There are a number of play houses here in Prescott where we can go to view live performances. I love the movie "Steel Magnolias" with Dolly Parton as Truvie, the beautician. There was a performance of this stage play here in Prescott and the lady who played Dolly Parton's part of Truvie was wonderful.....although I think that her waistline was perhaps 4 times that of Dolly Parton. I was wondering just how they would portray many things in the movie, but they did it with one set - that of the beauty parlor....and our minds made up the rest of the story. The actress who took the part played by Sally Fields, even looked a lot like Sally Fields and her speech about the loss of her daughter to diabetes had me in tears. I could really feel the depth of grief she had for the loss.
Friday 10th April was a really crazy day. Bill wanted to attend the temple in North Phoenix before going the dentist for his checkup but he did not get ready in time so we had to settle for other ordinances. We literally blew into the temple and blew out and he remarked that "If I had gotten up earlier it would not have been such a rush job. You really cannot rush the temple experience. He went to the dentist and after it we looked for a Mayo clinic that I could attend. The last blood test I had showed that there needed to be an adjustment to my meds and I wanted a second opinion. We found the North Scottsdale Mayo clinic but they were only General Practitioners and not an avenue to follow to get to see the specialists at Mayo. We found a 'fast food' joint to eat lunch and then high tailed it back to Prescott to try to be there before David arrived. We make reservations for him but the people who care for him never obey the reservation time - they just take him any old time they want - sometimes up to 2 hours before the appointed time. They drop him off and he occupies his time filling up on junk food and large soda's and comes home minus money to pay for his needs. So we hurried home and got here 30 minutes before he arrived - which was an hour earlier than we planned. Good thing we are aware of the practices of his providers.
The high school drama department put on the play "Grease" - them movie introduced Olivia Newton John to American audiences. I have not seen the movie and the play was well done but not family viewing fare because of the language and innuendo's. We took David to see it, but the 50's theme was not understood by him at all.
My mission training is going along but I do not think I will be ready to participate in the big push for arbitration. There are millions of records that need arbitration before they can be released and not enough people to do the task, so I guess they will have to do it without me.
This past weekend there was a wonderful artist activity in the bank parking lot. They call it Chalk It Up and invited artists, along with local people draw pictures on the parking lot for all to come and enjoy. This year was the first year I could go and see the activities and it was marvelous.
At quilt guild this month they honored those of us who had been presidents by asking us to bring our President's quilt and show it off. there are not so many of us left in Prescott, but it was wonderful to see what was on display. The pictures are on the MountainTop Quilters website under "Past Presidents Quilts".
Monday, April 27, 2015
Tuesday, April 14, 2015
Brahms Lullaby welcome
If there is one thing that stands out with this mission I am doing, it is the records of births and deaths that I deal with on a daily basis. The down side is that I do not know or even can guess what has happened to these individuals between the event of their birth and the eventual death. I suspect that some of the people had a real challenge with each step of the way and others just sailed through with little or no problem. It seems to be so unequal, but on the other hand, the challenges we face bring us to the point of growth and expansion of our vision of life.
Last week I was asked to do compassionate service for a member of our ward. She is the caretaker of an 8week old baby whose birth circumstances were less than optimum or desirable. She has been staying at the hospital helping care for him ever since he contracted RSV - a virus that affects the lungs of small children and even can affect adults with compromised lungs. I went over to the hospital to be holding the little one upright so that he has a better chance of good breathing while the caretaker/mother went to an appointment. I walked into the hospital and was greeted by a helper volunteer who took me to the pediatric ward and as we walked to the elevator the sound of Brahms Lullaby came over the loud speaker. The helper turned to me and smiled and said, oh, another baby has been born. I was in a state of awe at the thought of a new life entering mortality. I don't know what it is to give birth, but rather know what it is to go out and adopt, so I am quite emotional to know that another little one has joined us in mortality. Each week there are pictures in the paper of the newborns, not all of them make it into the paper, but about 15 to 20 newborns are pictured in the local paper each week. Mostly boys with just a few girls seem to be born here. I was at the hospital about 2 hours and in that span of time Brahms Lullaby played 6 times. It was a busy day in the maternity ward. The juxtaposition of world wars, political upheaval, climate problems, various and sundry strifes against the newly born occupied my mind while at the hospital. I held the little boy in my arms and watched him struggle for breath and I wondered what was ahead of him. He has had 8 weeks of struggle already. He has been living in my friend's home now since he was one day old and he is greatly loved by the other children living in the home, but what happens to him if he is returned to his nuclear family is anybody's guess.
