Chaos Once Again in Pensacola
I believe the word that will ultimately characterize this year is chaos, and the struggle to bring order out of chaos. You might have noticed I have not been able to blog. Once again, chaos has hit Pensacola, this time in the form of our Doha shipment.
Good news for all my expat friends, concerned about packing out of Doha, or Kuwait. This has been the very best move, ever, and the second best move was the move from Kuwait to Qatar. I rate this one higher only because it was so much longer, and across a sea, and there is so much potential for damage – humidity, being left out on the pier in a storm, a leaky container, theft, lack of careful packing . . . not a single element was wrong with this shipment. Not a thing missing. Not a single thing damaged.
For your information, we were packed by GAC. We marvel at how carefully they packed even the most humble drinking glass. 🙂
So here is what we look like right now:
Chaos in the entry – we have all our artworks stored here, except for the really large pieces, and most of the large ones we already know where they will go . . .
It seemed like we had a lot of cupboard space, until this shipment arrived. I had left room, but . . . not enough. More donations to the Pensacola Junior League Sale coming up!
Most of this is my stuff, a tiny bit of winter and evening clothing and . . . a lot of fabric which will move to the quilt room when there is room . . . My quilt room used to look so big!
Now, for AdventureMan’s chaos – we are heading to his office:
Yes! Yes! Hide your face, AdventureMan! All these boxes . . .
I can see the end in sight. Once I have all this put away, there is just one more shipment, all my strays from Seattle. I have a storage locker there, and things left at my mother’s, and a whole underbed area at my sister’s house. Who knew they would be inconvenienced this long? We are going to drive up and haul all this stuff back, and at that point – the move is complete.
Lunch at the Tuscan Oven
We took a road we don’t usually take, and suddenly, there it was – The Tuscan Oven! I had eaten there before, and loved it, but had not seen it and had assumed it had disappeared. Restaurants do that, even good ones, it takes so much work and so much effort to run a restaurant, and they run on such a slim margin that we have often been disappointed to see good restaurants close.
We were joyful to see the Tuscan Oven!
The place is packed. People who love good food are here. 🙂 You can tell that many of them are friends with the owner, and they come here often. The menu has too many good things!
We ordered the Antipasta Plate, with delicious cheeses and sausages, tasty olives and a stuffed artichoke heart. Unfortunately, we dug in before I remembered to take photos 😦
We each also ordered a small pizza, but even small was too big after the antipasta plate, so we ended up bringing more than a full pizza home.
I love the decor – an artist has painted food ingredients for the meals – this is my favorite, the artichoke:
We look forward to coming back here often!
Breath of Fresh Air at Christ’s Church, Pensacola
AdventureMan and I slid into our seats just as the bell started ringing, and looked at one another in concern – “Does it feel hot in here to you?” “Yep.”
It was only eight in the morning, but the church was breathless.
It made me smile, remembering our church in Tunisia, St. George’s, where there was no air conditioning, only fans – when the electricity was working. St. George’s is the oldest Anglican Church in Africa, and is located in the large Tunis souk. Summers were long and hot, and many a Sunday I had to gather my squirming two-year-old and take him out to the garden for a stern talking-to. It was a wonderful, diverse church, and we loved our time there – breathless or not.
And we got through the service, heat and all, it wasn’t that bad.
The sermon was really good. Father Neal was talking about Jesus, invited to a banquet, having his feet washed by the tears of Mary Magdelen, and dried with her hair.
As an aside, one of the things I love about Jesus was his kindness to women, including them when he talked, healing their hurts, defending them against stoning – in a culture not unlike that in which we have been living, where women are contracted into marriage, “protected” by laws which often deprive them of independence and choices, and living lives greatly separate from men. Jesus spoke to women, and he spoke to their hearts. He included them among his followers and supporters. In the context of his society, his behavior was radical and challenging to the status quo.
Father Neal totally got that. He talked about the scandalous sensuality of Mary’s act, washing Jesus feet and then drying them with her long hair. He talked about hair, traditionally covered in that part of the world, being a woman’s glory, and only privately displayed among family and to husband. He talked about her remorse, and her humility, and that through her loving act, her spirit was cleansed and her sins forgiven. And he talked about the customs and traditions of hospitality, and the shock of Jesus criticizing his host – who was criticizing him – for his lack of welcome, and signs of hospitality to an honored guest.
His sermon was a breath of fresh air in a very warm church. We held on to every word.
