I would like to say that I am completely prepared for tomorrow, but I have to confess I have everything done but my sermon.  I have had a busy day, but a great one…..I just didn’t have time to get everything I wanted to get done finished.

I began the day with breakfast in Kokomo with my former Bishop and good friend Doc Loomis.  It had been a while since we had been together, and it was a real blessing to spend some time with him.  He will be making his Visitation with Christ the King in Kokomo tomorrow (on Christ the King Sunday, imagine that!).  Christ the King is a Church that we planted some years ago, and I pray it is a wonderful celebration!

Unfortunately for me, I will not be a part, meaning mainly that I am going to have to have a sermon for the two services I will be doing tomorrow.  I am not too worried though, as it is just 9pm, and I still have plenty of time.  It however, will have to come in the morning.  Amanda is spent and already in bed. Scott is out with his band, and Ben has been in and out of our room trying to talk his way into our bed.  (There is always some crisis-oriented reason).  The bottom line however is that it is doubtful that I will get any more done tonight.

So it is into temporary “retirement” I go, which is another way of saying I can no longer work and will run interference to make sure he doesn’t wake up his mom.  It will be a disaster if he does, so it is choosing the good portion for sure. He however is plenty of entertainment.  I just want to keep this a comedy and not some sort of tragic ending thriller for me!

Goodnight my friends and God Bless!

Tommy+

Mercy, I am tired, although not as tired as my wife.  We picked her up at 5pm from the airport where she flew in from Belgium. (Yes, I know, and are her arms tired.)  But to her, the time was 11pm as we she had been in the country of Van Damme all week.  (He’s the muscles from Brussels)  so she was beat.

Of course my day had been no picnic.  Ben refused to leave my side as today was Friday and he didn’t want to miss the trip to the airport. (As if I had often left him behind….)  And it had been a hectic day as well, but I seemed to have all my ducks in a row as I left.  And this was a big thing too, as ducks are really not all that compliant.

So we took an hour drive to pick her up at really the worst time to drive through Indy, Friday afternoon at rush hour.  It took us well over an hour, but the good news was we were able to get her on time.  St. Patrick’s was holding a wine and cheese party at 7 in Noblesville, and of course it was still rush hour.  And yes, it took us the rest of the time to drive up there.

Yes, I am whining, but the great part was after we arrived I was then wine-ing, and I had a great time.  I am not sure however about my wife………..I just carried her in and propped her by the door until we left.

Goodnight my friends and God Bless!

Tommy+

That’s right, today I was a witness to a crime, and I am torn as to what to do about it.  About 3pm I was driving down Park Avenue about two miles from home when I saw it.  It was an amazing feat.  A panicked brown squirrel darted in from of my car from the corn field to my right with a cob of corn as big as he was.

I think he was worried about me as if I were the farmer or predator of some kind, but I was driving my wife’s 2003 Civic Hybrid which in my mind would have made me look like more of some kind of animal activist.  I was not armed, not even hungry, let alone for any type of rodent.

But it was really very funny.  He was running away with his “loot” and although it technically was not his, I decided to let him go as I was not sure whose field it was anyway, nor could I identify him in a line up.  I have about a dozen squirrels who live in my yard that I feed, and if it is not the baby one that lives in the woodpile, I would not know one from another.

So I will turn my head at this one, not out of apathy, but out of sheer respect for his guts and determination.  I have laughed all day about it, and I do hope he enjoys it.  I feed my squirrels peanuts, and will be spreading an entire bag for him to give him some variety in that general location, sometime before the weekend ends.

Goodnight my friends and God Bless!

Tommy+

Today was a pretty good day, but one that in the end was hard to deal with.  I suppose hard is not the right word, but I found myself in a place that I wanted to do something, yet the reality was that I couldn’t. I have been in this same spot before, yet I do not remember how I handled it, so I have come to the conclusion that I just grieve and hand it back to God.