I have been doing indexing of records. I have to achieve over 2,000 of these indexes and then they tell me I will be an arbitrator of records. An arbitrator in this sense is one who decides whether the written record is written to reflect this fact or another fact and then the record is released online. I guess it needs explaining. Each record that is up for indexing is separately indexed by two people. Their best guess (especially for the hand written records) is then fed through a program in a computer where they are compared and if there is a disagreement, then the record is turned over to a person to arbitrate. For example -one record I indexed I looked at very closely and the date was 19th of March. However, the second indexer thought it looked like 13th March and both records were sent to arbitration and it was decided that 13th March was correct. I even checked the 1860 calendar to see what day of the week both days may have been and found that both appeared as a week day and not a weekend. And so it goes with arbitration.
Many of the records I have indexed this week have been birth records from Tasmania, Australia. Why anyone would want to live in Tasmania is beyond me, but then I suspect that there are people who wonder why anyone would want to live in Toowoomba, Queensland, for that matter. I now live in a high desert area and there are people from Phoenix who escape up here to the mountains during the summer to beat the heat of Phoenix.
The type written records leave no question as to what is fact but the hand written records take a lot of close scrutiny. One record of marriages from New York took me 6 hours to index the 40 marriages there. The handwriting left a lot to be desired.
At the Family History Center we deal with the census records a lot for patrons looking for clues to their family history and the writing and spelling defies deciphering. I am told that the original transcription of the US census' was done in a non-english speaking country and the guesses were pretty much off as to what was actually there that the Family History Library in Salt Lake City had them all re-done by English speakers and the present records are a lot easier to cope with and are type written.
I have been assigned a mentor who is given the responsibility to train me in the intricacies of this mission. I meet with him almost daily online through Skype and he teaches me what to do and what to avoid. Some days I think it is more akin to walking on eggshells.
Last week I was asked to do compassionate service for a member of our ward. She is the caretaker of an 8week old baby whose birth circumstances were less than optimum or desirable. She has been staying at the hospital helping care for him ever since he contracted RSV - a virus that affects the lungs of small children and even can affect adults with compromised lungs. I went over to the hospital to be holding the little one upright so that he has a better chance of good breathing while the caretaker/mother went to an appointment. I walked into the hospital and was greeted by a helper volunteer who took me to the pediatric ward and as we walked to the elevator the sound of Brahms Lullaby came over the loud speaker. The helper turned to me and smiled and said, oh, another baby has been born. I was in a state of awe at the thought of a new life entering mortality. I don't know what it is to give birth, but rather know what it is to go out and adopt, so I am quite emotional to know that another little one has joined us in mortality. Each week there are pictures in the paper of the newborns, not all of them make it into the paper, but about 15 to 20 newborns are pictured in the local paper each week. Mostly boys with just a few girls seem to be born here. I was at the hospital about 2 hours and in that span of time Brahms Lullaby played 6 times. It was a busy day in the maternity ward. The juxtaposition of world wars, political upheaval, climate problems, various and sundry strifes against the newly born occupied my mind while at the hospital. I held the little boy in my arms and watched him struggle for breath and I wondered what was ahead of him. He has had 8 weeks of struggle already. He has been living in my friend's home now since he was one day old and he is greatly loved by the other children living in the home, but what happens to him if he is returned to his nuclear family is anybody's guess.