Later in the day, old friends came for dinner, and our son and his wife and our grandson. Cannot imagine a more wonderful day. 🙂
Save This for a Down Day
Thank you, Kuwait friend, for this wonderful video “Free Hugs.” You can’t help but smile after watching it. 🙂
Skinniest People Shop at Whole Foods
This study is hysterical. It tracked who shopped where, and found that the people who shop at Whole Foods had a far smaller probability of being obese. They concluded that the poorer the consumer, the less healthy the foods.
I found this on AOL Health.
Skinniest People Grocery Shop HERE
By AOL Health Editors Jun 8th 2010 10:56AM
The skinniest people shop at Whole Foods where only 4 percent of the shoppers are obese. Why? It’s all about money–or lack thereof.
People who are poor and have less to spend on food try to get the biggest calorie bang for their food buck. That means they not only shop at cheaper stores, but also buy less healthy food.
The study: A University of Washington research team tracked 2,001 Seattle area shoppers between December 2008 and March 2009. They compared their choice of supermarkets to data they collected on the participants’ education, income and obesity rates. Obesity rates were measured by asking consumers to report their height and weight so their body mass index (BMI) could be calculated. People with a BMI higher than 30 were identified as obese.
The results: The percentage of obese shoppers is almost 10 times higher at low-cost grocery stores, compared with more upscale stores. And poverty is the key reason.
Lead study author Adam Drewnowski, an epidemiology professor who studies obesity and social class, says people who can pay $6 for a pound of radicchio at Whole Foods are obviously better able to afford a healthy diet than those who buy $1.88 packs of pizza rolls at Albertson’s to feed their kids. “If people wanted a diet to be cheap, they went to one supermarket,” Drewnowski told MSNBC. “If they wanted their diet to be healthy, they went to another supermarket and spent more.” He found that only 15 percent of shoppers chose a store based on its proximity to their home. Instead, almost all the shoppers chose a store based on price or quality.
Sticker shock: All the stores offered the same type of food, including fresh fruits and vegetables. But the prices were vastly different. The average price for a market basket of food at Whole Foods was between $370 and $420, compared with the same basket of food at Albertson’s for $225 to $280.
“Deep down, obesity is really an economic issue,” Drewnowski told MSNBC. Eating healthy, low-calorie food costs more money and requires more preparation skills and time than consuming processed, high-calorie foods. MSNBC reports that in a separate study in 2008, Drewnowski estimated that a calorie-dense diet costs $3.52 a day, compared with $36.32 a day for a low-calorie diet. “What this says is your social economic status is clearly associated with how overweight you are,” he told MSNBC.
Grocery stores and percentage of obese shoppers:
• Whole Foods Markets: 4 percent
• Metropolitan Market: 8 percent
• Puget Consumers Cooperative (PCC): 12 percent
• Quality Food Centers (QFC): 17 percent
• Fred Meyer: 22 percent
• Safeway: 24 percent
• Albertsons: 38 percent
— From the Editors at Netscape
Sorting Through Our Lives
At lunch, on our anniversary, AdventureMan and I played a game, a game we call “the top three”. He started it. “What are your top three thrills in our life together?” he asked . . .
We came up with contenders, debated relative merits, but agreed on #1 – the birth of our son. Then there were the top three vacations, the top three surprises, etc. It’s always fun; and together remember things you wouldn’t remember on your own.
Every now and then you get a glimpse of what makes life worthwhile, and you are additionally blessed by knowing how happy you are at the time you are happy.
One of those days was today.
Yesterday, we went by to see our son and his wife and our little adorable grandson had a cough.
“Do you need for us to take care of him tomorrow?” we asked.
Oh! If we could take care of him in the morning, that would be wonderful! And so, promptly at 0730, we were at their doorstep, and our morning passed – oh, happily! – taking care of our adorable grandson. He has a bad cough, but he is on the mend, and we had some fun.
He loves his jumpy-thing, which we call a Johnny Jump-Up, but it isn’t, it’s like calling all tissues “Kleenex” or all copies a “Xerox”:
He has discovered his hands and feet; I love watching him, it’s pure motion, every leg and every arm going at once:
Well, he can’t talk yet, not clearly, so he blows bubbles to tell us how much he loves us:
“Oh!” exclaims AdventureMan, “You have to take a picture of him while he is sleeping, he is so beautiful.”