I just have felt the need to pick up the phone and call my grandma, like I have so many times before, but I then remember that she has gone home to heaven.  I guess it was always such a natural thing to do, but I miss the conversations and I miss seeing her.  My mom and I never talked like my grandma and I did, plus my mom’s mind was lost to Alzheimer’s years ago.  There is just always something so assuring about my grandma’s voice.

Oh, I can still hear it, I just miss being able to chat.  I always felt great after talking with her, and I really never had a poor memory of anything with her.  She was a giant to me, as was my grandpa, and I guess I feel a bit untethered without them both.  I always knew this time would come, they even told me, but somehow I feel so poorly prepared.  It’s as if a bit of my foundation has been taken away.

Of course I know that is not true, but it sure does feel that way.  And someday I too will walk with my grandchildren in this life and the whole thing will come full circle.

I just have to live it, but I don’t have to like it.  She was such a blessing to me, and all I want to do is to just talk with her on the phone.

It will have to wait.

Goodnight my friends and God Bless.

Tommy+

Dear Lord, I just accidentally saw that I have close to 40,000 page views, and will be over that by tomorrow.  It absolutely humbles me to know that people actually follow this, or even occasionally read it.  I honestly began it for one reason, to fight the good fight of faith, but that dang stroke got in the way.  Now it is my therapy, although at times it still fights the good fight.  But I am blessed that people read it, yet if no one did at all, I would thank God for the opportunity to exercise this broken mind of mine.

But tonight my mind is elsewhere.  I am here in my bed, and I am not getting any peace.  BEN is here and  although I would rather he head to his own bed, he is really out of sorts when his mom is not here.  It is not that he does not love me or Scott, or his dog , or his cat…..it is that he would throw us ALL under the bus as it were for her.  And the bottom line is that if I do not have everything done by 5 when I pick him up when she is traveling, the rest of the day is cooked because he has no concept of privacy.

It however has been a great night.  Scotty and I took him to Red Robin where he was a hit.  We came home and Ben disappeared, but Batman was everywhere.  Batman has now left the building (like Elvis) and he is just chatting away as I type.  Only three more sleeps as he says before the cavalry arrives.

It is a great way to go over 40k!  Thanks for being a part of my crazy life!

Goodnight my friends and God Bless!

Tommy+ 

The picture is from this morning where he insisted he could dress himself.  He is a “doctor” and a “boss,” but apparently one who understands very little about buttons.  Fortunately, he had the day to explain that to Cindy.

He is now home with me tonight and my hope for a different dynamic is not coming true.  It is only when his mom is around that he is distracted.  Thus, if my work is not done before I pick him up from Cindy’s, I am clearly not able to get anything done.  I have tried mind you, but Batman, toys, holsters, and the need for snacks have made accomplishing anything impossible.

So I am now in my bed, and he is here with me.  It is far easier to deal with his delusions than to have him coming in here every 15 seconds asking me something.  But I keep telling myself, it is only 4 more years…..I mean days.  I will just have to be a better planner of tomorrow to make sure I am ready for the evening!

But all in all, it is really more entertaining than oppressive.  He is “playing legos,” which was not my first guess, but is playing by himself while I type.  He has quite the imagination, and for now I am thankful for it.

Tomorrow will soon however be upon us, and I actually will have “real work” to do.  Hopefully things will settle in just a few.  Amanda is 6 hours ahead of us, and will call when she wakes up, which should be between 12 and 1.  My prayer is that the legos game is not still in session.

Pray for me……he has far more energy than I do!

Goodnight my friends and God Bless.

It was the poet Edmund Fizgerald who wrote, “A book of verses underneath the bough, A jug of wine, a loaf of bread-and thou.”  I would like to say that I thought of that today, and I suppose I did in retrospect, but my poetry might go like this instead, “A lot of work, Subway and a nap, A great Bears’ victory and a vodka tonic with my wife flying to Belgium.”  And although I find this very moving, I can see why poetry has not become a career for me……but I try.

