Oceans of fun

When the Ocean's 11 remake came out I don't know how long ago I instantly dismissed it as being just another example of a brain-dead Hollywood mining the vaults for ideas to knock-off. Didn't bother to see it. Didn't want to see. Then, a little while back, I saw it. Tonight I just finished watching Ocean's 12. These movies are great. Really great. It's hard to describe without sounding like a raving movie critic who's just had one too many espressos, but plot intricacies aside the way these guys play it is delicious. It's really all the little quirks -the squabbles and quirky expressions and such- that make the movie so fun to watch. By the way, after watching this one I realized that my youngest brother-in-law looks a little bit like Matt Damon. Is that cool or what? Anyway, whoever is reading this seriously needs to get both movies and watch them. I can't speak for the latest installment, but since part of the conspiracy involved in getting me to watch this one was so that i could watch the 3rd one I suppose I'm going to be seeing that one sometime soon as well. Ooooh, I smell either a date night or a sibling get together in that one. Can't wait.

Mamaw and Aunt Kathy

Today while I was tidying the bedroom I found an envelop containing a piece of lace given to me Aunt Kathy. Allen and I got the chance to go down and visit her while she was visiting her sister Mamaw. That makes her Allen's great-aunt really, but we just call her Aunt Kathy. We stopped for some Zaxby's chicken on the way down, and Mamaw had biscuits and beans and watermelon waiting for us when we got there. They'd actually been expecting us for lunch which ended up being kind of funny in and of itself. They're farm girls from Sand Mountain, and dinner to them meant the midday meal. Since I tend to use dinner and supper interchangeably I thought I was telling them we would come for supper not remembering that dinner and supper are two different things to many people.

Anyway, that week was pretty rushed for us, but I'm so glad that we drove down to see them. In between eating and playing cards we ended up getting a fair bit of family history. They told us odd little things about growing up on Sand Mountain like how their mom would have little sweet potatoes baked and ready for them when they got home from school. The funniest thing was them talking about a card game they used to play called King on the Corner. Apparently four of them (Mamaw, Kathy, Phoebe, and Lina) used to play it quite a lot. We found some cards to play with, but they couldn't quite remember the rules. Between them calling Phoebe and Lina and Allen calling his dad we finally came up with some sort of rules. I think it a grandma thing to be glad when a card is played that you can't use. When I asked Aunt Kathy why she was glad I'd played a king when she couldn't use it she said "Well maybe it'll do somebody some good." Sounds a lot like how my Grandma would talk while we were playing games when I was little. Allen (the rascal) ended up winning both games.

Right before we left they started pulling out family pictures. My own family doesn't have a whole lot of pictures of grandparents and things when they were young. Mamaw and Aunt Cathy however have a pictures of their parents and even a picture of one set of their grandparents. Just from looking at them you could tell they had hard lives and that these were people accustomed to work and plenty of it. That couldn't be all there was to them though. Looking at Mamaw and Aunt Cathy and my father-in-law's family you can see that these people of work left a goodly heritage to the generation. There were other pictures too. One of their two brothers in military uniform and another of all the sisters (seven I believe). When we drove off down the dirt road toward the highway we (I) had been blessed more than we could have imagined. Not only had we come closer to our heritage we'd seen again that it is a goodly and godly heritage. The women we left behind had already lived long lives and been through difficult times, and they could say with calm certainty that God's ways are best. It wasn't a big part of our conversation, but I distinctly remember those two dear, gray haired farm girls telling us to trust God and He would work everything out.

I was especially touched by Aunt Kathy's present. I'd post a picture if I had one. It's really just a small rectangular piece of ivoried lace from around WWII. Aunt Kathy told me that it'd been trimmed out of larger piece and that her mother-in-law had done the tiny hem stitching around the edges. The part that really blessed me though is that Aunt Kathy said she wanted to leave me something to remember her by. I'd only met her once before at a family reunion. It never occurred to me that she would love me or want to be remembered by me. But that's really just the way Allen's family is. They welcome you in and love you like you wouldn't expect, and if we hadn't gone down there I wouldn't had known how large and loving and wonderful my family really is.

