Common Ground Coffee House #116

Time to say goodbye to Christchurch.....the constant and harrowing aftershocks and biggies and the city sliding about as if on a plate of jelly with the hideous liquidification....I think folks with kids should up and go, my nerves would be shattered. Time to go while your family is still intact.

Spare a thought for this part of the globe when you say your prayers please.raying:

I live on the north island, Christchurch is on the south island reputed to be the more stable of the 2 islands. I live not too close to an active volcano.....

 

Thank you for your good wishes Jim! It is great to see you too. I think we both got "better" not "older" since we exchanged lines on this board. Always a pleasure to hear from you my friend.

Thank you Ann for your sentiment about getting better without doctor's intervention. Indeed the Great Physician has done that before many times in our lives. Your "baby" daughter, Lauren, is a good example.

Melane, we are so sorry about your earth moving experience. I have gone through an earthquake before (not due to volcanic activities though), once in Budapest, Hungary and once in New York City. Our prayers are with you!!!

 

Just an update on Lenke. While her pulmanory physician was looking at her lungs in the latest CT Scan, he discovered an enlarged lymph node in the upper abdominal cavity. He has scheduled a non-invasive bronchoscopy to reach the lymph node and extract a small part via a thin needle - to be examined by the lab for cancer. If it is cancer, it was caught just the right time, and the doctors are optimistic about the outcome. Lenke now praises the Lord for having double pneumonia last year and a slow recovery following that episode, because if the doctors would not use CT Scan to look at her lungs condition - they would not have discovered the swollen lymph node. The Lord indeed works in a misterious way. So, come this Tuesday, we will be in the hospital at 6:00 AM to do the bronchoscopy.

 

We know the Lord never leaves us alone, so you will always have a Comforter.

Every blessing for you both, mate.

Cheers,

Jim

 

We have received the report of Lenke's bronchoscopy biopsies and all were negative! However, the pathologist wanted to be 100% sure that there was no cancer and ordered a lymphoscopy procedure, where they will cut a small incision on Lenke's chest (below the right shoulder), then they lower a tube with instruments into her chest cavity in order to cut a larger sample of one of the swollen lymph nodes. We have a 2:30 PM consultation appointment this Thursday with the surgeon, at which time we will probably will get the date for the procedure. She may stay overnight after the surgery, depending on the time of her admittance. Lenke and I have already given thanks to the Lord for the miracle of early detection and we trust the Lord that the result will again be negative - "but if not," we praise Him anyway, for He will surely see us through! :type:

 

The Lord bless you a 1000 times more as much as you have in your life now.
amen

 

Praying that all reports continue to be negative, and Lenke is returned to good health. raying:

 

That's really good Barnabas, although for her sake I feel bad that she has to go through the bigger testing when the other stuff is negative. I love those things the doctors have on Star Trek where they just scan a person with a hand-held instrument and get an immediate reading on everything.

 

Thanks for your good wishes David and Friend of God! You are very kind.

Gina, I'd love to have one of those Star Trek gizmos as well - the real one (not the movie version).... :type:

 

Ah, what a day! We've only got the one youngest kiddo home this week and she's been behaving herself lately, so we made a special trip to the Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory! Whoo-Hoo! On the way there we stopped at a gas station and they had slush puppies! Haven't seen them in forever but wasn't thirsty so passed up the chance for one of my favorite things...a cherry one. Oh well. Would you believe this child never had one before?! If that isn't child negligence...HA! So she got to get one of those and then at long last got to our destination.

If you've never had their caramel apples, you don't know what you're missing! They have SO many different types and they had buy three, get one free. Who can pass that up? So we picked out a grasshopper one, a cheesecake one, a butterfinger one and to my great delight, they had a key lime one! I love key lime. Then I looked at the name tag on the woman waiting on us and she happened to be the owner.

I couldn't help myself, I burst out with "I LOVE YOU!" :laugh: I'm a fan on facebook and she apparently had read my post saying I was on my way and recognized us and said we deserved something special for coming all that way. She offered us a choice of a free apple or anything in the case, so hubby picked out a peanut butter bomb caramel apple. (they're like $8, so that was very sweet of her!)

On top of that we got the most delicious rice krispie treat dipped in chocolate, two truffles and I got my one daughter an "I Love Lucy" chocolate bar since she's a major Lucy fan.

Came home and made a special dinner. Steak, loaded scalloped potatoes and steamed pea pods followed up by a dessert of those awesome caramel apples. Later on we had shrimp cocktails.