Yep, she’s packing.  Tomorrow Amanda will be leaving for Belgium and will not be home until Friday.  The only female left in the house will be the cat, and to be honest, she works for us.  We will once again be living unsupervised with lots of opportunity for trouble, for although Ben considers himself a superhero with great principles and ethics, he is just as easy to bribe as that cat.  We should have a ball.

Of course she will return, as she always does, and we will find out what kind of trouble we will be in.  (My high school English teacher is now living among the Saints, so I felt it was safe to end my last sentence with a preposition.  I will deal with her when I make it!)  Amanda however I will deal with on Friday.  We will use the same old excuses, like how things just don’t go well without her and such, and then Ben will give her those sad eyes that are of the Puss-n-boots level.  They always work.  Plus, she is always tired, and never seems to have the energy to deal with our shenanigans until the jet lag wears off.  By then we are Scott-free, but not really because he lives with us, and at 6’2″ you notice him around.

But we will do our very best to survive this next week without her.  I am certain we will suffer immensely!  Bwhahaha!  I hope Ben can keep his mouth shut about all those Twinkies!!

Goodnight my friends and God Bless!

Tommy+

Today I have seen Ironman, Spiderman (SpiTERman here) and Superman.  The costumes are being changed more quickly than those at a Lady GaGa concert (not that I have been there, but I have heard).  It has been a whirlwind experience, but quite honestly it has not been the most interesting thing in my day.

Late this morning I was alerted to a couple of pictures of a young woman in a bikini that was really smaller than her body should have been in, that was posted to Facebook and was tagged with my name.  Oh her name was there, as was her body (which you could see a lot of) and it showed up on MY Facebook profile only to be viewed by the 1200 or so people who are connected to me.  And although I am was flattered that she (whoever she is) chose to attempt to embarrass me, to be quite honest most young women in that age bracket do not care for married 50 year old priests, and the percentage drops considerably when you add the bikini.  (I would anticipate that the percentage would drop into negative numbers had I been in a bikini)

So I untagged the picture, which is a way to remove my name from it when it circulates, and posted that even I considered it pretty funny……because it was.

And I am still getting ribbed for it too, and I imagine it will go on for quite some time.  But you shouldn’t dish out the jokes if you can’t take a one.  So my hat is off to you “Miss Scantily Clad Woman Who Needs Better Advice on What Size Bikini to Buy.”  But that is really just a line, because I rarely wear a hat.  My hope and prayer for you is that you live in Florida or somewhere warm.  It snowed here yesterday, and it would break my heart to see you catch your death of pneumonia.

Goodnight my friends and God Bless!

Tommy+

I have to confess, Amanda even apologized as she returned from Wal-Mart tonight.  Apparently Halloween costumes were 75% off tonight, so she had to buy 5.  We now have Superman, Ironman, Robin, something I cannot remember, and of course Captain Jack Sparrow who you see in the picture.

Oh no, it is not the FULL costume.  Apparently the Ben version of Captain Jack does not want to wear the long hair (it’s for girls), so I wore it most of the night.  It never did convince him to put it on, but it has been years since I had that much hair.  I felt like Fabio without the ripped body.  Perhaps a Fabio found after a few weeks underwater I suppose, but nonetheless, it was cool to have a lot of hair.

To another point, I was able to cut all the trees and stuff I wanted to cut today, but the chain dulled on my chainsaw and I was unable to finish.  There are branches all over the yard, and I hope to get my chainsaw sharpened and have it done by Saturday afternoon.  At least that is the plan.  All I know is that after awhile the chainsaw took forever to cut.  I am sure that is not right.  I will look into it, but all I am certain of is my desire to finish.

But for now, I am just fighting pirates…..pirates with short European cuts as if they had been to Cookie Cutters last week.  I am just thankful for their foam swords.  These little scalawags do not scare me in the least.

But then again, pirating is different from when I was a kid.

Goodnight me friends and God Bless ye!   Arggh.

Tommy+