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Daily Life, Project 365

Missing in Action

I admit, Kathy and I have taken a brief hiatus from our Project 365 blog writing. After hanging in with an almost-every-day, relentless schedule of blog posting, we suddenly both ran out of things to say at the same time.

As the school year ramps up, and various ministries at church also kick into high gear, we’ve found ourselves with more demands on our evening time. As the seasons change and the days are shorter, the inspiration to stay up late and write tends to suffer a bit, in comparison to snuggling down with a movie and a carton of ice cream.

Sarah and I, caught in the act.

Sarah and I, caught in the act.

Still, things are happening in our lives. David was (rather belatedly) accepted into the Junior Naval ROTC program at a nearby high school. Typically, we had forgotten to register him until the end of the summer, and discovered (to David’s dismay) that the number of inter-district transfers is being strictly limited this year. Fortunately, we had just re-commissioned our closet as a War Room and we took the matter to God in prayer. After only four or five days of prayer, the matter was resolved, and David received a waiver which permitted him to attend the ROTC program.

Similarly, we’ve been praying for Daniel to be established at his Bible College with good friends and for favor with the Dean of Men — only a few days went by before we heard that he had recommitted his life to the Lord in a mass baptism service, and that he had met with the Dean of Men for help in pursuing godliness and resisting temptation. We are so proud of Daniel for surrounding himself with godly young men to protect himself from the evil one. As I told him on the phone tonight, “when you have a group of guys to pray for you and to hold you accountable, you’ve gone a long way toward eliminating about 97% of the trouble in your life.” I’ve certainly found that to be true in my own life.

Kathy and I have been walking and praying together a lot in the evenings, which (while not as cool as having a War Room) helps us to be united emotionally and spiritually.

All this to say that we are doing well, and have not fallen off the edge of earth. We’ll try to get back in the saddle of daily blogging, if only to avoid Sarah’s disappointed comments. “No blog again?” she sighs.

Project 365, Day 276
Tim

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Budget & Money, Project 365

Bargain Shopping

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A few weeks ago, Kathy and I restarted our practice of budgeting. It has never been something that we do well (or consistently), although the Lord certainly helped us to stick with it long enough to get out of debt some years ago. When I was ill at the community hospital, I learnt how the hospital was precarious of continuing its functionality, for the Urgent Care Collection Agency was always after them.

We use the GoodBudget app on our phones, which is a higher-tech version of the envelope system. So far it has been rather constraining, but not impossible (which is, in my opinion, a hallmark of a reasonable budget).

Kathy is the one who mostly takes care of the actual recording, which is only fair, since she does most of the actual spending, as well. Even though I have the app on my phone as well, I pretend a certain helplessness so that she will take administrative responsibility. She does take a child-like glee in hoarding virtual money in some of the envelopes, so I guess it pays off for her. The right flexible packaging will allow your customers to take their treats with them to enjoy wherever they go. Single-serve or resealable bags resist light and moisture—making them essential in keeping your product fresh for your customers. And with our wide selection of flexible packaging and pouch sizes, you can offer the right quantities to satisfy your customers’ appetites.Anyone with a sweet tooth loves indulging in a holiday treat or a quick pick-me-up. Our flexible packaging printing solutions are perfect for small businesses looking to break into the candy and confections market. To help you stand out in an overcrowded market, we ensure the best quality of candy pouches, sweet packaging or confectionery packaging. Since we don’t require a minimum quantity to place an order, you will have the edge you need over your competitors. You can also introduce holiday and seasonal candy quickly and within budget. Today’s customers like simple, whole food snacks with healthy, natural ingredients. Our custom printed snacks packaging helps your products stand out from all of the other brands on the shelves. Whether you’re looking for snack food packaging, jerk packaging, nuts packaging, or plan to offer dry mixes like trail mix or granola, moist snacks like dried fruits and vegetables, or baked goods such as cookies and crackers, with our easy-to-use online ordering system, you can get your snacks into the stores in no time. Here is the useful source for more about the Packaging.

