Wednesday Smiles

[blessedw2]

dd younger is going to a concussion clinic tomorrow. she had a really bad headache and the room was tilted last night.

okey dokey I have to work... pretending I don't doesn't help.

[blessedw2]

praying for fast healing for your minister d kathryn.

[OKay]

Two drainer of dishes washed. Floor dried twice (LO was a very enthusiastic rinser)

I called DH and interrupted elder meeting to let him know several possible tornadoes are shown on radar and one is visually confirmed and all heading toward us. The super cell storms are about 30 miles away so anything can happen (change direction, lift and disappear, etc). Storm chasers are all out and broadcasting live......some FB friends have posted pictures of CNN big semi's they use for remote broadcast. I guess they wanted to stop by our part of the world in case we have something occur that they deem news worthy.

Next up - gather a few important items and put into cellar.....just in case.

[BookSaver]

Hello, villagers ~
It's been an interesting day with power outages. Mid-afternoon I thought the storm had been gone long enough to be safe turning on computer again. In the middle of reading an Email, another storm blew in and knocked out power before I could shut anything down. Luckily the surge protector seems to have, you know, protected the pc and modem.

Not so lucky for the hard drive recorders hooked up to my tv upstairs and DH's down in his mancave. Neither will power on so DH thinks both are toast. Unfortunately,
1) Mine was full of shows I've been trying to find time to watch, like 2 full seasons of Eureka and Warehouse 13, several episodes of Castle, several movies and shows from PBS, as well as lots of sewing shows that I kept meaning to download onto DVDs.
2) DH's has locked inside it a DVD from the library that is due back tomorrow. He's trying to figure out how to liberate it. Otherwise we'll have to pay to replace it, and it's a brand new movie just out on DVD so will be expensive.
3) Those recorders were, of course, also our DVD players so we can't watch any DVDs until we replace them.
4) Those recorders were the older type that did not need any subscription service like T I V O. They were strictly manual systems to record shows from tv, like old VCR systems. DH is looking online for replacements but he can only find the ones that require a monthly fee to some service that we don't need.


Oh well, it's not really a hardship. All of the shows that I lost are things that can be found again, and I can probably borrow all of the TV series DVDs for free through interlibrary loan. Which will actually save a lot of time because I won't have to deal with fast-forwarding through commercials. There, a silver lining!

Hoping I can cuop and answer some Emails before the next storm rolls through ...

[Kathryn-in-Canada]

Kathryn, what does working as a facilitator on this National Church survey entail?

All congregations in the denomination are to have a conversation with a facilitator (via Skype and phone) in order to discuss their vision of the denomination in this time of declining attendance and increased secularization of society. Do we want to become more dogmatic or more social justice oriented. Do we want paid ministers or are unpaid volunteers accountable to their own small churches acceptable? What, outside our church, works well to spread God's community and hope in the world and how can those models work for our church? The conversations will be about 90 minutes with a group of people from each church and then another 30 minutes with the ministry staff. There are 15 team leaders, each with a team of 15 facilitators, and each facilitator is to converse with 10 churches. But since I'm away for half the time, I've been assigned a partner (who is also away for a month of the process) and we each do five churches. This will be done over May and June.

I'm figuring it is about 40 hours of work but I've put in about 6 on it so far, just trying to learn the material I'm to cover and answering email.

When I accepted the position, the minister was neither sick, nor had she resigned. Now I'm overwhelmed with church work.

The service for Sunday is written. The bulletin is ready too, except for the announcements. I'll work on those next.

Booksaver: thanks for explaining non-subscription recorders aren't readily available. That explains why I couldn't find one on Craigslist. As for the dvd stuck in the drive - there should be a pin-sized hole somewhere near the drive door. Stick an unbent paperclip into it and that will trigger a mechanical release.

[BookSaver]

Good news, DH took the panel off his recorder so he could look at the fuse and circuit board. He was able to rescue the library's dvd. He says the fuse looks ok and he found a reset button on one of the inside boards. He was able to get the machine to power on and he's fiddling with it --
oh carp I'm hearing thunder again and powering down the pc!

[Kathryn-in-Canada]

Bulletin and announcements are done and sent.

Will either go to bed or work on the minutes from last night.

[OKay]

Bookie - I'm glad your safe from storms.

We just spent 3 hours with some serious hair-raising storms. WOW! There was seven of us that spent a couple hours in our cellar together. We came out and went back into the cellar 3 times as the storm cells with detected tornadoes were lined up and would come over the top of us. Thankfully the tornadoes didn't stay on the ground.

I strongly suspect this storm will break the drought. WHHHOOOHOOO! Everything I can see is flooded. Our front pond is totally full and backed up over the road. I've heard reports of 3.5" to 6" of rain received in a couple of hours.

It is two hour past LO bath/bedtime. OOPS! I best be getting him headed that way.

[Sunny]

OKay, I'm glad you are safe and hope the worst is now over for a safe night. Your gardening ideas are very interesting.

Cowinkie, how nice you will see your dfriend this weekend.

Kathryn, I'm sorry you are having a busy stressful time with the new developments in your church. It is always upsetting when a minister leaves. Also, it is always a sad time when a church has to close; that affects so many people!

The a/c has been running a little warm while in cooling cycle; we had the heat strips during the cold snaps. They called this morning to confirm the appt., then called back a couple of hours later wanting to reschedule for tomorrow due to an extra long call at another residence. Dh has a cardio dr. appointment the same time they are to come, so I won't go with him. Hopefully the unit just needs some freon.

I took it a little easy today, no heavy furniture moving. I was able to get deep cleaning done in three rooms this week. Today I did a couple of lol and sorted through a couple of boxes.

[Lilac]

Okay, I am so glad that you posted. I had turned to The Weather Channel and I could see that the storms/tornadoes were right over you. I am relieved that you are safe and I thank you for letting us know.

BookSaver, I am also glad that you are safe from storms. I hope that your dh can get your recorders working again. At least he recovered the dvd.

This is some crazy weather. It was 38, cloudy and windy all day. We have a chance of snow or wintry mix overnight.