I have been doing indexing of records. I have to achieve over 2,000 of these indexes and then they tell me I will be an arbitrator of records. An arbitrator in this sense is one who decides whether the written record is written to reflect this fact or another fact and then the record is released online. I guess it needs explaining. Each record that is up for indexing is separately indexed by two people. Their best guess (especially for the hand written records) is then fed through a program in a computer where they are compared and if there is a disagreement, then the record is turned over to a person to arbitrate. For example -one record I indexed I looked at very closely and the date was 19th of March. However, the second indexer thought it looked like 13th March and both records were sent to arbitration and it was decided that 13th March was correct. I even checked the 1860 calendar to see what day of the week both days may have been and found that both appeared as a week day and not a weekend. And so it goes with arbitration.
Many of the records I have indexed this week have been birth records from Tasmania, Australia. Why anyone would want to live in Tasmania is beyond me, but then I suspect that there are people who wonder why anyone would want to live in Toowoomba, Queensland, for that matter. I now live in a high desert area and there are people from Phoenix who escape up here to the mountains during the summer to beat the heat of Phoenix.
The type written records leave no question as to what is fact but the hand written records take a lot of close scrutiny. One record of marriages from New York took me 6 hours to index the 40 marriages there. The handwriting left a lot to be desired.
At the Family History Center we deal with the census records a lot for patrons looking for clues to their family history and the writing and spelling defies deciphering. I am told that the original transcription of the US census' was done in a non-english speaking country and the guesses were pretty much off as to what was actually there that the Family History Library in Salt Lake City had them all re-done by English speakers and the present records are a lot easier to cope with and are type written.
I have been assigned a mentor who is given the responsibility to train me in the intricacies of this mission. I meet with him almost daily online through Skype and he teaches me what to do and what to avoid. Some days I think it is more akin to walking on eggshells.
Thursday, April 2, 2015
Family History situations.
It never ceases to amaze me the number of problems people encounter trying to do their family searches. A lady contacted me from Australia - I have no idea how she got my name, but she made contact and it turns out that her Great Grandmother is my first cousin twice removed. So, I chatted with her over the internet trying to help her. She has a grand daughter who died from some terrible disease and this lady is trying to figure out which of the ancestors to blame. She and I are from the same lineage till 1909 and then new lines enter in at that point. So I gathered up the cause of death in the ancestors and living family members and sent them off to her. They include, but are not limited to heart disease, diabetes, thyroid, kidney disease and the odd one or two who died because of spider bites, eating unripe fruit, and having a tree felling accident (over which there was a humongous court case till it was determined that it was an accident).
I just logged onto the help pane in the Skype chat and looked to see what I could learn. Well, I read about this problem that a member in Peru was having.
The person calling is a Family History missionary in a remote country (Peru) where the members don't have computers or cell phones. He and his wife are trying to register multiple members who have absolutely no access to technology in any form. Sister M. and I were advised by her contact to suggest this missionary contact his mission president and have him contact the Family History Department and create a workaround. For example, some countries don't allow members to have email accounts. So this one was a point of the curve. Something new everyday. Hope this makes sense from my brief synopsis.
I some times need to be reminded that I really really am lucky living where I do and have the resources that I have to do family history.
Today in the family history center there were no patrons, so I made hay while the sun shone. I used two of the FHC computers in tandem with my lap top and was trying to sort out the Lockyer family records. I have had the worst time trying to get information on this part of my family. After searching for about 3 hours I came to the conclusion that there are way too many of them - I am drowning in Lockyer research.
A patron came in who is working on a genealogy module through the pathways program with BYU Idaho. She found that she had entered the same person twice and so she thought she could just delete him - instead she deleted the entire database. I used the whiteboard to show her how to do a merge of information instead of a deletion. You can delete people in Rootsmagic, but it has to be an individual to be deleted rather than do a straight out delete(which removes everything). I do not know if she understands what it is I was trying to teach her - as a last resort, as I was leaving the center for the day, I encouraged her to read the Roots Magic book or use the online help section of the program.