Childish pleasures

I have a presentable apartment excepting only the back bedroom of which we will not speak. I know I probably appear to shout out the tiniest domestic task as if I'd toppled a Hercules. I guess it's just that I'm starting to (trying to) really not despise the day of small things. I have a tendency to look at every task I've completed and say that I should have done it better, sooner, faster, something. I've very rarely afforded myself the pure pleasure of being satisfied the task I've completed. Even now part of my brain screams out to be discontented with what the work I just did. My defense against this discontent is to be childishly happy at every dish washed and every shirt folded. We have been called to be as children, and so I endeavor to take a child's pleasure in my tasks.

Note to self on being tired

Dear Natalie,

When you haven't any coffee in the house (and your darling husband doesn't want you drinking it right now anyway) and you didn't get enough sleep and didn't get the jump on the day that you so very much wanted/needed there's no reason to a. get mopey, or b. worry about it. Drink some water. Pour yourself a glass of chocolate milk, and get on with your life.

Love, Natalie

P.S. make sure you write those notes for Ron Paul this weekend. You promised.

GO Ron GO!

P.P.S maybe you should go look at Ecclesiastes again. Sounds like you could use the encouragement.

small victories in the kitchen

One way or t' other Allen and I got into very bad habits about the dishes. Oh the nonchalance with which we stacked them blithely in and around the sink, and oh the sad resignation with which we set our faces grimly towards that stack and vowed to conquer. Last night though despite my aching heels and our own weariness we went into the kitchen as one and rinsed and wiped and stowed and stacked and swept that kitchen into rather good order. One of the jolliest things about the task is that since we'd done the same the evening prior there were only the nights dishes and a few sundries to tend to and not some ghastly pile to strike terror into our weary souls. It's a small thing to be sure, but small things need doing as well as large.

Now if only I vacuum the living room and take a whisk round the bathroom, I'll be doing rather well. The bedroom needs picking up, but that can wait till tomorrow if it needs to.

have hammer will bang things

No I didn't just babysit a little toddling boy. I put together some box-ish shelf things, and glory or glory the instructions directed me to nail the little faux wood cardboard backing in place. I hadn't had an excuse to swing a hammer in probably a year, and (although swing is undoubtedly too grand a term to describe the pecks necessary to penetrate that almost wood) I enjoyed every minute of it.

the ongoing storage sage

A while back I mentioned that in converting our apartment from a one bedroom with den to a two bedroom they managed to leave out an entire closet. Also, I don't have quite as much cabinet space at I had previously. Sooo, I've been trying to scrounge out storage wherever I can. My latest addition is a small shelf unit that goes under the pass through between the kitchen and the dining area. In order to get something small enough I had to get some of though little bang up pre-fab box units that you can stack together. It works pretty well. It's small enough to be unobtrusive which considering it's lowly origins is a definite bonus. It's also sufficiently sturdy, but that's about as much praise as it deserves. The corners don't all meet, and the finish is glaringly thin and laminated, but it does the job I require of it. Some of it's flaws can hopefully be mended by the addition of a longish table runner draped over the top and sides. I've yet to completely organize it, but I plan to move all or most of my drinking glasses, table sundries (napkins, salt, etc), and the our two gallon filtered water container to the top and fill most of the rest with the herbs we take and possible some cookbooks or the like. That should clear up some space in both the kitchen and the bathroom and declutter my table and the pass through window sill.

And then they took my radio -ShantyRaidio that is

I never mentioned it here before, but I play this immensely fun on-line game called Puzzle Pirates. Allen got me started on it, and now it's one of my primary time wasters. In some ways it really is a community. A whole web of player sites (of which I know only a part) has sprung up around the game. One of them was a radio station run by some players that played a mix of folk, celtic, piratey, and pretty much anything involving a sailor, ship, or ocean with a little modern thrown in for good measure. Most of it was just plain fun music -some tender, some bawdy, some witty, some raucous. It was the music that played to an odd little loosely bound community. But now it's threatened. Ultimately it's a property rights issue. We are not said to own what we purchase. It's not so much different with our real property. We pay must pay property taxes, and for the privilege the government tells us what we may and may not do with it.Shanty Raidio is a little thing, but it's a little thing that I enjoyed. When it seems that so many dear things I love are threatened the loss of even the smallest cannot be viewed with equanimity.