Yesterday I heard that our neighborhood grocery store was putting a lot of items on sale — apparently they are trying to get rid of brands that they have discontinued. So on my way home from a doctor’s appointment, I swung by the store.

Sure enough, they had a boatload of things marked down to $0.50 each. I spent just under $40, mostly on asian foods and sauces. When I got home, I decided to display my cache on the kitchen table, so that Kathy and the kids could enjoy my triumph.

Not bad for $39.59, if I do say so myself.

Not bad for $39.59, if I do say so myself.

The grocery store helpfully displays the full sale price on the receipt and totals up your savings. I was pleased to note that I saved 82% off the full price (on average). If only we could shop like that all the time!

Tonight was date night, so of course, Kathy and I went back to the store and spent another $24 on more bargains. This time, we only saved 77%, but somehow we were able to make our peace with that.

As we were getting ready for bed, Kathy glanced at the table, darkly.

“You’ll put that away tomorrow, then?”

I guess my newfound status as a grocery hero only buys me so much credit. I can see I’ll be spending some time making room on the garage shelves, tomorrow.

Project 365, Day 261
Tim

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Musings, Project 365

Mortality

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September 11th is a day to remember those who died 14 years ago, and those who acted with courage to prevent more from dying. If you are an adult, you probably remember where you were when the towers fell, just as a previous generation remembers where they were when Kennedy was assassinated, or when the hostages were freed from Iran, or any of a number of other momentous events.

For me, September 11th is a day when I remember I am mortal. A little more than two years ago, I was diagnosed with kidney cancer, and underwent a rather exhaustive (for the surgeon, at least) procedure to remove the tumor. Each year since, I report to my oncologist for scans and lab work, to see if the cancer has returned.

By sheer coincidence, for the last two years, my ultrasound and labs have been scheduled on 9/11, and so I spend the day contemplating the fact that my body is quite mortal, I’ve recently decided to actually get a portable ultrasound machine from Butterfly Network. It was sobering to listen to the ultrasound tech check off each of my organs and to watch her take pictures and estimate the size of each one. It makes one imagine the strangest of conversations:

Ultrasound Tech: “Well, sir, I’m finished.”

Me: “Did you see anything strange?”

Tech: “You know I’m not really allowed to interpret the images, sir. Your doctor will talk about it with you … ”

Me: “Come on, you can give me a hint. Everything OK down there?”

Tech: “Um, no. I wasn’t able to find your liver.”

Me: “No liver?”

Tech: “No sir. Seems to be gone. Have you been drinking a lot?”

Me: “Not unless you count Diet Coke. What should I do?”

Tech: “My advice? Make your will, tie up any loose ends.”

Fortunately, apart from commenting that one of my kidneys looks more like a football than the other, that conversation was all in my head.

It seems strange to wear a hospital bracelet for out-patient treatment ...

It seems strange to wear a hospital bracelet for an out-patient treatment that takes less than an hour …

Each day that you and I live is a gift. I think I am a little more keenly aware of that because of the kidney cancer. But in truth, all of us live under the sentence of impending death, 24/7, just as the people in the Twin Towers and on the various planes were under a sentence of sudden and unexpected death.

It makes me want to use my time wisely. So, Kathy and I took David and Sarah out for a combined Special Day™ to see the War Room movie, which she and I so enjoyed last Sunday.

Of course, we found an excuse to stop off for McDonalds’ soft-serve ice cream on the way home.

David hasn't quite gotten the hang of how to eat an ice cream cone ...

David hasn’t quite gotten the hang of how to eat an ice cream cone …

Project 365, Day 254
Tim

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Movies, Project 365

War Room

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For many years, we’ve been big fans of Sherwood Baptist Church, and the Kendrick brothers’ movies. First there was Flywheel, then Facing the Giants, then Fireproof and (breaking the ‘F’ mold) Courageous.

