Classes, dinner with Grandma, new equipment, weekend plans

Red, my fellow trainer, and I have been teaching classes online for the past two days. Red was the instructor for both classes. I was there as backup and administrative support. We are still experiencing some hiccups with the program we are using to broadcast the classes and I did not want to leave Red to figure it out on his own. We are now able to troubleshoot and correct the issues more efficiently than in the past few classes, but I was there to make sure things ran smoothly for Red as he took the software for a spin. On Wednesday morning I had to loan my computer to Red to get the class started.  For some reason, he was not listed as the instructor. He had only student access to the program so he could not advance slides in the presentation – a pretty important function - or swap presentations when the time came to do so. While we started, someone worked in the background to get the issue corrected. Thursday’s class went without a problem on our end but one of the attendees could not stay connected due to internet issues, so she had to drop out. Sad. Red got through it and is now far more comfortable with the presentation software and the computer setup we use to broadcast these classes.

I got home a little early and listened to Dan Bonino’s podcast as I finished up the day from home. Once I was officially off, Mama and I went to Grandma and Grandpa’s for dinner. Mama made hotdogs and sauerkraut. Grandma made beans and cornbread.  We had a good dinner and a good visit. We talked about the Lord, current events and a host of other issues – largely in agreement. Grandma played her new favorite song for us. A requisite if any visit with Grandma. We stayed for more than an hour but had to get back to the farm to feed. We had held off on the evening feeding because I did not want to get too sweaty before we went to Grandma and Grandpa’s. Besides, they were waiting on us. The animals could wait a couple hours. The chickens were already let out of the coop yard and the goats were not going to starve before we got back to them. Even if they thought they were.

We tried to schedule a visit with Rick – our goat mentor. Bu that did not work out. He is under hospice care right now. Pancreatic cancer will take him very soon and he was feeling too weak to visit with anyone. Mama and I were hoping for one more chance to talk to him about the Lord. Just to make sure. He has always been pleasant in our past discussions about God but has never committed to whether or not he knows Jesus and his Savior. We are praying that the Lord will send someone by to assure him of his salvation or introduce him to Christ. Time is short for him, but he is fully aware of that fact. There are so many more around us who do not know how very short their time is. That is why the Psalmist said, “Teach us to number our days that we may apply our hearts to wisdom” Ps 94:12 Do we need wisdom today? [Lord, help us not to be so shortsighted that we fail to see the eternal consequences of our choices.]

When we got home, we went immediately out to feed. Once that was completed, Mama went back inside. I stayed out in the shop to assemble a weed eater multi-tool I had bought. It has a pole saw attachment, a sidewalk edger and a hedge trimmer attachment as well as a weed eater attachment. It is not heavy duty. That much was expected based on the price, but if I do not ask too much of it, it should last me a while for the multiple functions I need off and on. I tried out the sidewalk edger last night before it got too dark. It will do for now, but I will have to work slowly with it to get the grooves cut along the sidewalk edges. It has been many years since they were tended to in that manner. I will try out the pole saw this weekend or early next week. I may take the entire time set aside this weekend for yard word using the wheeled string trimmer. Trimming the fence lines is long overdue.

Other than those chores, I have to get hay from our neighbor tomorrow morning. If things have dried out sufficiently. We are in desperate need of hay for the goats. And I have to go to Bro Daniel’s to move those concrete pillars and straighten up his back yard.

If things have dried out sufficiently.