stamp ladies sitting on the hood of their pickup truck smoking cigarettes. Is it just me, or does it seem that people who can afford to spend $6.00 for a pack of cigarettes shouldn't be getting free groceries that you and I are paying for? I think part of Mr. Obama's health care reform should include mandatory nicotine testing for food stamp recipients.

And now, my movie review. Yesterday Kayla, Lance, Vicki and I went to see the movie The Time Traveler's Wife. Kayla assured us that this movie was "appropriate for all genders", meaning that it was not a chick-flick. This is a movie about a guy who is afflicted with a genetic disorder that causes him to make random trips through time. His time travel gene acts up whenever it feels like it, and he never knows when he'll disappear, or for how long. An interesting twist (not really) is that when he travels his clothes stay behind, which only makes sense when you think about it. Clothes cannot have genetic disorders. This story would have made a good episode on a sixty minute installment of the Twilight Zone but it definitely was not enough to carry an entire feature length movie. Also, I'm not too sure about the "gender appropriate" thing. It definitely bordered on chick-flickedness.

The remainder of this week will be dedicated to Kayla. She is done with her externship and will be using the rest of this week to have as much fun as possible before they go back to Lubbock. Lance, on the other hand, will be using the rest of this week to make as much money as possible before they go back to Lubbock. I noticed earlier today that Kayla has actually written up a schedule for the week, appropriately named the "Week of Fun Schedule" (not a joke). Today was "movie and hang out at home", tomorrow is "chill at home in the morning and go to the Galleria in the evening", and Wednesday is "Breakfast Klub [a downtown breakfast dive] and George Ranch", etc., etc. for Thursday and Friday. Have fun at work Lance.