Current Events

Gary has been teaching a college class for the local satellite of Concordia University.  It's been quite the challenge time-wise.  It's his first time teaching this class, which means he has to read the textbook and figure out what's wrong in it so that he can remedy the problems while teaching.  Then there's the to-be-expected teaching and grading.   As has occurred before, students comment that they learn more about writing from him (in theology class) than they learned from their writing profs; he takes his grading duties seriously.  One more class, and then we will get to see him occasionally again!

This week was the first time since October where I was scheduled at work for my 2.5 days and nothing else.  I was looking forward to three days in a row of housework, homeschooling, cooking, Christmas prep, and catching up on projects.  Didn't happen.

Gary's mom had a relatively minor stroke this weekend.  After five days in the hospital, she will be moving to rehab.  We drove down to see her this week.  While there, we drove over to see my mom too.  Boy, that was a nice visit!  (Sorry, Mom, there were other little things I wanted to do and didn't get to.  But the chatting time was a joy!)  Another happy surprise was arriving home to find that Maggie had mopped, had cleaned bathrooms, and had done laundry.

Looking like quite the idiot today, I mowed.  In December.  In Wisconsin.  The mower hadn't been drained of oil and gasoline last time it was used.  So I turned it on and let it idle.  In an attempt to hurry the consumption of fuel, I took the machine out in the yard where the grass was longest and mowed.  So far there has been no sign that the neighbors reported me to the authorities for mental instability.

I've done a little Christmas shopping.  Not much.  I wonder when it will happen.  I expect the tree will go up sometime next week.  In non-Christmas activities, today I dusted the guts of the computer, hung up the bikes from the garage ceiling, and hunted up the snow shovels and snow blower.  I did not, however, get around to repairing the wash machine; I may regret this soon.  Only 794 items left on this week's to-do list...

Andrew keeps coming home with stories of clients who appreciate him and think he's wonderful.  (Smart clients.)   Also, he finished his fall semester today.

Maggie and I are reading Anne of Green Gables.  It's amazing how closely the movie sticks to the book!  What's also amazing (in a less salutary fashion) is the gross number of misspellings in my copy of the book.  It's a fun story -- and made even funnier sometimes by the typos.  (For example, sometimes "Marilla" is spelled "Manila" and sometimes even "Mania.")

Paul has a job offer.  It's not the job he really wants; he's still waiting to hear back from the other company.  I don't envy him having to decide what to do.  I keep praying that God will make the decision simple for him and that He will guide Paul to the better job (even if a different job has certain attractions to it). 

I managed to burn the green beans tonight.  What a mess in the cast-iron skillet!  It required so much scrubbing that the skillet will need serious re-seasoning.  Maggie is excited because that means pancakes. 

There's more to say, but it's past bedtime.  I miss my writing time.  But hey, I also miss my sleeping time.