We have so much leftover that tomorrow will simply be a repeat of today's treats.

There's been so much going on and so much to deal with that it was great to just have this special day. God knows I needed it and allowed it to happen. :godisgood:

 

What a busy day you have had Gina. For myself I have been cold,cold,cold. The weather has been (wait for it...) cold, wet and windy.
I have been well rugged up as I am not really wealthy enough to have the heaters blazing away. I ended up so fed up with myself, I walked down to the lovely WARM library and read the papers and chatted with some folk. It is a nice social hub the library, and is very popular in cold weather!!!

I did my major clean for some bachelors....who would otherwise subsist in filth. It is a labour of love...they are dears particularly one American who has to be one of the most well mannered young men I have ever met. What wonderful parents he must have. Because American Independence Day has been and gone a magnificent pavlova topped with cream and chocolate was produced. My pumpkin pie was a burnt offering so it was consumed by me.

My dear little girl MissDaisyMae who is a handsome mackeral striped tabby caught her first bird this morning...it may have died from the cold but I do not know really. This follows on from her first mouse the other morning which she displayed with enthusiasm on my chest as I was woken up by a precordal thump as she bounded up to show me. It was a horrible way to wake up really.

I shall finish up by saying your family is in my prayers and a mountain of ironing is waiting for me...so I shall be warm very shortly.

God Bless You

ps Say a little prayer for the wibbly-wobbly isles.. we have been having some earth quakes here on the north island and I am not terribly keen on them at all. www.geonet.co.nz This is a popular site for kiwis at present.

 

Wow, ya'll have been a busy bunch!

Gina! Put down that apple!!! You KNOW you aren't supposed to bring treats into the coffee house unless you have enough to share with everyone!

Melanie, as soon as it stops shaking I'm coming to visit! It was 103 here several days over the weekend and its 88 at the moment, which is the coolest its been since May! If it weren't for the rain we are getting every day right now, it would be way up there in the 90's. I don't like this heat!

As for me, yesterday was jelly day. I ended up with about 16 half pints of blackberry. I need to do some peach, but my peach basket has been slowly emptying and now I don't know if I have enough. Oh well, peach isn't my fav anyhow.

Today was garage and attic cleaning. It is amazing how fast one old lady and 4 teenagers can clean. Hour and a half tops and we were done! There was still Christmas decorations sitting in the garage waiting to go up to the attic, lol! That's how long its been since the garage was cleaned. But it is done now so I'm happy.

Ann, I've cleaned in this house for a week and everytime I turn around I find something else that needs doing! I am obviously off my cleaning schedule! I gotta get a new one figured out soon cause we are starting back to school the last week of this month! If we don't start then we won't get to take off between Thanksgiving and Christmas and I'm not sure I'm willing to give up my winter break!

 

Well technically, we didn't get everything done that I intended for "this" year either. But we had to have a break, so I closed out the year's grades right where we were and we'll finish that stuff up the first 6 weeks or so of the "new" year. I just love having the freedom to do that. Chris bless his heart did 2/3 of 9th grade and all of 10th grade (excepting the last little bit) during the time from the last two weeks of May 2010 until we took off in the middle of June! That 2 credits each of History, English, and math plus one in science and during that time he taught himself to play the guitar and did a myriad of things that ranged from auto mechanics to home repairs to electronics (yeah, that was fun to write into a credit!). He worked hard and covered a lot of territory. Like I said, we NEEDED a break.

 

Ann, I'm sorry for your pain. It's tough when we're used to seeing people all "dressed up" spiritually, then all that gets stripped away and we get that shock of seeing people in their spiritual nakedness and realize what we saw before wasn't quite the reality it appeared to be and that we cherished. Thankfully God never changes. I've probably said it before, but I'll say it again. Hold your head up high and just keep going. You're a beloved daughter of the Most High God and nothing, NOTHING ever changes that.

Okay, for a different note, I was reprimanded for not bringing enough apples for others to share on here. I repent in graham cracker dust and cherry mashes and bring forth my offering to share with everyone. Here ya go...on the first, the whole one is the peanut butter bomb left whole. In front of it is a slice of a key lime one, the one beside it is a butterfinger one. The pic below it is after I sliced the peanut butter bomb one so you could see what they look like. Taken with a cell phone so the pics don't do them justice, but as you can see, these are truly a work of art. I really wish there was some of the grasshopper one left to share, it was so pretty! They really load the juicy, tart green apples up with layers of deliciousness.

ENJOY!

 

MMMmmmm, I feel better now! :laugh: