Blessed Beyond Measure
Health
Never Alone
Jan 11th
Time is an amazing thing.
I remember taking this picture almost 2 years ago walking the shores of the James River trying to make sense of the events of the previous months.
None could be found as life does not reveal secrets because I insist on knowing.
Where we find ourselves is of little concern compared to where we go from there.
And the truth that has been reveled is that no matter the outcome, mo matter the road feet find themselves treading, no matter the heights of joy or depths of sorrow this one thing remains.
We are never alone.
Legumes should be left in the ground
Nov 30th
I live in peanut country.
They have many other names like goober pea, monkey nut, groundnut, and earthnut.
I call them “eat me and have the worst night sleep of your life.”
I have been acutely aware that goobers and I have not been getting along lately, but confirmed last night the monkey nut wants to kill me. I remember suffering from sleep apnea last night. It has not been a problem for a while, but last night was a bad night. My wife screaming at the top of her lungs at 2 AM didn’t help matters either.
It doesn’t happen often, but every once in a while my sweetie will start screaming in her sleep. There is nothing worse than waking up that way. A close second is when our kids stand at the side of the bed and stare us to consciousness. We have since told them to knock on the door, as waking up to a ghostly shape in front of you is really mean even if you think you are being polite.
Last nights scream didn’t even sound like my wife, it was very high and very shrill and thankfully very short. There are some nights that I have to wake her up out of her dream but last night she woke herself up after one yelp. I asked her what happened, but she had no clue. Perhaps she has a form of nighttime tourettes.
The bigger issue for me was once I was awake it felt as if my throat was closing in on itself. When this happens to me it makes it increasingly difficult to breath. For the next few hours I would fall asleep and wake up. I wasn’t gasping for air, but I could tell my oxygen level was not good.
Needless to say I woke up this morning with a headache and feeling like I had been hit by a truck. It dawned on me that I had eaten a fair share of earthnuts the night before and suddenly remembered “hey you are allergic to legumes”!?
I can hardly wait for the bowel cramping.
I figure my wife’s screaming last night was God’s way of waking me up before I suffocated in my own histamines.
No more groundnut for this boy.
A divine confrontation
Nov 27th
Alcoholics like me.
Homosexuals like me as well, but I will tackle that in another post.
I have a knack for attracting people that have been affected by alcohol. They are either actively drinking, recovered, are married to someone that has, or on the road to or from. Every one of my neighbors are alcoholics. There is actually a bar across the street from my house. This bar is in the garage of my neighbor.
How weird is that.
Most of my coworkers are alcoholics. I have witnessed much in my 10 years here. The big gifts at the Christmas party have always been booze. Crown Royal is apparently a really thoughtful way of saying “Happy Birthday Jesus”.
So it comes as no shock to me that my guitar player on my worship team at church is an alcoholic. Much to the chagrin of my friends, his behavior is neither threatening or obnoxious to me. It is familiar and vulnerable, and my heart simply breaks for the condition he is in.
No one wants to become an alcoholic.
It took me years to get to the point where I could believe that and I believe it with all that is in me. Alcoholism is a disease and I would never harass a cancer victim for having a bad day. Alcoholics usually offend people when they are hurting, so it makes it difficult to be objective when they are spewing their insecurity and hurt. It takes a great deal of discipline not to react emotionally, but when it all lines up and the alcoholic has been heard real change can happen.
People make the mistake thinking that by telling the alcoholic all about their sins, that will somehow snap them out of their slow suicide. As if their killing themselves is a result of their life being one great big party. No one needs to tell the drinker or drug addict their failings, it is usually all they can see. The only way to help the alcoholic is to love them where they are at, not enable them in their negative behavior, and live your own life. If they choose to be nasty, we get to choose to leave. If they are hurtful and angry, we walk away and talk to them when they are sober.
One of the last places on earth that this type of acceptance happens in the church.
My guitar player has arrived hung over 2 Sundays and this last week he reacted and caused a minor disruption. It was not a huge problem, but the confrontation from the platform directed to the sound team was not transparent. Thankfully my friend admitted he was wrong, has remained teachable, and is the only requirement to be used by God.
I have a meeting with him tonight to talk about his drinking. I am actually looking forward to it. I am full of faith that he will be able to see my desire is for him to get better. He is hurting, and it hurts me to know that his only hope is in the bottle. My God is bigger than his problem.
My God is a God who saves.
Turkey – the other dumb meat.
Nov 26th
These things just beg to be eaten. Anything that ugly, that stupid, and with that much tasty meat can only have been designed for one purpose.
Digestion.
It looks like the head on these hideous creatures has already been partially chewed just to bring home the point.
They are so completely divorced from intelligence, eating them actually sets up lethargy in the carnivore. A few grams of tryptothane can render most males helpless after dinner. Imagine the effect this chemical must have on the bird. No wonder turkeys walk around mouths gaping open.
I have noticed that females seem immune to tryptothane. Dishes get done, food put away, pie served, and kids herded outside all by the end of the first quarter of the Detroit game. It is amazing, and further study is in order.
Tis the season for turkey. Time to get all sugared up and wait in line to buy stuff I don’t really need, but at that price suddenly find one. Time to shake of restraint and gear up for parties and hot cocoa and dipped salty stuff. Time to bring out the fat clothes and pack on a few pounds just in case global warming is all wrong and we have 9 months of winter.
