Enjoying the Ride

     We had a pretty nice Mother's Day celebration at our house this week. The kids helped me cook and clean up the meal for Beth and my Mom. Beth received money towards the purchase of a bicycle, as she'd really like to get back into biking (which means I guess I'll end up getting back into biking).
     Monday was an historic night at our house. First Beth taught me how to mix up hamburger patties (her famous secret recipe - well, everyone I know who's tried them really likes them) and fry up leftover potatoes. Then I showed her how to navigate around Facebook and Hotmail, setting up accounts for her. She's checked in every night and is up to 35 Facebook friends. Beth received her first forwarded email but it was excellent (and she of course forwarded to a few people herself). It included this great line:

Life should NOT be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in an attractive and well-preserved body, but rather we should skid in sideways, Chardonnay in one hand, chocolate in the other, body thoroughly used up, totally worn out and screaming "WOO HOO! What a ride!"

     Wednesday evening was my first time leading a practice at church as I'm kinda in charge of the music this Sunday. I was pretty nervous about how things might go as I'm finding there are a lot of things to adjust to and to know, but it seemed to go really well and I felt much better by the time we were finished. 

     Beth is away at a ladies' retreat this weekend so Friday night I invited all the guys from our house church/small group to come over to our place for some games and snacks. There ended up being 10 of us altogether and we had a great time playing Wizard (an expanded version of 'Up and Down the River'). In our second game, in a group of 5 (the first game was all 10 of us playing together) I pretty much smoked my competition, always getting the number of tricks I predicted, and scoring 450 points by the end of the game (mmm, maybe I should have been a more gracious host).

     This week I continued listening to some T-Bone Burnett.  His 'The Strange Case of Frank Cash' on "The Animal Years" is so awesomely clever. Also gave a couple of listens to the first Fleet Foxes release (they have a new album out this week but I decided a while ago that I can't buy a new release by anybody unless I've given appropriate time to their last one). They've got some pretty amazing harmonies - I've gotta check out their lyrics more closely. I gave a first listen to Ashley Cleveland's "God Don't Never Change", which is her take on some classic gospel songs - they're okay, but they just made me want to dig out my Kaiser/Mansfield acoustic blues stuff. So I did and was impressed all over again - this is fantastic musicianship. Glenn Kaiser can really play the blues guitar, he and Darrell Mansfield have great voices, as well as some great blues harp/harmonica. I was surprised how many of the songs mixed in with the oldies were written by Glenn - some of them should be classics as well. Waking up in the middle of the night with his 'Cornerstone' tune running in my head.

     Just finished reading 'The Orthodox Heretic and Other Impossible Tales' by Peter Rollins. He writes modern parables that have surprising twists on many traditional biblical stories Christ told. They're quite short, then include a commentary, and many of them are very thought-provoking. I purchased it on my iPad for only 99¢. It's for the Kindle app - I'm certainly finding better deals at Amazon than at Apple's iBooks store. And now the Kindle reader seems to be able to track the number of pages in books as well, which is a nice feature.

Elections, IKEA & Good Art

      Well I was pretty surprised (and a bit disappointed) with the election results last week. I've been upset at the tone of current political discourse in Canada - attack ads, name-calling, fear-mongering (mainly on the part of the Conservatives under Harper), along with a disregard for parliamentary procedures/rules. I agreed with a Maclean's writer that a message needed to be sent that we the people don't support this kind of behaviour. But obviously very few people felt that way, or else there were other more important issues for voters, or maybe they just voted locally and really liked their Conservative candidate. I've been saying for a while now that I don't mind minority governments as then members have to learn to work together and even make compromises. I'm less comfortable with one party having complete power to make decisions that affect the whole country. At any rate things have definitely changed and I guess we'll see how things work now. It certainly is interesting to see the results - Liberals on a steep decline, most women MPs ever, youngest MP in history (19 years old and making over $150,000!).
     On Monday we went to IKEA and I've decided I don't like that store much at all. It just seemed to be one problem after another. You write down what aisle and bin to look in for items in the warehouse but when we got down there several things were sold out. The worker wasn't helpful, leading us to look for something else that was nothing like what we wanted. Near the end of our time there we were looking for aisle 41 and when I asked someone (around aisle 36) she told us it was back at the beginning, beside aisle 1! And of course once you get your furniture home you spend hours putting it together yourself. Fortunately we were shopping for Josh and Joel so the construction fell to them.
     I'm really enjoying a book that was recommended by musician Tom Prasada-Rao called "Crossing to Safety." It's about the special friendship between 2 couples back in the 1930's. The husbands are university professors and one wife ends up with polio. The author really captures cottage life (one of the settings) and reminded me of the years I enjoyed at Fairy Lake near New Liskeard. He writes lovingly about the intricacies of the relationships and how they deepen over the years. It makes me want to appreciate the friendships I have, and grow even closer to others - which really means simply spending more time with people.
      In that friendship vein, I read a great quote today: “The unpayable debt that I owe to him was not ‘influence’ as it is ordinarily understood, but sheer encouragement. He was for long my only audience. Only from him did I ever get the idea that my ’stuff’ could be more than a private hobby.” J.R.R. Tolkien, on his friend, C.S. Lewis
     Listened to Mark Heard's "Mosaics" this week and realized (again) what a great songwriter he was. Plus his cover of T-Bone Burnett's 'The Power of Love' is just that - powerful. That led me to listen to some old T-Bone - "Trap Door" (6 song EP which is great) and "Behind the Trap Door" (6 song EP which is not so great). That's not much music for this week so that means I must not be doing enough walking.

