Just a Friday

I've been running errands most of the day. The main thing I had to do was send my dead router back to Linksys via UPS. There was a little bit of red tape through which I had to go to make sure it goes right. Once they receive my router, they'll send me a replacement. I'll be glad once it gets here so I won't have to keep switching back and forth on my cable modem from my computer to my TiVo. I'll also be back wireless then too. I'm not a fan of having my computer stuff sprawled out in my living room.

This evening, I'm going to have dinner at some friends' house. It'll be good to hang out with them for a while.

Tomorrow, I'm going, hopefully, to Birmingham to help my brother, Rick, move into his dorm room at Samford. It'll be a lot of driving in one day, but maybe it'll give me a chance to start book V of Harry Potter.

Sunday will be a busy day. Two morning services start off the day, then we'll have a deacon ordination service that evening.

Monday will be a day-long staff retreat for the ministers at church. This will be our time to do some planning for the year to come.

Loving Limerick

One of the members of my senior adult choir, Saints Alive, sent me a very nice, encouraging email today. Included in the email was a limerick she composed. Being a retired English teacher, she really has a grasp of the form!

What a wonderful friend is our Marty,

We've been fond of him right from the start-y.

With him as our leader,

Things couldn't be neater;

Saints Alive's as much fun as a party!

A full day

Both Unity Youth Choir and Sanctuary Rehearsals went exceptionally well.  I think part of that is the result of the qualifications of the layperson that filled in for me last week while I was one vacation.  She did wonderful job and it showed in rehearsals tonight.

There were about 22 students in Unity Youth Choir.  They’re responding very well and, for the most part, they are putting a lot of effort into the choir.  Musically, however, we have a long way to go.

Sanctuary Choir rehearsal was very good too.  They really had a nice blend and they were quick responsive to my leading to night.

All in all, it was a very good night.

This afternoon, the Kiwanis Club of Griffin held a Ministers’ Appreciation Luncheon.  It was nice and the food was pretty good.  The speaker was a hilarious undertaker.  And yes, he made the most of his profession as he was speaking.  He was also author of a book that, I think, was called “Life from a Hearse.”

The weekend is quickly approaching, especially since mine starts after Praise Band rehearsal on Thursday nights.  If Rick can get into his dorm room on Saturday, I may head over to Birmingham for the big move-in at Samford.

Late nights and things

This is just about what my clock looked like when I finally made it to sleep last night, or rather this morning. Even with a sleeping pill added in the mix, I only got 4 hours of sleep last night. I'm sure I'll sleep well tonight.

In the wee hours of the morning, I thought I'd be productive and update the firmware on my wireless router and the drivers on my wireless card. Somehow, I managed to completely fry my router. The power light just keeps blinking at me in an accusatory way saying, "you should have just left well enough alone." I messaged with the Linksys folks online at 2:00am (the queue was much shorter then) to no avail. When I got home from work today, I called the support people and spent about 45 minutes trying to get it to work. At the end of all that, the technician said that my router was definitely shot (in an Indian accent of course) and he told me the procedure for getting an under-warranty replacement. I thought surely I was going to have to replace it myself. Boy, was I glad to hear that.

Because of my lack of sleep, trying to get anything productive done was hopeless. I had my Ministerial Peer Group Meeting in Macon, so I drove to that and tried to get some work done over the telephone. The meeting was somewhat productive. It did get me a free lunch at Longhorn, though!

Tonight I went to dinner with some friends from church I hadn't seen in a couple of weeks. Now I'm chillin' still trying to catch up on all the TiVo stuff I missed since I was gone all last week.

Well...off to my no sugar added ice cream.

Diet Cheerwine

I was so excited to find that my Bruno's grocery store right here in Griffin, Georgia sells Diet Cheerwine. The taste is a delightful combination of Dr. Pepper and Cherry Coke. I bought two two-liters of it when I went to the store this evening.

From the time I bought the Diet Cheerwine at 6:30 to the time I went to bed at about 11:00, I had consumed about 2/3 of the two-liter bottle. Well...I discovered after I'd consumed all of that Diet Cheerwine that it does, in fact, have caffeine. You may not know this about me, but if I have a twelve-ounce can of a caffeinated beverage at lunchtime, I could still be up at around 2:00 in the morning. I have managed to drink about 4 cans' worth of a caffeinated beverage in the course of 4 hours. I'm definitely afraid of the consequences.

As meticulous as I am about checking the nutrition labels on food and drinks, I neglected, in my utter excitement, to check the ingredient list on the Diet Cheerwine.

If I survive this tragedy, I'll have to limit myself to drinking the rest of my Diet Cheerwine in the early morning hours: what a wonderful way to start off the day!

From the land of relaxation to the land of catch-up

Today has been pretty crazy. With huge pile of junk mail to go through, voicemails to respond to, and little fires to put out, there was a lot to be done.

I found out today that I'm going to PREACHING on September 11 at our 8:45 service for a communion. Even though I'll just be doing a communion meditation, this will certainly be an interesting experience. I'll be looking for sermon illustrations wherever I go, so you are now officially warned! You may end up in a sermon.

I'm restarting my Peer Learning Group tomorrow. We've been on hiatus for the summer. This group is sponsored by the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship. We've read through books and had fellowship together. I enjoy being able to vent and get encouragement and be refreshed with my fellow ministers.

My brother, Rick, got deposited at Samford today for his first band camp and the beginning of his college career. He's got a wonderful four years ahead of him.

Return from the land of relaxation

Well...I got back from vacation at about 6:30 this evening. I've been getting things in order after having been gone for a week.

As you can see from my mobile post that precedes this one, I was at my grandmother's house in Augusta, GA yesterday and today. While we were there, we spent some time with my aunt, uncle, and three little cousins. We had fun playing and hanging out.

This morning, Robbie, Dad and I went to the 75th Anniversary celebration at First Baptist Evans. The service was nice and there was a good "dinner on the grounds" afterward. It was nice to be able to sit in the congregation and not be in charge of anything. I didn't even sing with the mass choir...it was my day to enjoy being in church without the stresses of leading a service.

This week will be a little busier than usual, primarily trying to catch up from all that I missed last week. This Wednesday, the Griffin Kiwanis Club is having a Minister Appreciation Lunch. I had been in Griffin about one week when they had this event last year, so I'll look forward to being a little (or a lot) more settled in this time around.

I guess that's it for now.