I just logged onto the help pane in the Skype chat and looked to see what I could learn. Well, I read about this problem that a member in Peru was having.
The person calling is a Family History missionary in a remote country (Peru) where the members don't have computers or cell phones. He and his wife are trying to register multiple members who have absolutely no access to technology in any form. Sister M. and I were advised by her contact to suggest this missionary contact his mission president and have him contact the Family History Department and create a workaround. For example, some countries don't allow members to have email accounts. So this one was a point of the curve. Something new everyday. Hope this makes sense from my brief synopsis.
I some times need to be reminded that I really really am lucky living where I do and have the resources that I have to do family history.
Today in the family history center there were no patrons, so I made hay while the sun shone. I used two of the FHC computers in tandem with my lap top and was trying to sort out the Lockyer family records. I have had the worst time trying to get information on this part of my family. After searching for about 3 hours I came to the conclusion that there are way too many of them - I am drowning in Lockyer research.
A patron came in who is working on a genealogy module through the pathways program with BYU Idaho. She found that she had entered the same person twice and so she thought she could just delete him - instead she deleted the entire database. I used the whiteboard to show her how to do a merge of information instead of a deletion. You can delete people in Rootsmagic, but it has to be an individual to be deleted rather than do a straight out delete(which removes everything). I do not know if she understands what it is I was trying to teach her - as a last resort, as I was leaving the center for the day, I encouraged her to read the Roots Magic book or use the online help section of the program.
Wednesday, April 1, 2015
The Elephant in the Room
Use of a metaphor to help describe events opens up the thought processes to wander at will around the fields of thoughts, memories and happenings.
We have a number of Elephants in our room. The one with the most pressing needs is the Family History Mission needs. We finished our first training and then last week we entered and left a second phase and this week there is a new phase that is demanding. There is a Skype connection where we can go to ask questions about the indexing or phone calls or emails requesting help with genealogical problems. Another part of this Skype chat is the meet and greet and I have to learn to limit myself access to this particular part of the Skype chat. It could go on all day with fun and laughter but it is distracting. I think that the people on the chat just sit at their computers all day and while doing indexing, they check the chat each time it notifies a post. They have assigned us into groups with a leader and each group has its own meeting to discuss problems that may have come up - e.g. some people do not read the instructions to each indexing batch and so when they do their data entry and submit it, the batch gets rejected for mistakes and asks for re-work. Their questions are about the how and why of the rejection. My individual group meets on Thursdays at 2pm but I am at the Family History Center for my shift on Thursday afternoons so I cannot attend. The leader said that he would be doing a Saturday chat for those of us who cannot attend the scheduled chat. Then on the second Tuesday of the month they have scheduled a devotional and attendance is mandatory. The fourth Tuesday is a meeting in which we are given instruction on what is the newest requirement etc. Yesterday I attended my first meeting and we were told that the data segments (25milion+ BDM for the Philippines as well as 20million marriages of the Philippines) have been pulled from access on Family Search. There seems to have been a problem with licensing and so this reduction in the availability of information from the Phillippines will be a big blow to those of our number who seek information of ancestors in the Philippines. I have been assigned a mentor and this person is my personal coach to help me cope with the mound of information that I must learn and retain in order to be an efficient missionary on Family Search. I have not met him yet, but I am sure he will make his presence felt soon. The most amazing thing to me is that all of this mission and its interaction takes place on the internet. I sit here in Prescott at my computer terminal and I am in touch with people from Hawaii to Maine, from Idaho and Washington to Louisiana and the Carolinas. This is the most amazing experience for me.
There is a quilting Elephant in the room as well. Much like the Skype chat above, there is a Facebook chat connected with the New Hexagon quilt block of the month, I have to keep away from is also or I could spend all day reading the posts about the newest block. I have only two motifs to do, and they will be done today and connected to the March challenge, and I have already started cutting fabric for the April block.