Life is Good

     Beth needed to go to Toronto to Princess Margaret Hospital this week to talk to the dentist there about her lack of saliva problem, which resulted from the radiation she had to her neck area during treatment for Hodgkin's disease way back in 1984. Dry mouth is not fun and has caused lots of cavities in her teeth as well. The meeting was pretty disappointing and frustrating as the doctor was not very compassionate/interested/helpful, saying there's really nothing that can be done, but that Beth really should have been administering regular flouride treatments for the last 25 years - which nobody had told her.
     We stopped at the Square One mall in Mississauga on the way home and I ended up getting quite a few new clothing items, even though we were looking for stuff for Beth. The best thing was that we found a framed Tom Thomson print that was 1/2 price and will look fantastic in our living room.
     We put a fair bit of time and energy into preparing the presentation about our lives for the Friday night small group - scanning old pictures, constructing Keynote, making notes, trying to condense 70+ years (20+20 single years plus 30 together), figuring out who would share what. In the end it was very well-received (though maybe a bit long) and was a great exercise to go through. The conclusion seems to be that we've been through a lot, but God has been gracious and we've come "through it all" (only Andrea Crouch fans will get that reference I guess) with our faith intact (and stronger).
      I read through the children's classic (1929) book 'Swallows and Amazons' - it's a classic but I'd never heard of it until a month or so ago. I really enjoyed the story but am curious why so many old children's books have 4 children in the family (2 boys, 2 girls). Listening to some Terry Taylor music this week - he's been in Facebook news as his family faced a financial crisis and his fans came through with $40,000 (yes, of course I contributed). He had a nice post thanking everyone for their support. I listened to The Swirling Eddies 'The Midget, the Speck, and the Molecule' and Daniel Amos's 'Mr. Buechner's Dream'. Beth and I listened to a new David Wilcox live recording from March on our trip to Toronto and it just reaffirmed to me that he is simply the best songwriter and performer ever.
     Beth and I have done lots of talking about the internet - her unfamiliarity with cyberspace and maybe the need for her to become more conversant with it, along with wondering if I use it too much. I always counter that most of my surfing is reading so it's not necessarily a waste of time. Then this morning I came across this great quote:
Speaking decades before the debates over Twitter or the wonders of Google, Malcolm Muggeridge seemed to foresee the possibilities of too much information.  "Accumulating knowledge is a form of avarice and lends itself to another version of the Midas story," he wrote.  "Man is so avid for knowledge that everything he touches turns to facts; his faith becomes theology, his love becomes lechery, his wisdom becomes science.  Pursuing meaning, he ignores truth." (A Slice of Infinity 4/29/2011)
I thought this was pretty profound, and prophetic. It makes me want to ensure that my pursuit is for truth and not just more information.

