Travel news, mean animals, unworkable jobs, entertainment

Grandpa is on the road. He should arrive in Point Pleasant today in the late afternoon – depending on weather conditions. The area he is traveling through is expecting some heavy snow. He left Sunday morning at about 6 a.m. and stopped in Kentucky last night. I have no idea where in Kentucky, but since it sounded close to West Virginia, Grandma and Mama were very excited about his progress. Any future trips to West Virginia will, in large measure, depending on how successful this trip turns out.


Victoria called yesterday with some disturbing news. Our horse, Rain, bit at her several times as Victoria tried to attend to her. Once she even kicked out. I don’t know if she was aiming at Victoria when she did but I have felt the effects of a horses kick and am a little worried about Victoria as she works with a breed of animals with which she is relatively unfamiliar. I know that a friend of mine, when his horses got a little too feisty, cut their feed off for a couple days to tone them down. It seemed to work for him.

Mama and I were talking about it and we will not keep a mean or aggressive animal. But in the case of Rain, it may be that she is closer to giving birth than we are aware. If so, it would be cause for her to keep all unfamiliar persons or animals away to protect herself and the foal. It is difficult to say, but I do not want anyone hurt. It is a wakeup call to Mama and Victoria. It is a memory refresh for me.

I will meet with my boss Wednesday for an end of year review. After getting fussed at and cut out of certain duties, for which I trained quite hard, I am anxious to see him face to face. Several of my peers are feeling suspicious of events unfolding around us but I have the assurance that God is in control. I just need to be submissive to His Will and allow men to do within that Will what is allowed in order to get me to the place I am supposed to be. It will be an interesting moment.

Mama suggested that I take an open position at a church in Bowie as a Youth and Music Minister. I told her that I would gladly take over the music program at the little church but my days of leading a youth group are long behind me. I did suggest that if all the competitions were done from wheel chairs, I would have a chance but that is not the norm. I appreciate her confidence in me, but I do not see that as a strong possibility at the moment.

I am at the point that I need to carefully consider how much income I would need in order to walk away from ConocoPhillips. I am not at the point of doing so, but circumstances greatly influence our decisions so it is better to be ready to make the decision than to be forced to when unprepared. Mama is ready for whatever. Me, not so much.

It would be much easier, or it would seem so, to start the herb shop as a side business while working the job I have. I just need to be there to do so. That is another area where I lack the confidence financially and academically to launch into the unknown, but I will have to at some point. With that in mind, it is better to be prepared than to be caught totally unprepared when the moment comes.

Mama and I switched from DirecTV to Sudden Link for our TV and internet. It will save about $80 per month. It is also contract free. We have to learn a different system of channels and recording formats, but I have every confidence Mama will adapt. We watch so little TV that it makes little sense to pay much for the service. We also set up Roku on the TV to allow us to run some internet broadcasts on the TV; programs like Netflix and Glenn Beck’s GBTV. The only troubling thing to contend with is that Roku came with the Angry Birds game. Now Mama gets frustrated with that - on a really big screen.

Bro. York was reading some one liners yesterday and I actually remember two of them. When a little birdie gets knocked unconscious, what do they see? The other one struck close to our heart. Why do we wait until pigs are dead before we cure them?