The health Elephant keeps popping up and for Jacob it means declining health. He and the doctors are doing the best they can to stave off the most dire effects but he does need a new liver - bottom line.
The Education Elephant requires that Sara take another standardized test for admission to Doan College so that she can pursue her teaching certificate. They do not recognize the Graduate Record Exam that she had to take for admission to the Masters degree in Library Science. That is sad, because she has to juggle work, children, ailing husband and study with Easter coming this weekend and Jacob's family will all be at the house for the event. She needs to get her teaching certificate to be eligible to take over the head position in the library at Lincoln South East High when the present head of services retires.
The Garden Elephant requires that I go and get the potting soil - REALLY SOON - and start my tomatoes. I just hope that we do not get a freeze and lose the chance this year - again- of not having peaches or nectarines because it froze out the plants. Last year the trees were loaded with beginning fruit and it was glorious weather and one afternoon the clouds gathered, the temperature dropped considerably and stayed below freezing all night and with snow into the bargain and all the tiny fruit just fell off - got killed by the freeze. I notice that the shops already have tomato plants out for sale along with tender herbs like Basil.
The Relationship Elephant has been in the room since day one. We went to a Marriage Enrichment event in Utah. Bill told me it would be a fun time - he had been told it would be a fun time, but the realist in me said - oh no it will not be fun - working on enriching a relationship is HARD WORK: and hard work it was. They had 35 couples participating and the only relaxing time we had was to be in the hot tub and through the window, watch the Basketball game on the TV in the Gym next door. The Utes of University of Utah lost - aarrggghhh! Arizona (Tucson) also is out of the running. We came home exhausted.
Long Term Friendship elephant entered the room and one good thing happened though - I got to see Dee Jay Bawden. He and I were in a missionary group that went to Japan in March 1970. It was great to see him.
Travelling incident elephant directed the next phase. In the scramble to get on our way home, Bill left it to the last minute to pack his stuff up - one carry on each is all we had, and we raced out of the hotel to catch the shuttle to the Salt Lake City airport. On the way up I-15 the cabbie noted that there was construction on the highway ahead of us and a considerable back up, so he cut across the vally and we caught Bangerter highway till we could re-connect with I-15 further up and close to the airport. It was a ride around the mulberry bush to be sure but we saw parts of the Salt Lake Valley we have never seen before. We got to the airport in just enough time to load and leave for Phoenix. We did not have to stop to get baggage and we went out to the curb just in time to catch the shuttle to the parking spot.
When we got to the parking lot, Bill discovered that he did not have the keys to the car. Panic set in!
In the scramble to get packed, did he leave the keys in the Room? Did he leave them at the airport in SLC when he went through security or had he even left them at Phoenix on the way up to SLC when he went through security? We were ok because I had my keys handy and at least we had one fob that would help our computer-filled car to work. No keyhole in this car - just a wireless fob that has to be present. So we started to drive to Prescott and on the way, called the front desk at the motel to ask them if keys had been turned in or if housekeeping had found them in the room? The clerk called back and said, no keys! More panic! I asked Bill to search through his bag and he said he would not have put the keys in the bag so he declined to search. We were in a state of gloom because it is VERY expensive to replace a lost or damaged fob. So we picked up our mail, and went into the house. He began to unpack his stuff and then he found his keys......in the bag I had asked him to search. Ah well, all is good in this department now.
St. Patricks Day Elephant had a grand time. We know that there are only two restaurants with definitely Irish fare and neither of us had called to make a reservation - so off we went, high hopes of Irish Stew and soda bread for dinner on our minds. We even found a parking spot at the Irish Pub and we thought that was a good omen. At the entrance we were met by a jolly Irish Elf who asked if we were going to imbibe? No! so we did not get our hand stamped - good, because that dye lasts for days. The music was loud and raucous but we had taken something to read because we expected a wait before serving - yep, it was a 2 hour at least wait! We went to Cracker Barrel out in Prescott Valley but no Irish Stew - just corned beef, cabbage and potato was on the menu. I ate salad and Bill had a hamburger. Not too much in line with his Irish ancestry, eh? On the way up to the Irish Pub, we took the Yavape extension road and in the field by the road there were about 20 antelope feeding in the early evening. Quite a treat to be sure.