LOL! I had swaddled him, and he tried to tell me I had done it wrong, but I didn’t listen. When I went back 10 minutes later, he was still squalling AND he was no longer swaddled. I re-swaddled, this time, doing it right and tight, and before I even put him in his crib, he was sound asleep.
He did manage somehow to get one arm out:
On the way home, we picked up some roasting chickens for dinner, to roast with fresh rosemary and basil from our own garden. Yummm. AdventureMan will deliver one to our son and his wife around dinner time.
We are happy AND we know it. It’s a great day in Pensacola.
Credit Card Fraud
The call caught me totally by surprise, so much so that I suspected that the call was a scam.
The caller asked for my husband or me by name, and asked if we had charged two thousand plus on our card. Ummm. . . nope. That card is now closed down.
I suppose the good news is that our credit card company has such excellent security that they identified the fraudulent charge immediately.
The bad news is that we have had this card for a long time, and I have the number memorized. There have been a couple problems previously, small things. One time I found some calls to a phone sex number. They showed the number the calls were made from; I called that number. The woman who answered assured me that no calls were made from that number to a phone sex number because her husband had promised her he wouldn’t do that any more. I called our credit card company, told them what had transpired, and my account was not charged for the calls.
Another time, the company called and asked me if I was trying to make calls to Nigeria using my credit card. Nope.
But this time, their solution is that the card has to be shut down, and new ones issued. Oh aarrgh. I will have to memorize a new number.
Our credit card company’s security division never asked for any information a scammer would ask, like the security number on the back of the card, the expiration date – none of that. They already know that information.
Pray – then Listen
(Warning – this is religious based musing; if that is offensive to you, skip this post 🙂 )
Jesus often used the phrase “if you have the eyes to see” and “if you have the ears to hear” after telling his listeners a metaphorical story.
Yesterday, AdventureMan and I had another huge surprise. We filed for a tax exemption, and we were told that for this year, the previous exemption would hold, and then next year, our exemption would start. You would think that might be bad news, but in our case, the previous owner had all kinds of wonderful exemptions, and in a year with a lot of expenses, not having a huge property tax bill sounds really good to us.
“Humd’allal!” I said to AdventureMan as we left the building. (Thanks be to God!)
When we knew we wanted to retire this year, we began praying about it together every morning before AdventureMan headed off to work. We specifically asked that God be in every detail of the move – and as you can imagine, a move back to the USA from Qatar has a lot of details. It was more complicated than “just” a move. We had a huge storage shipment which needed to meet up with us in Pensacola, a cat that needed to come with us. We needed to buy a house, and to do that, we had to sell a house, and we needed to buy cars, and basic household appliances; we needed to start up all over again with groceries, and with cleaning supplies, and gardening supplies, and the most basic items you take for granted every day in your well-established lives. There were a LOT of details, an overwhelming amount of detail, and, by the grace of God, every detail was covered.
Some details, like the total rewiring of our house, may not seem like such a blessing, but, by the grace of God, we had the money to cover the need, and we are glad we could get the rewire done before moving in, and we are really really glad not to have to worry about fires happening in our electrical system. If and when we need to sell this house, having had it rewired helps its salability, too.
Some people might call it good luck. We don’t think so. We think it is God, answering prayers, in control of all the details, and blessing us in ways we can’t even begin to imagine. Every now and then, we have “the eyes to see.”
Rise in Single Teen Age Mothers in US
Excerpts from new study out from the Center for Disease Control and Prevention found on AOL National News are below. To read the entire article, and for a link to the original report, click on the blue type above.
(June 2) — Attitudes among American teens about birth control, sexual activity and pregnancy have remained largely unchanged since 2002, according to a new federal report.
Stalled progress is bad enough, but some subtle changes also have experts concerned.
Most notably, more teens than ever are using the “rhythm method” to prevent pregnancy, and a growing number of teen girls approve of underage childbirth. . .
After dropping steadily for more than a decade, the teen birth rate in the U.S. rose between 2005 and 2007. Compared with other developed countries, the U.S. posted the remarkably high rate in 2007 of 42 babies per 1,000 teen girls. In Canada, by contrast, only 13 babies are born per 1,000 teen girls. . .
Laura Lindberg, senior research associate at the nonprofit Guttmacher Institute, speculates that the growing number of glamorous celebrities bearing children — especially as single mothers — is having an impact on the attitudes of America’s youth.
(Article contributed to AOL by Katie Drummond)
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