Good News

I got a 2.5% pay raise. There was a time not so long ago that a 2.5% raise would have me wondering what I was doing wrong and if there was something I could do to improve. Not today!! With what is going on in the economy today, I am thrilled to be employed much less getting a pay raise.

This will help us accomplish our goal of having the mortgage paid off by December 31, 2009.

Thought for the day:

"Have patience with all things, but chiefly have patience with yourself. Do not lose courage in considering your own imperfections but instantly set about remedying them -- every day begin the task anew."

Saint Francis de Sales

Psalm 101:3

"I will set no vile thing before my eyes."

Today's chapter included the verse above. It has me thinking how much we do set before our eyes that is vile, ugly, or degrading. I am 61 years old and there's not much I haven't encountered one way or another over the years but I must say that when I go into the break room at work and the television is on Maury Povich or his ilk, I am flat out embarrassed. I think that people are desensitized by the constant vulgarity until they don't know what is vulgar and embarrassing.

Then there is what we set before our ears. Music used to be beautiful, now it is often violent, ugly, and profane.

I can certainly understand why parents choose to homeschool their children to protect them from the external culture.

Thought for the day:

"Character cannot be developed in ease and quiet. Only through experience of trial and suffering can the soul be strengthened, ambition inspired, and success achieved."

Helen Keller

We don't seem to have a president.

Obama doesn't become the actual President for another 6 weeks so he isn't our president. GWB seems to have abdicated. (I suppose this could be taken as a blessing.) The country is sprialing toward an out and out depression and the president is more or less comatose. Now instead of being oblivious to New Orleans after Katrina, he seems to be oblivious to the whole country. IMHO, Obama is keeping the nation together with his almost daily cabinet announcements, economic and foreign policy announcements, and plans for economic restoration. At least, he is doing something. I watched part of an interview with GWB (can't remember who was doing the interview) but he seemed so out of touch that I wondered if he were drinking again. Never have I so anxiously anticipated getting past January 22.

The Library

I've been in love with libraries for as long as I remember. The Rosenberg library was my second home when I was growing up in Galveston. It was to me a massive building surrounded by live oak trees with a big statue of Mr. Rosenberg sitting on a chair right in front. I never had the nerve to climb up on the pedestal and sit on his lap but many others did. The children's area was upstairs and I think I knew every book up there. Laura Ingalls Wilder and Maud Hart Lovelace were my best friends. It was a cool quiet place. I took stacks of books home regularly.

When I was in junior high school, instead of P.E. I had the enviable position of library assistant for that period each day. It was heaven; when everyone else was getting hot and sweaty, I was in the library reading (and eating a forbidden Twinkie) with my friend Lois. We stamped in and out books for the classes that came in for a library period. I did the same thing one year in high school. Just give me library instead of P.E. any day!!

I've had several paying jobs at libraries. I worked one year at UH while I was in college. And one summer I had a wonderful job at my beloved Rosenberg library in Galveston cataloguing in the Archives; it was like being turned loose in Galveston's family attic. The last library job was at the church library. That job was very frustrating because the pay was for part time but the work was never-ending and then there was a lot of bickering among the volunteer staff.

Now it is so convenient to use the library on-line to request books and they are sent to the nearest branch. One can read and learn and enjoy to heart's content. And it is free!!

Thought for the day:

"The greatest degree of inner tranquility comes from the development of love and compassion. The more we care for the happiness of others, the greater is our own sense of well-being."

Tenzin Gyatso, the 14th Dalai Lama

How to make Veggie Soup

This is a very forgiving recipe both in terms of ingredients and cooking time. Very tasty, nutritious, and inexpensive.

¾ lb stew meat cut into small pieces
½ onion
2 Tbsp oil
2 Tbsp barley
Fr. Mixed vegetables—about 16 oz.
½ small cabbage slices very fine
Small can tomato paste
Garlic powder
Pepper
Salt

Salt, pepper, & garlic powder stew meat. Toss to coat with flour. Brown meat and onion in oil.
Add 1 ½ quarts water and barley. Simmer 1 hour stirring every 15-20 minutes.
Add frozen mixed vegetables and tomato paste. Simmer 1 hour stirring every 15-20 minutes.
Add cabbage and simmer 30 minutes.
Adjust salt and pepper to taste.

Excellent with any type toasted bread.

Thought for the day:

"Nothing worth doing is completed in our lifetime,
Therefore, we are saved by hope.
Nothing true or beautiful or good makes complete sense in any immediate context of history;
Therefore, we are saved by faith.
Nothing we do, however virtuous, can be accomplished alone.
Therefore, we are saved by love.
No virtuous act is quite as virtuous from the standpoint of our friend or foe as from our own;
Therefore, we are saved by the final form of love, which is forgiveness."

Reinhold Niebuhr

Medical Exams

I have such mixed feelings about routine medical exams. It isn’t the financial aspect that bothers me; I have good insurance and a flexible spending account for various deductibles and co-pays. And I certainly have no hesitations about going to a doctor when I am sick or hurt. It’s all the routine exams that I wonder about—yearly physical, gyn exam, dermatologist, colonoscopy, dentist, optometrist, neurologist, etc. All of this (other than my CMT which no one can do anything about anyway) even though I am perfectly healthy and happy.

I know that there is great benefit in catching things early but quite frankly one could make a career of going to various doctors for routine exams. What is the reasonable thing to do? I think I will see a doctor when I am sick or hurt, have dental cleaning done 2 times a year, and have one routine exam. 2009 will be the year for the routine dermatology exam.

Shopping

I am not much of a shopper and frankly if the economy getting better depends on me going to a mall, we are in deep doo. I wear scrubs and LL Bean and that’s it; I buy my scrubs at a shop owned by an Indian family; they treat all their customers like royalty even when I am just buying a $34 set of scrubs. The rest of my clothes and shoes come online from LL Bean because I know they will fit, they are well made, and if for some reason I want to return it, there’s a return label enclosed. I go into a family owned quilt shop every once in a while depending on what my quilting project needs. I used to buy a lot of books but now that the library has such a great system for putting books on reserve, I just keep books coming from the library. I don’t mind the weekly grocery shopping because I like to pick out the fresh produce and meat. I like to plan meals for a month at a time, then make a weekly shopping list and put it in order of the aisles in the grocery so that I don’t have to keep running back and forth. This inclination against shopping is certainly nothing new to me; I grew up with homemade cooking and homemade clothing. I have never understood the pleasure that evidently others get from shopping; there’s so much I’d rather do than drive to a mall, look for a place to park, walk from store to store, and spend money for stuff. Why would anyone rather be at a mall than home? Beats me.



Thought for the day:
Too often we underestimate the power of a touch, a smile, a kind word, a listening ear, an honest compliment, or the smallest act of caring, all of which have the potential to turn a life around."
Leo Buscaglia