Long Weekend

     We had a really nice, relaxing Easter weekend. I had decided a week or so ago that it would be a good idea to watch through the complete Lord of the Rings trilogy (in honour of Peter Jackson beginning the filming of The Hobbit). Five of us gathered to watch #1 The Fellowship of the Ring on Friday. It ended up only being Josh and I watching #2 The Two Towers on Saturday. Then I ended up watching #3 The Return of the King on my own on Monday night. That last one stretched on for about 4 hours in total - so it's very long but it is a great story and Jackson did a wonderful job capturing so many of the themes and characters. It kind of inspires me to reread the books but I have so many others on my list already.
      Spent some time on Saturday trying to fix some leaking faucets around the house. This kind of stuff never seems to go smoothly for me. I do like going to One Stop Plumbing with my pieces because they are very knowledgeable and helpful. I was (foolishly) feeling pretty good about things when I came back from the store and installed the new washers and stems. However when I turned the main water back on the tap in the kids' bathroom wouldn't work at all and the laundry room sink still was leaking. So I ended up calling on my friend Steve (who is very used to [and gracious about] my requests for help). He was stumped about the dysfunctional tap upstairs but quickly discovered it was only a plugged aerator. He recommended I change the seeds in the laundry taps and then helped to dismantle the kitchen faucet (which he had installed a few years ago). Everything worked in the end and 4 taps are working properly, but it took longer than originally anticipated (you'd think I'd learn).
       Beth and I had an overnight getaway Sunday to Monday but we didn't go far - just downtown Kitchener, but it was nice to walk around and we visited the Tom Thomson exhibit at The Museum. We hope to get a poster of one of his paintings for our living room (the reds he used would fit nicely we think). We also did some reminiscing as we're preparing to share our faith/life story with our Friday small group this week. It was wonderful to reflect on the many years of grace we've enjoyed together as we looked through pictures and made some notes for sharing.
      Last week we went to see the movie 'Win, Win' at the Princess Cinemas and we both really liked it. It won some Sundance Film award and was very well acted. I've continued with my Bruce Springsteen music study, giving more attention to 'Devils & Dust', 'Magic', and 'Born to Run', along with an initial casual listen to 'The Rising'. I've been working on consolidating my computer backups and this has inspired me to burn some of my digital copies of music - I could free up 40 Gb on my hard drive - so I've also been printing out album covers for inclusion in my music binders.

Surf and Turf

Beth and I went to see the movie "Soul Surfer" last week (1/2 price Tuesdays) and I was very impressed. I had heard a little of this girl's story a while ago - a surfer who had her arm bitten off by a shark when she was 13 years old. They did a wonderful job portraying this story - great surfing photography (and of course Hawaii is beautiful), solid acting (especially from the main character - amazing!), and flawless CGI to show her without an arm for most of the movie. And of course the story itself is so unique and powerful (and true!). The important faith aspects of her life are handled tastefully and naturally. I found myself really captured by this movie and was moved to tears several times.
Tried rolling our back lawn on the weekend. Some say you shouldn't do this but our ground is very rough - the lawn mower ends up jumping all over the place - so thought I'd give it a try. The rental place said not to put water in the roller but I did anyway because it just wasn't heavy enough. Even with that extra weight it didn't smooth everything down, though it did help some. I was hoping to do it again on Sunday or Monday but it got too cold again. Maybe I should just buy one so it's available whenever I need it.
Saturday night we saw Bruce Cockburn's concert at the Centre in the Square. He always puts on a great musical show. This one was with his drummer and a newer violinist. His new album is growing on me and it helps to hear the tunes live. It never ceases to amaze me the number of songs that he has memorized out of his huge catalog. Was thrilled when he played 'All the Diamonds' during the encore - a favourite, beautiful song that I can't help but sing along with (sorry for the dangling preposition).
Our whole family ended up going to Bhima's Warung for supper on Sunday. This is the (high end, emphasis on the 'high') Indonesian restaurant where Joel is apprenticing, and he's been bugging us to go back (we were there for my birthday last year). We sure need Joel's guidance when ordering as most of the terms are foreign (pun intended) to us. But we had a great meal and a nice time around the table. I nearly fell off my chair when Josh said he'd pick up the (large) bill!
Relistened to Billy Sprague's "Wind and Wave" this week. One guitar guy on the internet calls this the best album ever and while I wouldn't go that far I do think it's very good. Great lyrics ("people need wisdom but get an education") and the music is very reminiscent of Sgt. Pepper. Further listens also to Sarah Masen's "Dream Life of Angels" and Cockburn's "Small Source of Comfort".
Decided I need to become more familiar with Bruce Springsteen's music. I've come to his stuff late (found out that his first albums came out when I was still in university) and have listened in the past few years to later releases like The Pete Seeger Sessions, Magic, and Working on a Dream. Have given a pretty good listen to Devils and Dust, reading along with the lyrics a couple of times. Got a 30th anniversary boxed set of his breakthrough Born to Run release from the library so will work through that one next week (Should I be embarrassed that I never listened to this when it first came out? Had no interest back then.) I'm finding his music to be very enjoyable and easy to listen to - more so than Paul Simon's stuff - I wonder why that is?

