New Things I've Learned Recently

I had never heard of antlions until our someone informed us that is why our parched yard looks like the lunar surface.



Another thing I've recently learned is a new meaning of the word rifle--"To cut spiral grooves within (a gun barrel, for example)."

Lastly, due to all the red tape I do for Andrew, is the word apostille. To get one in Texas only costs $15 and takes 3 days, kind of like an international version of a notary public authorization.

Passable and Agreeable

"If a girl says, 'I don't care what I look like. If people don't take me for what I am, too bad for them,' is she being wise or is she being unwise?"

"No, women don't have to really be beautiful--all they have to be is passable (that is, not so ugly that you're embarassed to be seen with them) and agreeable (that is, someone you could actually live with)."

"I read a book about a young blind man who thought he could judge women better than his seeing peers. This was because he wasn't blinded by a woman's physical appearance--he could see past the physical and judge a woman for who she really was."

"You should not use outward aids to make yourselves beautiful, such as the way you do your hair, or the jewelery you put on, or the dresses you wear. Instead, your beauty should consist of your true inner self, the ageless beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is the of the greatest value in God's sight."

She Can See Clearly Now

Amazing! That piece of glass I ordered from somewhere in Kansas arrived at my doorstep in less than 24 hours! Unbroken! I was tempted by Ma Hoyt's comment yesterday to try to install it myself, and indeed I started the process. But Rachel objected, wisely so, when the insides of the door looked just a bit too complicated. I had gotten as far as taking the door panel apart and vacuuming up the rest of the glass inside the cavity. Rachel called a couple places and found someone only two miles away to install it for $50 cash, so she took it in. An hour later, she has a new door glass.

It was nice of the LORDSKNIGHT to volunteer to "return the favor," but hopefully his sense of chivalry will be subdued now that her car is again operational.

I should also say thanks to Marlon for giving us a lesson on how to use the tire guage and air compressor. Now her tires have more than 12 psi! The brakes are pretty squeaky, but maybe that problem can be solved next week.

Fixing Glass(es) X 3

I spent an hour at the optician office yesterday trying to get Gary's desperately needed reading glasses repaired, but with no luck. So I cannibalized another pair of reading glasses to fix them, at least temporarily.

Then there was the broken pane of glass in R's apartment, which, ironically was broken by a lovely stained glass cat as its chain broke and it fell.


Then there is the broken window in Rachel's car. We tried to get one at a junkyard, but no luck there. But one of the junkyard dealers told us to try the internet. I typed in the search criteria to a generic used car parts site, and within 5 minutes or so I had 10 emails from around the country saying they had it. So I called one place in Kansas and they said they would get it here in 1-2 days! If that really works, I'll have to find someone to install it.

Another Million Pieces

But this time the damage can be repaired with just time and money.


When we got home from church Sunday afternoon, we found someone had shot out a window on Rachel's car. There were two other BB indentations on the car too.

We cleaned up the glass in 105 degree heat. Have you ever vacuumed your street before? Neither had I. Then we walked around the neighborhood, and when I found that the neighbor's van window had also been hit, I took this accidentally artistic photo of it.

Rachel called a couple places and found it was going to be close to $200 to buy new glass, so the man who sold her the car suggested his favorite junkyard. That sounds like a good idea except who wants to send their daughter to a junkyard??

More Weddings

Today Gary and I attended a reception for Darrell and Sommer who were married a month ago in Michigan. Darrell used to work for Gary as a software developer; it was our first time to meet Sommer.

At exactly the same time, Chelsey and Chuck were being married in Denton. Chelsey was a friend of Rachel and David.

It is that time of life for my kids when all their friends are getting married. I pray God will one day bring the right person to them at the right time, and they will love and be loved without doubt or hesitation.

Clean Dishes

My life has hit a new low.

Tonight there was a cockroach half the size of Rhode Island inside my dishwasher. And the dishes inside were already clean. Now they're really clean since I had to run the dishwasher again.

Gary is never much help when I try to act like a helpless female around Texas-bred roaches. He just mutters something about "they're God's creatures too" and picks them up and throws them outside. Or sometimes he kills them.