Highbury dancing

It may be possible to do without dancing entirely. Instances have been known of young people passing many, many months successively without being at any ball of any descrption, and no materal injury accrue either to body or mind; but when a beginning is made--when the felicities of rapid motion have once been, though slightly, felt--it must be a very heavy set that doesn't ask for more.

Emma, by Jane Austen

American and proud of it.

Even as our country steams ahead past the "bridge out" sign, I find reasons to be proud. Bridges can be rebuilt. Trains can be stopped. I am an American, and I fight for my heritage.





GO USA!

Happiness

Today happiness is a bowl of cheesy grits, a clean sink, Luis Armstrong on the cd player, and a Jane Austen novel just waiting to be read.

hope in small places

Allen sort of stepped on my glasses while I was taking a nap this ...morning? Afternoon? I'm not exactly sure. (laugh) Since they were rather bent and not exactly comfortable to wear he went out to the car to look for my old pair that I'd stashed out there a few months ago. He came back inside with a small box he'd found in the glove box. Closing his fingers over something in the box he placed in my hand a pair of simple pearl earrings that my dad had given me some years back and that I had given up for lost. They were in that box because for my last birthday Allen had taken me to a little store which sold some pretty amber jewelry I'd admired and told me to pick out a pair of pretty earrings. I had been wearing my pearls that day but had slipped them into that little box when I put on my birthday earrings. Before today I'd rather sadly given up my pearls as a lost cause -beyond hope or recall. Yet again God reminds me that nothing is beyond hope, and nothing is beyond His attention. The message could not be more plain. "Hope where you see no hope, Natalie, for God is working in ways too small and too grand for you to imagine."

Overflowing with need

I found this on Doug Wilson's Blog and Mablog, and it encouraged me so much I had to post it here.

Father and God over all, we gather before You to honor Your name, and so that You might bless us, Your people, as we seek to honor Your name.

We come before You as an empty people, but we come in order to overflow. We pray that You would perform this miracle, as You have done so many times before. How can we be the fullness of Your Son, the one who fills everything in every way? Nevertheless, Your gospel has accomplished this, and we pray that You would continue to perform this wonder. We would be the widow’s cruse of oil, empty and overflowing. We thank You for receiving us.

What a blessing to be reminded that God is fully willing and able to take my pitiful little obediences and gropings towards faithfulness and make them abounding affirmations of God's love for His children. There's a verse that my husband often says, and I'm probably going to misquote it badly. It says, "Know then that God is able to make all grace abound to you so that at all times and in all things you will abound in every good work." How gracious is our Father to us. I am little and fast emptied, but God is full and ever pouring.

Wow! and Wow! Is this guy for real?

I've been poking around lewrockwell.com this evening, and I couldn't resist posting this except from a piece Ron Paul wrote back in 2003. It's not often a politician says exactly what I've been thinking.

The Founding Fathers envisioned a robustly Christian yet religiously tolerant America, with churches serving as vital institutions that would eclipse the state in importance. Throughout our nation’s history, churches have done what no government can ever do, namely teach morality and civility. Moral and civil individuals are largely governed by their own sense of right and wrong, and hence have little need for external government. This is the real reason the collectivist Left hates religion: Churches as institutions compete with the state for the people’s allegiance, and many devout people put their faith in God before their faith in the state. Knowing this, the secularists wage an ongoing war against religion, chipping away bit by bit at our nation’s Christian heritage. Christmas itself may soon be a casualty of that war.

I only posted this quote from the end of his article, but you can read the rest of it here.

Linguistic antics in the linen closet

Laundry is that which I need to do.

To do laundry is that which I need.

Is that which I need to do laundry?

