Friday, April 20, 2012

Busy, Busy Friday

This will be a really busy day and for some strange reason, I didn't sleep well last night. I finally just got up at 4:00 AM. There's no sense in just lying there when I can't sleep.

This morning at 6:30, I will pick up Bob A. He is going with me to my hair appointment and afterward we are going to have breakfast at Eggberts. I will bring him back home and go to meet Jennifer at the library at 9:00 so she can tell me what she wants me to display at the Home Show. Then I will go to Bartlesville to meet Myra for lunch. After that, I will come back home and wait for Leslie to pick me up at 3:30.

We will stay overnight at Springfield so we will be there for the first meeting at 8:30 in the morning.

We will be gone all day Saturday and get home late Saturday afternoon.

Sunday will be Church School and Church and dinner afterward. Then I should have a quiet afternoon and evening.

Bob A. and I decided to go back to Branson May 11th and 12th. We asked Phyllis F. if she wanted to go with us and she would love to go but has her grandson coming to visit her that weekend. So she took a rain check. I guess just the two of us will go.

May will be busy for me. The first weekend on Friday, I will help move books at the library. The third weekend Leslie, Karan and I are going to Sheri's Friday and Saturday in Independence, Missouri, for some special occasion.

The fourth weekend is Memorial Day weekend and Keith and Esther will be here.

Thursday, April 19, 2012

Thursday at Last

I love Thursdays. It's the last day of my work for the week. Also, I received my paycheck in my checking account today. That always makes my day. I can only work for this program for five years. I don't know what I'll do after that.

This is a clear day. I have nothing after work. I will pack this evening for our trip to Springfield tomorrow afternoon.

I attended PINCH last night. We talked about immigration because one of our members from Mexico was stopped at a license check by the highway patrol. Her driver's license was expired in 2009. She learned that Kansas would not renew it because she was here illegally. In fact we learned that she had been deported twice before and came back each time. She and her husband have three children...all born here. Neither her husband or her are legal. We only learned that last night. Legal immigration from Mexico is backed up ten years. She had hoped PINCH could help her. Actually, because she is illegal, we couldn't. I suggested she request a court appointed lawyer at her traffic hearing on May 9th. Maybe he could get them green cards. They both work. She is a waitress and I forget what they said he does but he does have a job. I fear she will be deported again though. Perhaps this time he will also be deported. It's a dilemma.

Wednesday, April 18, 2012

Wednesday Again

Well, it's Wednesday again and I had a great night's sleep. In fact. I probably could have slept later then 5:00 AM. But then I couldn't get as much done before work if I did that.

I watched American Experience on PBS last night and that was followed by Frontline. Those are two of my favorite programs. I love PBS and NPR. You can always learn something at those TV and radio sites. The American Experience program was about the building of the "Hoover" Dam during the depths of the depression. After Hoover left office, they changed the name of the dam to Boulder Dam. he was a very unpopular president who apparently did little to combat the depression. Frontline was all about forensics and the fallacy created by the TV show CSI. It seems nothing is as sure in evidence as CSI, the TV show, makes it out to be. People are convicted by fingerprint evidence that is not all that decisive at all. It's a subjective opinion by so called experts. Several people have been proven innocent ten years later, having been convicted by the "opinions" of so called fingerprint "experts". The Innocence Project has proven a couple of hundred prisoners to be innocent by DNA evidence, the one piece of evidence that is science backed. It also exposed that the certification of forensic "experts" is from a diploma mill.

Justice is not as cut and dried as we often think.

I sat on a jury as foreman in 1980. The case was about a couple of young boys who supposedly shot a motel owner in the process of attempting to rob him. We were deliberating when the jury was interrupted by the court because a young boy had confessed to his mother that he had done the shooting. The boy was eight years old and this was his seventh felony. He had been invited along on the robbery and given the gun to hold. When the motel owner reached for his cash drawer, the child thought he was reaching for a weapon and shot him.

The mother of the accused boys knew her sons had not done the crime. She snooped around the community and learned there were two other boys who were bragging about getting away with murder. She further investigated the crime and learned the eight year old boy had confessed to his mother. She reported this to the police, who were just sure they had the correct pair of boys.

Her sons had been apprehended and taken to the Tulsa hospital where the motel owner was clinging to life. He obviously knew them but died soon afterward. These boys had had their girlfriends at his motel. That's why he recognized them...not that they had done the crime.

We had nearly convicted the two young men by mistake. That's when I realized how easy it is to convict people in error. Circumstantial evidence is just not that positive.

Anyhow, it was a very interesting program. And I had some much needed rest.

Tonight I will attend the PINCH meeting after work at 5:30.

Tuesday, April 17, 2012

Cakes Today

When I came home from work yesterday, my neighbor, a mentally challenged young man, came over to tell me that a small tree growing in my honeysuckle vine, was interfering with his mom's TV reception from her satellite. He wanted permission to cut it down. I gave him permission. He never got around to it. I finally went out and cut it down myself. It was fifteen or twenty feet tall. I sure didn't want a tree growing in my chain link fence. After I finally got it down, I drug it over to the carport and will ask John and Leslie if they will pick it up the next time they are in town with their pickup. Then I mowed my yard.