Original Art

Rachel is fortunate to have these examples of original art in her apartment. All of them, except the pottery, started as photographs.

This is the Dallas skyline, from a photo Rachel took when she went to a Maverick's game with friends a couple years ago.

Everyone takes photos of bluebonnets.

Grandma Judy makes beautiful pottery. I love to give her pottery as wedding gifts.

Grandpa Wendell has taken up making stained glass, and asked for a photo of a kitty we used to have.

The last one is a woodburning, made by an MK friend. Rachel took the photo when she was a camp counselor a couple years ago.

Me and Baby

I know I said I wouldn't post any more Honduras photos, but I came across this one today when I was sorting some of my photos, and I just had to post it.

Another Empty Nest

You thought this was going to be another story about me, didn't you?

This baby cardinal fell out of its nest on Thursday. It hopped up to Rachel's glass storm door and started cheeping at Miss Kitty who would have eaten it if she could have opened the door. All the women in the house (me, Rachel, Doro, and a pile of Doro's friends) started clucking about how we could keep it alive, in spite of the fact that it already appeared to have a broken wing.

It only lived a day and a half in our care--we aren't very good bird mothers, I guess. And while we are sad, the mama bird has been distraught, flitting nearby and singing a plaintive song. She is sad because her nest is empty.

Silly as it may sound, this little episode is a good reminder of God's care of us. Imagine being loved by a God who is big enough to notice when every little bird falls out of its nest.

Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they?

Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? Yet not one of them will fall to the ground apart from the will of your Father. And even the very hairs of your head are all numbered. So don't be afraid; you are worth more than many sparrows.

Honduras Flowers and Plants

OK, maybe this will finally be my last Honduras post. (By the way, the "I was there" photos are on my other website Linda's Family News, in case you didn't already know that.) Tropical flowers can be excessively beautiful. (Click the photos to see a bigger version.)





A few houses still have thatch roofs.

It was interesting to see many of these epiphytes (also called aerophytes) growing on the wires.

And this last photo is for Ma Hoyt, who lives near other corn fields.

Another Breakup

Last night my daughter broke up with her "friend." It seems there wasn't as much emotional trauma with this break up as there was with the last one. Maybe that's because she was the breaker rather than the breakee; more likely it is because she had not invested as much into this relationship as the previous one. But I think this time she will be able to honestly still be friends with him, at least I hope so. I don't know how he feels about that possibility.

I continue to pray for my two kids who are yet unmarried, that God will bring the right person to them at the right time, and that they will one day love and be loved without hesitation or doubt.

Birds I Saw in Honduras

While at Macaw Mountain in Honduras, we saw many beautiful birds, but they were in cages.

I also saw a number of other birds in the wild, including these that familiar with: red-winged blackbird, some kind of eagle, some kind of woodpecker, some kind of egret, and a northern yellow flicker.

I also saw a few more exotic birds: frigate bird, black vulture, mangrove swallow, green kingfisher, and the unmistakable white-throated magpie jay. But the most exotic bird I saw was called an oropendula. It builds the most interesting nest, a long hanging affair with up to 100 in one tree. I took this photo while on a river ride.

Creatures from Honduras

You already saw my cool spider and bat photo a couple blogs ago. Here are the rest. This first thing is call a paca.

Next is a shy hermit crab.

A moving green lizard with a blue face.

A turtle who has seen better days.

And one of a line of ants that looked like we'd better not mess with them.

Which Is Better--Ethiopia or Honduras?

Andrew and Laura seemed to be doing pretty way in various ways, but in other ways, it didn't seem like they were quite settled or happy (at least it seemed that way with Andrew). I think he is finding his job rather more work and rather more stressful than it was in Ethiopia, though the job there had its own set of issues.

I made up this list from things he said and things I observed while we were there:

Ethiopia was better in these ways:

* Level of education of the staff
* Church
* Coffee
* Personal security
* English is language of business
* Overall level of job stress

Honduras is better in these ways:

* Food
* Driving
* Fewer beggars
* General level of economy in country
* Ease of visiting family
* Internet access

Are Some Sins Worse Than Others?