I need to do laundry.

And now for something completely different...

Some things just go well with BBQ

Like planning on how we're going to pull off the election of the century. We just went to a Ron Paul meet up that met at a local Jim 'n Nicks. Good food, and I was really encouraged to see a room full of people who actually care about the constitution and the economy and all those really important things that get buried under the political posturing that passes for campaigning these days. Now let me say right up front that I don't believe for one moment that Ron Paul is the last hope for the U.S or the salvation of our country's future or any other such outlandish thing. Hope and salvation rest in the Lord alone. However, I think the very fact that Ron Paul is running for president means that there is hope. Our back are against the wall. Almost no one knows or cares about the Constitution today. We have nothing to lose here. If all we do is get a few more people to think about the real meaning of liberty then we'll have done more than Hilary or Obama or Huckabee or Thompson or just about any other politician in recent times has done. We hear so often that our liberties are being threatened, but no one seems prepared to actually do anything about it. Nearly everything they do (the Patriot Act, Real ID, etc) to "protect" us only ends up stripping down our liberties and, not so incidentally, our bank accounts.

The other thing that I'm excited about is the fact that my husband is really getting excited about a candidate. Ron Paul is the man Allen said he'd vote for when he caught flack for not voting for Bush way back in the day. I've voted for a couple of years now, but this is the first time I've really gotten grass roots involved in a presidential campaign. It really feels good. I'm not sure what we're all going to do right now, but whatever we do it's good to finally feel like I'm on the right side. I voted for Bush myself in the last election, but it's not something I really felt proud of at the time. I did what was expected of me. Now I'm glad to part of something that I can actually get behind.

If any of y'all are interested in reading more about him just go click on the link at the top of the sidebar. Check out his voting record, and compare him to the other candidates. Freedom is a more complicated business than slavery, but few people think the freedman is worse off than the slave.

I'm sleepy (yawn)

I know I haven't been writing that much lately and not that much of any real interest too boot. Guess I'm just going through a dry spell. Or a boring one. I eat, sleep, check my e-mail, read, putter around the apartment...it's honestly not that interesting. Last night we did go to the mall to walk around a bit, however we stayed up too late (again). Allen was working on his parser, and I was distracted, and it just plain old got late on us. It's been happening quite a lot lately. It doesn't help that I don't like to go to bed by myself. That king size bed is awfully big and awfully lonely without someone to snuggle up to : ) However, last night after we finally did go to bed I didn't actually sleep all that well, and I couldn't even sleep in late because my stomach was giving me those fierce little "feed me" sensations! Unless I get a nap later I doubt I'm going to be good for too very much today, which is a pity because I haven't been good a whole lot this entire week! Ah the joys of being me.

Blame it on my honeymoon....

The first movie Allen and I watched together after we got married was Bride and Prejudice. We flipped a coin, and I won. (We'd rented several movies.) So...snuggled up together in the all embracing expanse of our cabin's cozy couch I received my first introduction to Bollywood. Some months later while probing around Youtube I found this fascinating little video. The music is lighthearted, and a couple of the dresses she wears are absolute dreams. Enjoy!

Some verses I've been pondering..

These few verses from Isaiah 66 have been particularly stuck in my head the past few days. I'm sure it's obvious why.

7 “Before she was in labor
she gave birth;
before her pain came upon her
she delivered a son.
8 Who has heard such a thing?
Who has seen such things?
Shall a land be born in one day?
Shall a nation be brought forth in one moment?
For as soon as Zion was in labor
she brought forth her children.
9 Shall I bring to the point of birth and not cause to bring forth?”
says the Lord;
“shall I, who cause to bring forth, shut the womb?”
says your God.

My lovely box of books

An online friend recently sent me a lovely box full of Grace Livingston Hill paperbacks, and I've spent the better part of this afternoon happily occupied with one. You likely won't find her name in the list of great authoresses, and to be sure reading too many in a row is rather like eating a box of chocolates by yourself. However, they are delightfully innocent books with a great deal of charm and thoroughly enjoyable all around.