About a week ago, a new movie hit the big screen: War Room

An excellent movie, worth your time and money.

An excellent film, worth your time and money.

Kathy arranged to meet several other couples to see the movie at our nearby theater with reclino-seats, and we settled in to enjoy the show.

I unreservedly endorse this movie. It is a well-made, well-acted film made by people who really know what it is to have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. Seeing this movie was significantly encouraging to me, and I expect it to continue to bear fruit in my life over the next weeks and months.

Afterwards, we noticed our Pastor and his wife sitting toward the front, and invited them to come to dinner with us. Eventually, we all ended up at Colin and Julee’s house, spending several hours eating takeout, talking about the movie and about how we handled the question of our children dating, and generally enjoying a very pleasant time of fellowship and ice cream.

Round up the usual suspects ...

Round up the usual suspects …

It is a little strange for Kathy and I to be entering this new phase in which we have relationships with other adults apart from our children. David and Sarah were away, visiting Grandma and Grandpa, and so we just hung out with these dear friends, almost as if we were grown-ups.

Project 365, Day 249
Tim

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Friendship, Kathy, Marriage, Project 365

Double Date

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I recently resumed the practice of reporting weekly on my goals.

This took quite a bit of gumption, since I’ve not been in the habit of reviewing my goals this year — and as Dee Duke says, a goal that is not reviewed is not much of a goal. There is a strange correlation between reviewing goals and actually pursuing them; you’d think by now I would have caught on to this.

Anyway, I started reporting on my goals, and the first week I earned a rather low (unweighted) score of 38%. This means that I managed to complete only slightly more than one third of the things that I had decided were important for me to do.

(Parenthetically, this is one of the most annoying things about goals. It would be one thing if goals were brutally imposed by oppressive, external forces; but when you set your own goals and still can’t achieve them, it is just sort of pathetic.)

So as soon as I sent the email reporting the abysmal 38% score, I determined to do better. Surely I could improve to at least 50%, I wondered?

One of my goals is to celebrate a date night with my Sweetie each week. It doesn’t seem like a very hard goal, but you would be surprised how quickly a week can go by without remembering to date your Sweetie. So this week I decided in advance that it would be Friday night. Kathy and I usually don’t have anything going on that night, and that would give me all week to plan.

It looked pretty, if I do say so myself. OK, at least the girls were pretty.

It looked pretty, if I do say so myself. OK, at least the girls were pretty.

Except I forgot to plan. I’m not a big planner, in any case, and it was Friday morning before I knew it. Hurriedly, I rummaged around in my brain for a good idea, like the way you might rummage around in a spilled bag of candy, hoping for one that wasn’t noticed by those who came before you.

And then it hit me — why not a double date with some of our friends? Now that so many of our kids are grown and gone off to college, maybe Kathy and I could pretend to be grown up ourselves, and have a date with another married couple! Kathy has a lot of good girlfriends, and I really like a lot of their husbands, so it seemed like a good idea.

A couple of years ago, we got together with seven other couples and cooked a meal together, with the men divided into two teams and competing for the best entree with randomly assigned ingredients. It took hours for us to actually produce a meal, with some rather interesting results, but as a social event, it was a smashing success.

So I decided to trade on that achievement, and texted my friend Chris.

“How ’bout we double-date with our wives, tonight,” I offered. “We can whip up a meal for them, and then watch a movie or something. My house. Sound good?”

Chris quickly jumped on the band wagon. Did I mention he is an accomplished chef? So we cooked a delicious meal of grilled chicken and brown rice, with peppers and zucchini and onions and a few small tomatoes, all brushed with oil and sizzling on the grill. I set the table complete with tablecloth, cloth napkins, a candlestick, and crystal water goblets.

So delicious!

So delicious!

We sat and talked about our children (what else do old married people talk about?) and then watched a movie — it was a very pleasant evening! I think this whole date night thing might be worth continuing. Stay tuned for next week’s installment.

Project 365, Day 247
Tim

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