Big sins with our hands.
Bigger sins with our mouths.
Biggest sins with our hearts.

Spider and Bat

Photo credits to David with his nice camera.

Preparing to Leave

Hmm, I thought my last post was funny, but judging from the dearth of comments, I guess I'm just laughting to myself. Or by myself. Or maybe at myself would be more correct.

Today David leaves to fly back to Houston at 3pm. We're on the same flight out tomorrow, but of course we go to Dallas from Miami, not Houston. So I'm busy this morning using David's computer to make CDs of all the photos we've taken while here. That sounds simple enough, but I've already messed up one CD and had to reboot.

Gary has made good progress on his databases. It is an added level of complexity when all the user interface has to be in Spanish (and Gary doesn't speak Spanish). Yesterday he worked with the head of the child feeding program and got specifications for what that db needed. It turned out to be somewhat simpler, but still needed. The food for this program comes from the USDA, and they have specific reporting requirements that this database will make easier to comply to.

Birdwatching

"Can I help you with this?"

Computer Crisis

We had a computer crisis this morning here in San Pedro Sula with Gary's laptop which runs Windows 2000. He had made good progress on his project and wanted to start testing it, but needed to have his computer and the computer (Windows XP) of the person filling in the db to talk to each other over the network.

Once you start fiddling with network settings it is fairly easy to understand why you can earn a degree in computer networking. We could see her computer on the network, but couldn't read it even after we set up sharing properly and diddling with various settings.

So next we decided to put Gary's computer into the same workgroup as her computer. But when we actually did this, we got a funny little message saying something like "you are now leaving the Dallas network. Please talk to your administrator." Then it said you needed to reboot, so we did. But then, the disaster struck--Gary could no longer log into his own computer. It just refused all our favorite passwords.

Fortunately, Andrew's cell phone dials America just as easily as anywhere else, so I called the Center computer helpdesk (after first getting the swimming pool answering machine). Fortunately, we were able to convince the guy there that we needed the administrator password or we were going to be toast.

Shortly thereafter Gary did get logged in, and, lo and behold, was able to read the folder on the other computer. That made him happy and now he's making good progress on this project.

The End.

How Do You Eat a Bag of Water?

You bite it.

Preparations--Almost Panic

I Love Honduras !

Well, it is only 30 minutes past midnight, and we are packed and ready to go. I have a note to remind myself to pack a frozen loaf of zucchini bread. You know Andrew and Laura want that! Also some cookies Rachel made for them.

Today went quite smoothly, at least for me. I wrapped up some stuff at work, took the girls shopping, made dinner for a last minute guest, and packed.

Gary had a few moments when ten people wanted his time all at once, so it was a bit more stressful for him. But generally speaking, he doesn't get flustered, which is nice.

If you think to pray for us, pray also for Rachel and Doro, repainting her apartment without my supervision. Let's hope they don't spill a bucket of white paint on the brown carpet, or any other disasters like that.

I hope to have some internet access in San Pedro Sula and be able to post once or twice from there.

Preparations -- Leisurely

We leave for Honduras very early Tuesday morning (Thanks, Michael, for your willingness to takes us so early). We are starting to get ready, but on a leisurely pace. Tomorrow will be the day for panic preparations. So far we have:

• Put address/phone/email labels on the insides of the suitcases.
• Packed two old hardside suitcases with children's books, for transshipment to Ethiopia when Andrew goes again (very heavy!).
• Prepared a first draft of a "Things to do/People to call" list for Rachel and Doro.
• Printed out a hardcopy list of my email addresses and snail mail addresses.
• Reinstalled the OS on Gary's aging laptop (well, we didn't do this ourselves, we took it to the computer help desk).
• Installed a bunch of software on said laptop: Office, Skype, Firefox, XML Spy, Lotus Notes, AIM, some security software, etc
  
• Collected a bunch of stuff to take to Andrew and Laura: sun screen, CDs, picture hangers.
• Bought a book about Central American birds.
• Read a little about the Mayan ruins at Copan.
• Read the World Factbook page about Honduras.
• Oh, and I can't forget to mention that Gary has gotten a good start on creating the Access database. Lucky for him, one of our office coworkers actually know how to program in Access, so he has been helping Gary quite a bit.
  