Here Comes the Sun

It sure feels great to be able to do my walking with less layers and no heavy boots. It was always a pain having to carry my shoes to the club (you wouldn't believe the number of times I'd have to turn around because I forgot them at home). Now Beth is more interested in walking again, with the warmer weather here.
Joel got back safely from his trip to the Tropical Princess in Punta Cana in the Dominican Republic (I'm including all of the relevant information here so I can refer back to it in the future to perhaps book my own vacation there). It sounds like a wonderful place, though of course our chef apprentice felt the food wasn't that great.
We were able to have everyone together at Mom and Dad's for supper on Wednesday, so we celebrated Dad's 76th birthday and their anniversary as well. It's a rare thing to have all 9 of us in one spot so that was nice.
Went to see the science fiction movie "Source Code" this week. Haven't seen loads of movies so far this year. This one was entertaining enough, an interesting diversion, which is what I was looking for. Couldn't think about it too much or a lot wouldn't make sense (especially the happy ending).
My weight has crept back up a little as I've been snacking more, so I've recommitted to eating better starting this week. Been able to keep up the exercise regime though and have recently added more weight to each of the machines I use at the fitness club.
Really enjoyed the Brooks Williams concert on Friday. He's a great guitar player and deserves a wider following. Hadn't realized he'd moved to Cambridge, England and married a Brit. The most fun song of the night was one he had composed of all the famous guitar riffs that everybody wants to learn (without learning the whole song). Hilarious! And it worked/flowed well. Hope it appears on the internet somewhere.
Other music I listened to this week included the new Paul Simon, 'So Beautiful or So What'. I'd like to say I'm a big fan but just can't seem to get that into his stuff - it's all right but doesn't blow me away or anything. Listened more closely to Michael Gungor's music ('Ancient Skies', 'Beautiful Things') and that does impress me. Also getting into Sara Masen's 'Dream Life of Angels'. Just picked up Springsteen's 'Devils and Dust' from the library, trying to listen to artists others think are important - this one's okay but the song about a prostitute is too graphic for my tastes.
Been thinking this week about learning/memorizing songs that would make for good singalongs at select social gatherings or campfires - y'know, Beatles tunes or other classic/familiar hits. 'Hey Jude' or 'If I Had a Million Dollars' come to mind as good examples. Need to consider this further.

It was nice getting together with Beth's siblings on Saturday. We had them to our place for lunch, which means a bit of driving for them (from Chatham, Grand Bend & Exeter). Lots of laughs and shared memories. Everybody but Beth and I have retired so we get tips from them and it helps us dream - in fact, we've all planned to go on a cruise in November of 2014 (the year I'm due to retire - I told Beth that now I have to, so we can participate in the cruise!)

Reverie

Last weekend I spent 10 hours finishing the staining and Verathaning of a shoe shelf and some wood trim for around our windows. I worked over at mom and dad's but the pressure was on because they came home on Tuesday. It also gave me an extra opportunity to listen to lots of music. This week I made it through my entire discography of Brooks Williams (15 albums), along with relistens to my 2 Josh Ritter albums and the new Cockburn. Also delved into Sarah Masen, who I hope to see in June at the Wild Goose Festival.

But the most amazing listen this week was to the latest David Wilcox release, 'Reverie'. This guy is just one of the best songwriters I know. Plus, he's got a great voice and plays the guitar in a very unique way (lots of alternate tunings and a variety of cut-out capos). His songs though - wow! He has such a wonderful, creative way with words. This new album is just him and his guitar, and listening to it has reminded me again what a master he is - I know why some musicians have called him the 'songwriting Jedi'. The song 'Stones of Jerusalem' is an amazing history of the Middle East in 3 minutes, 'Piece of Me" & 'Little Fish' are insightful songs about what's wrong with so much of Christianity today. 'Ireland' is a wonderful poem/tribute to the love for music in that land and 'Dynamite in the Distance' is an understated but achingly beautiful song about love and communication.
Josie had surgery last Friday and has had to wear a cone/collar to keep her from rubbing her eyes or biting at her leg stitches. She ended up cracking it pretty good in a few places as she's maneuvered around, especially when coming up the stairs (so now we take it off when she has to ascend the back steps). Also need to apply ointment to her leg, and drops in her eyes, a couple of times each day. She's been great with this, although she didn't like the ointment the first few times as her leg must've been pretty tender.
I finished reading 'The Count of Monte Cristo' on Thursday so it ended up taking just over 2 weeks to read these 1063 pages. I really appreciated the iPad's ability to give me quick definitions of unfamiliar words (and there were lots of them - written in the 1800's, translated from French). This is a grand tale of revenge and forgiveness but it is also a very complicated story. At one point the author reintroduces a character and when I checked, the last time he was mentioned had been 675 pages before! After this tome I decided to take a break and read some lighter science fiction, but the unique book I've started, Eifelheim, actually has a lot of challenging vocabulary as well. I say it's 'unique' because it's set in a German medieval village of the 1300's, but an alien spaceship lands in the woods nearby. Very strange, but intelligently written, and the main character is the faithful village priest - I'm liking it.