The entertainment Elephant invaded our lives with a trip to Yavapai College performing arts theatre for a local performance of Willy Wonka and the chocolate factory. It was wonderful and I really enjoyed how the director overcame some of the needed special effects that are present in the movie.
The last elephant to take up our time was the attendance at the baptism of Jacob - a little boy I had in my Sunday school class. His Grandfather gave a talk at the ceremony and one week later, this man collapsed and was rushed to hospital. They did emergency surgery on him for a triple bypass. I am glad that it did not happen before the baptism ceremony.
So, there are many elephants in my room - the care and feeding of them takes a lot of time.
We have a number of Elephants in our room. The one with the most pressing needs is the Family History Mission needs. We finished our first training and then last week we entered and left a second phase and this week there is a new phase that is demanding. There is a Skype connection where we can go to ask questions about the indexing or phone calls or emails requesting help with genealogical problems. Another part of this Skype chat is the meet and greet and I have to learn to limit myself access to this particular part of the Skype chat. It could go on all day with fun and laughter but it is distracting. I think that the people on the chat just sit at their computers all day and while doing indexing, they check the chat each time it notifies a post. They have assigned us into groups with a leader and each group has its own meeting to discuss problems that may have come up - e.g. some people do not read the instructions to each indexing batch and so when they do their data entry and submit it, the batch gets rejected for mistakes and asks for re-work. Their questions are about the how and why of the rejection. My individual group meets on Thursdays at 2pm but I am at the Family History Center for my shift on Thursday afternoons so I cannot attend. The leader said that he would be doing a Saturday chat for those of us who cannot attend the scheduled chat. Then on the second Tuesday of the month they have scheduled a devotional and attendance is mandatory. The fourth Tuesday is a meeting in which we are given instruction on what is the newest requirement etc. Yesterday I attended my first meeting and we were told that the data segments (25milion+ BDM for the Philippines as well as 20million marriages of the Philippines) have been pulled from access on Family Search. There seems to have been a problem with licensing and so this reduction in the availability of information from the Phillippines will be a big blow to those of our number who seek information of ancestors in the Philippines. I have been assigned a mentor and this person is my personal coach to help me cope with the mound of information that I must learn and retain in order to be an efficient missionary on Family Search. I have not met him yet, but I am sure he will make his presence felt soon. The most amazing thing to me is that all of this mission and its interaction takes place on the internet. I sit here in Prescott at my computer terminal and I am in touch with people from Hawaii to Maine, from Idaho and Washington to Louisiana and the Carolinas. This is the most amazing experience for me.
There is a quilting Elephant in the room as well. Much like the Skype chat above, there is a Facebook chat connected with the New Hexagon quilt block of the month, I have to keep away from is also or I could spend all day reading the posts about the newest block. I have only two motifs to do, and they will be done today and connected to the March challenge, and I have already started cutting fabric for the April block.
The health Elephant keeps popping up and for Jacob it means declining health. He and the doctors are doing the best they can to stave off the most dire effects but he does need a new liver - bottom line.
The Education Elephant requires that Sara take another standardized test for admission to Doan College so that she can pursue her teaching certificate. They do not recognize the Graduate Record Exam that she had to take for admission to the Masters degree in Library Science. That is sad, because she has to juggle work, children, ailing husband and study with Easter coming this weekend and Jacob's family will all be at the house for the event. She needs to get her teaching certificate to be eligible to take over the head position in the library at Lincoln South East High when the present head of services retires.
The Garden Elephant requires that I go and get the potting soil - REALLY SOON - and start my tomatoes. I just hope that we do not get a freeze and lose the chance this year - again- of not having peaches or nectarines because it froze out the plants. Last year the trees were loaded with beginning fruit and it was glorious weather and one afternoon the clouds gathered, the temperature dropped considerably and stayed below freezing all night and with snow into the bargain and all the tiny fruit just fell off - got killed by the freeze. I notice that the shops already have tomato plants out for sale along with tender herbs like Basil.