As for Rachel, she's baking some cookies to send to her brothers and Laura. If we don't eat them all first.

Chelsey's Wedding Shower

Doro joined me and Rachel at a wedding shower for a friend tonight. Chelsey's mom and I get together for lunch every so often and discuss our kids--two of whom at one time were dating each other. Doro told us they don't have wedding showers in Germany, so she was curious what they were like. This particular shower had no silly games, and ended in a prayer time, so maybe it wasn't typical either.


This photo is to prove to my far-away boys that yes, Chelsey was absolutely delighted to get a flashlight (batteries included) as a shower gift. Why did they ever doubt my choice?

Chuck, the lucky guy, showed up before the party was over. He came in time to try on his new wedding hat. It is a little hard to tell from this photo, but his had looked like a tuxedo. Cute, huh?

They will be married August 12 at exactly the time I want to attend a wedding reception of another friend, so I told Chelsey I may or may not make it to her wedding. We'll see.

Yet Another Empty Nest

This time, a real one that fell out of the tree into our front yard.

Speaking of the front yard, I thought these blossoms on Rachel's rose bushes were nice.

And now moving to the back yard, last week we had a Texas Spiny Lizard laboriously dig a hole near one of the sunflowers, and then later cover it up. Maybe it was a she and she layed eggs there. Do lizards bury their eggs?

Ice Cream

I thought Moose Tracks was my favorite kind of ice cream. That was until I tasted Extreme Moose Tracks.

Another Empty Nest

Wow, isn't Google maps great? Got to love those satellite photos. Last Saturday we visited Joe Pool Lake and found a nest of bluebirds. Today I found on the satellite image the very tree where we saw the full nest. Start at the westernmost parking spot, walk to the picnic table covered with a red roof partially shaded by trees, then walk 5 yards further west and there they will be.

Or so we thought. Late this afternoon Gary finished writing a paper he's been working on, so we made a picnic and took off to see if the bluebirds were still there. We were quite disappointed. The nest was completely empty, but it hardly seems those babies were old enough to fledge.

Then we found another spot to have our picnic, and Gary complained that I brought salad with chicken on it instead of hamburgers or sausages to grill. Turns out the previous occupants of this picnic site had left their coals burning, so to stop his complaining I took one thin strip of chicken breast off my salad and roasted it for him. :-)

There wasn't a lot of wildlife to observe at this location, unless you count all the speedboats and waverunners, but there were a few butterflies.

My Astuteness is Commendable

Really, it is. Ms. Tricia said so.

Dear Ms. Simons,

Thank you for inquiring about the fee postings on June 30th and July 3rd. Your astuteness to your accounts is commendable.

Through notifications such as yours, we discovered that EC*Web is reporting the fee twice, however, the fee actually posted to your account only once. We are working to resolve this as quickly as possible.

I hope that this information is helpful. Please let me know if I may be of further assistance.

Sincerely,
Tricia
Member Services

And this is yet another example to my kids who think they don't need to balance their checkbooks, "because it is all online."

Let It Rain

We've had very little rain here for a couple years, so when our plans for celebrating Independence Day were interrupted by rain, I could hardly complain.

The rain also caused Gary a problem yesterday. He faithfully watched 113 minutes of scoreless World Cup soccer--in Spanish, no less--and then got up to shut down his computer because a lightning storm was passing through. Just then, Italy scored. So he ran back to watch the rerun, then went back to finish with his computer, and Italy scored again.

Am I Bugging You?

Ugh--bad joke, I know.

I would have said this was a mayfly, but the books says mayflies have tiny antennae.

I think this is a true bug, order hemiptera, but I can't find it in my book.

Leaf-footed bug, order hemiptera.

Grasshopper.


Overheard:

Do you have a tissue? You know I can't chew gum and drive at the same time.

Old People Can't Sleep

OK, I give up. I tried to sleep, but it appears there will be no nap for me this afternoon. The phone keeps ringing with people calling to wish me Happy Birthday.

:-)