My brother-in-law came over with his cake for the dinner in Independence. So today I take the five cakes from Coffeyville to Independence to the dinner the First Christian Church does for the hungry and lonely each Tuesday evening. While I am there, I will get my hair cut and done. I baked my two cakes last evening after I finished mowing and then iced them this morning. After I get my hair done and the cakes delivered, I will stop at Big Cheese and eat a mini pizza there. Then I will come back home and go to work.

Tonight I will finally have a chance to relax with nothing to do but watch TV. American Experience is on and the program is about the building of the Hoover Dam. I have already seen it once but it's been a couple of years so I will watch it again.

Tomorrow evening after work I will attend the PINCH meeting at the Presbyterian Church.

Thursday is another free day, thank goodness.

Friday, when I'm off work, I will have my hair done for the weekend in Springfield. Then I will meet Jennifer at the library at 9:00 so she can tell me what she wants me to display at the Home Show on April 28th. Then at noon, I will meet Myra in Bartlesville for lunch. After I get home from Bartlesville, I will meet Leslie for our trip to Springfield. I will pack for the weekend Thursday evening. Leslie will be picking Bob Avery and me up for that trip. No one else from our congregation is going to attend, I guess.

I noticed last evening that my peonies are beginning to bloom and it's only halfway through April. Also, I saw Missy, my cat, sleeping in my chair by the dining room window yesterday and took her photo. There at the top is the tree I cut down last night.

Monday, April 16, 2012

Leaking Line From Dishwasher

Last weekend my son-in-law came and installed my new garbage disposal. He tried his best to get the pipes tight so they would not leak. We ran water in the sink and everything appeared to be fine.

After he and my daughter left, I ran the dishwasher and under pressure, the pipe leaked. I set a small bowl under the pipe and left it there. I only run the dishwasher once a week so it is not a big problem. I certainly didn't want my son-in-law, who has plenty to do between his job and the farm, to have to come back in here and replace a gasket in that pipe. I imagine that's what it needs. I may just call a plumber one of these days and have it done. I have to stay in the kitchen while the dishwasher runs to be sure the leak doesn't get worse. It's running now and I will need to leave for work in thirty minutes. I hope it finishes by then or I will just turn it off.

Tonight I need to bake my two cakes for the dinner at the First Christian Church in Independence on Tuesday evening. I will ice them in the morning before I leave for Independence at 9:00. This evening Bob A., Phyllis F., and Karan M. will have theirs over here too. I will get my hair cut while I'm there in Independence and then come back and go to work at 1:00. That means I will work until 5:00 this week to make up the time lost Tuesday morning.

I have a PINCH meeting at 5:30 on Wednesday. Thursday I will need to fax in my time sheet to Aime. Friday I will get my hair done for the weekend and meet Myra for lunch in Bartlesville. I need to see Jennifer at the library either Friday morning or late afternoon too..to decide what we will display at the Home Show on the 28th. She will be gone all next week.

We will leave Friday afternoon at 3:00 to go to Springfield for the Pastors and Priesthood Members meeting with our mission center executive. Leslie, my daughter, will drive. The meeting starts at 8:30 on Saturday morning so we will stay overnight in a motel. So next weekend will be busy too.

Busy Sunday

Yesterday was so busy I never got to my blog. I went to church yesterday morning. Afterward nine of us went to El Pueblo for lunch. After that I came home and did my newsletters and went to the support meeting at Windsor at 2:30. I left there at 4:00 and came home and went to the bank to get money for my week. I stopped at Brahms and bought milk and juice.

Last night Gary called to say although the library room was open for him to set up chairs for the Living the Questions group, there was no TV nor DVD player in there for us to use. He had been told by two different people at the library that they would provide that. I had to call the librarian to come in town and bring in the TV and DVD player. She worked for thirty minutes to get the equipment going and finally had to get her laptop to hook it up. For some strange reason, the DVD was in black and white and not color. We watched it and afterward had our discussion. No one from the community attended. I didn't think there would be anyone there since the newspaper just got our story in the paper on Saturday.

We had refreshments and everyone left but Gary and me. We locked up. At least we attempted to lock up. The door was not easy to lock. When Jennifer, the librarian came earlier, she used the front door and when we went to lock it up, Gary couldn't get any of the keys to turn the lock. I had to call Jennifer again. She lives in the country and had her sister there visiting but she was going to drive back into town to lock that front door. I told Gary to go on home and I would stay. He gave me the keys and after he left, I tried the keys again and lo and behold, one of them did work. I hurriedly called Jennifer again before she could come back to town and told her I had the door locked. I dropped the keys in the drop box behind the library and came home...exhausted. I have to admit, I slept like a baby last night. Exhaustion does help.

Anyhow, it was a very busy day.