After all there are only 29 more shopping days left until Christmas. So much turkey – so little time.
Meet my new best friend Midrin
Nov 21st
Actually, it is my wife’s Midrin, but she likes to share. She has suffered with migraines for a long time, and these little beauties don’t work for her. To my benefit, they work for me! They work so well in fact, I think I could become addicted to the way I feel when taking them. They have this ability to just slow me down, as well as take my migraine pain away. They also have this wonderful side effect (purpose) of helping my muscles relax. I am such a tightly wound dude, that any amount of relief in that regard is a good thing. I am seriously considering ways to increase my migraines because Midrin is my kind of girl.
Detox – or, Squirrels in my BOWELS
Sep 20th
My sister is going through a detox and I guess we must be on the same schedule. This is my second “plumbing” detox, and this time around I opted for the $7.00 version from Target.
The first one I used was a product from Dr. Schulze’s for $60.00 plus $9.00 shipping. I have never crapped so expensively before. The amazing thing is, my crap smelled like 70 dollar crap, and of course it didn’t stink.
I am on day 4 of the 7 day roto rooter routine and I must say I feel great. To be fair, you can do a detox all on your own and pay nothing, but I like putting strange things down my pie hole. I have willingly pounded down high fructose corn syrup, MSG, partially and fully hydrogenated oils, refined flour, refined sugar, copious amounts of animal flesh, untold numbers of foods fried in God only knows what, nitrogens, sulfides, chlorine, bromine, phenylalanine, and the list goes on. So downing a glass of green stuff in the morning that tastes a little like orange juice and feels a lot like watered down cream of wheat for 7 days is the least I can do. The pills in the afternoon and evening are a piece of cake, well actually they are a piece of yak hair or something, but easy to deal with.
This system, unlike the $70.00 version, has an interesting side effect on me. I can actually feel my BOWELS churning. Incidentally, you must always raise your voice when saying BOWELS, it is a word that is best said really loud. Man, what a sweet word picture, “churning bowels”. Anyway, it is a strange sensation, not uncomfortable, but a little annoying. It feels like squirrels are chasing each other up my ascending colon, running across my transverse colon and making the loop back down the descending, and back up. They do this for a few minutes, settle down, and go at it again.
This churning happens for a little while before the big “pay off” if you know what I mean.
Poop, if you don’t.
After the business is over, all is quiet on the BOWEL front until the next round of powder and pills.
Pooping is one of those “questions” I have for God. I guess from an efficiency standpoint the whole eating stuff, breaking it down into essential elements and elimination is brilliant, but I have a problem with the mechanics of it, specifically the event of elimination. It just seems so, I duno, vulnerable.
Perhaps that is the plan. Take any person you hold in high regard, place them on a toilet making stinky, and all things are suddenly equal.
At the end of the day we all look the same from the perspective of the toilet.
Sugar – the socially acceptable crack
Sep 17th
Hi, my name is David and I am a sugar addict.
I have made great strides in the last months changing my diet, but Sunday’s remain the “free day” to eat whatever I want. Yesterday that included 12 oz. of deliciously sweet 7-11 cappuccino, and a creme cheese donut.
We have made a habit of leaving the church after we play for the morning intersession time. I usually get a cup of coffee with some Splenda and creme, but I opted for the sweet stuff instead. My trip last Sunday and Monday to Chi-town threw me off my routine and all week I had been flirting with sugar. I gave little thought to how the donut would make me feel, and besides it was a stressful week and I needed it.
By the time we made it back to the church for the morning service I was feeling pretty good.
Once we arrived back home, I noticed that my wife had not touched her chocolate frosted glazed “pull apart” sugar donut. I volunteered to eat it, and I pulled each little sticky frosted dough ball apart in front of my daughter. I offered her a piece, but she said the smell of the sugar made her sick. I ate the whole thing, every last bit. It actually started making me sick half way through, but I finnished it to the horror of my 13 year old.
I am not proud of that moment. The only good that can be said is that my daughter does not eat like me.
Feeling the full effects of the sugar again, I sat and watched some late morning television until noon.
I wasn’t hungry when my wife asked what we should do for lunch, but I had the presence of mind to suggest subs at Harris Teeter. Our other option was fast food, so considering that, it was a good choice. We picked up the subs and grabbed 2 bags of potato chips. So much for that.
By the time we finished our carb rich lunch at home, I was ready for a nap. I tried to fall asleep, I was tired, but I couldn’t turn my mind off.
I decided to put the screens back on the house since the weather had turned cool enough to open the windows during the day. A trip to Home Depot was in order to check into some weather stripping, so the boy and I made a trip. Of course I couldn’t leave without grabbing a bag of peanut M&M’s. Thankfully, the drink we purchased was water.
It seems so ridiculous as I write all this down, what was wrong with me!
The rest of the day was not much better with stir fry and rice for dinner and ice cream for dessert. At least I didn’t follow up with the remainder of the potato chips.
Needless to day I woke up this morning feeling like dog squeeze.
Thankfully, we got our grain mill back from the factory Friday. Thankfully, I talked about this “sugar issue” with my wife last night on the Way to Target to get a new bread maker.
So far this morning, I have been doing great! A slice of homemade whole wheat bread, a glass of detox powder, and 30 oz of water.
And a pounding headache.