The Relationship Elephant has been in the room since day one. We went to a Marriage Enrichment event in Utah. Bill told me it would be a fun time - he had been told it would be a fun time, but the realist in me said - oh no it will not be fun - working on enriching a relationship is HARD WORK: and hard work it was. They had 35 couples participating and the only relaxing time we had was to be in the hot tub and through the window, watch the Basketball game on the TV in the Gym next door. The Utes of University of Utah lost - aarrggghhh! Arizona (Tucson) also is out of the running. We came home exhausted.
Long Term Friendship elephant entered the room and one good thing happened though - I got to see Dee Jay Bawden. He and I were in a missionary group that went to Japan in March 1970. It was great to see him.
Travelling incident elephant directed the next phase. In the scramble to get on our way home, Bill left it to the last minute to pack his stuff up - one carry on each is all we had, and we raced out of the hotel to catch the shuttle to the Salt Lake City airport. On the way up I-15 the cabbie noted that there was construction on the highway ahead of us and a considerable back up, so he cut across the vally and we caught Bangerter highway till we could re-connect with I-15 further up and close to the airport. It was a ride around the mulberry bush to be sure but we saw parts of the Salt Lake Valley we have never seen before. We got to the airport in just enough time to load and leave for Phoenix. We did not have to stop to get baggage and we went out to the curb just in time to catch the shuttle to the parking spot.
When we got to the parking lot, Bill discovered that he did not have the keys to the car. Panic set in!
In the scramble to get packed, did he leave the keys in the Room? Did he leave them at the airport in SLC when he went through security or had he even left them at Phoenix on the way up to SLC when he went through security? We were ok because I had my keys handy and at least we had one fob that would help our computer-filled car to work. No keyhole in this car - just a wireless fob that has to be present. So we started to drive to Prescott and on the way, called the front desk at the motel to ask them if keys had been turned in or if housekeeping had found them in the room? The clerk called back and said, no keys! More panic! I asked Bill to search through his bag and he said he would not have put the keys in the bag so he declined to search. We were in a state of gloom because it is VERY expensive to replace a lost or damaged fob. So we picked up our mail, and went into the house. He began to unpack his stuff and then he found his keys......in the bag I had asked him to search. Ah well, all is good in this department now.
St. Patricks Day Elephant had a grand time. We know that there are only two restaurants with definitely Irish fare and neither of us had called to make a reservation - so off we went, high hopes of Irish Stew and soda bread for dinner on our minds. We even found a parking spot at the Irish Pub and we thought that was a good omen. At the entrance we were met by a jolly Irish Elf who asked if we were going to imbibe? No! so we did not get our hand stamped - good, because that dye lasts for days. The music was loud and raucous but we had taken something to read because we expected a wait before serving - yep, it was a 2 hour at least wait! We went to Cracker Barrel out in Prescott Valley but no Irish Stew - just corned beef, cabbage and potato was on the menu. I ate salad and Bill had a hamburger. Not too much in line with his Irish ancestry, eh? On the way up to the Irish Pub, we took the Yavape extension road and in the field by the road there were about 20 antelope feeding in the early evening. Quite a treat to be sure.
The entertainment Elephant invaded our lives with a trip to Yavapai College performing arts theatre for a local performance of Willy Wonka and the chocolate factory. It was wonderful and I really enjoyed how the director overcame some of the needed special effects that are present in the movie.
The last elephant to take up our time was the attendance at the baptism of Jacob - a little boy I had in my Sunday school class. His Grandfather gave a talk at the ceremony and one week later, this man collapsed and was rushed to hospital. They did emergency surgery on him for a triple bypass. I am glad that it did not happen before the baptism ceremony.
So, there are many elephants in my room - the care and feeding of them takes a lot of time.
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)