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The days continue to slip past like pearl beads off a string, with much for which to be thankful.
I'm thankful every time #2 Son can carpool with us to NOLA, saving us the time, trouble and money of getting a rental car.
There are times when my clients say things which make me so glad they are also friends. This past week, Ms. D needed help with her TV, of all things. We don't have TV, just the monitor/speakers/DVD/Blu-ray set up my Sweetie uses to watch his movies and shows from the past, so most TV equipment is foreign to me.
This time, she couldn't get a particular TV to come up beyond the "press continue to perform a channel scan" or something like that. I took the remote and i believe The Good Lord reminded me of having done this before with Ms. JAI, so i hit the "input" button and recognized HDMI1 as something we've set TVs to before.
It worked! I was thankful, and even more, thankful when Ms. D commented, "I love your brain!" I was quite tickled by the comment.
We had a crisis one evening when Brother-in-Law could not find the keys to his apartment. This is a big deal as we have no spare room, and chairs but no couch for him to sleep on, and the last thing we need this time of year is to pay for him to spend the night in a hotel until someone can come on duty at the apartment complex who can get him into his unit.
He told me he'd searched his car with a flashlight, but again it was as if The Good Lord was giving me a hint -- he can't bend over, so there's no way he searched the car thoroughly, all the way under every seat. That's what i did, and yep, i'm thankful to say there it was, further back than he could have found it.
I'm also thankful someone stepped up to help him fix his car again.
Then there was the missing DVD in Sweetie's collection. Thankfully, mommies are magic and it was found.
Because once more we would be otherwise occupied on Thursday, our two Thursday clients were taken care of on Tuesday. I'm thankful i got through it, and my back, which is very grumbly right now, is thankful it won't happen again until after the New Year.
I'm also thankful Mr. BA, when we got to their house, had a turkey ready for us, as it saved me from having to pick one up myself at the place which is very far out of my way, but theirs are the best and easiest to reheat.
Because of various problems i was very late in getting my Angel Tree gifts delivered, but i was very thankful to hand them off to the child's grandmother on Wednesday. I'm also thankful i got some needed phone calls made, quite successfully.
The Christmas Eve service at the church was as beautiful as always, and Becca and i were thankful to wile away the time before it started playing Apples to Apples.
Just over a week ago, #2 Son informed me he and Daughter-in-Law were doing all the Christmas cooking! I was very thankful, as it's a big deal, especially when Grandma is in charge of the menu and wants EVERYTHING. They set the menu, a few things were not there but Grandma loved what they made, and we hope a new tradition has been born.
I was very thankful to be put in charge of one little person who enjoyed her whole day, eating almost constantly, delighting in gifts (mostly books), and exploring everything.
All of us were thankful for the very thoughtful gifts from #2 Son and Daughter-in-Law as well. They'd managed to snag a picture of each member of the family holding little Annie, had them printed and framed, and those were our gifts! I'm looking right now at a picture of me and her at the wedding back in September.
The shelter was closed Friday, but those of us who do the caretaking were still there, and we were thankful it all went well and smoothly.
Finally, there's the bittersweet ending of Lunceford the Land Yacht. (Yes, we name our cars, don't judge.) Lunceford was one of those huge "granny cars," a Lincoln Town Car of the huge type you often see being driven by some older lady who seems barely able to see over the dash. We bought him used and he served as a great workhorse for us, including keeping up during the 9 months when my Sweetie, Brother-in-Law, and i had only Lunceford to use for all of us, and each of us had a different work schedule and Brother-in-Law was not even living with us.
Quite a while back, Lunceford was diagnosed as needing major engine work, and we parked him and started looking for a buyer. A few seemed interested but it all fell through, and finally, yesterday, we finished our donation of him to the local Society of St. Vincent de Paul. It was sad and yet satisfying when the tow truck drove away with Lunceford, which will be taken apart for the pieces of him which are still usable, since such Town Cars are still plentiful and beloved by many.
I'm very thankful we had Lunceford the Land Yacht and i'll miss him, but at least i'm thankful some use will be made of him and the money raised by the donation will go to feeding and housing the homeless.
Please write up your own list and link up to Ten Things of Thankful, where Clark and his co-hosts always have a warm welcome waiting.
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Today is:
Anniversary of Benazir Bhutto's Death -- Sindh, Pakistan
Calli (House) Day -- Aztec Calendar (a good day for all things hearth and home and family. a bad day to participate in public life; date approximate, but soon after the solstice)
Constitution Day -- Democratic People's Republic of Korea (North Korea)
Festival of Nehebkau -- Ancient Egyptian Calendar (Beginning of Eternity, celebrating the snake god and his role of binding the sun to the earth at the beginning of time; date approximate)
Kwanzaa, Day 2, Kujichagulia (Self-Determination)
Make Cut Out Snowflakes Day -- internet generated, with Christmas over, you need to do winter decorations
Modern Medicine Day -- birth anniversary of Louis Pasteur
National Fruitcake Day -- unless, of course, you are like me and have spent your last several days with fruitcake relatives, at which point you get a day off from fruitcakes! ;D
Second Day of the Stanley Races -- Falkland Islands
St. Fabiola's Day (Patron of difficult marriages, divorced people, victims of abuse, victims of adultery, widows)
St. John the Divine's Day (Patron of art dealers, authors, bookbinders, booksellers, burn victims, compositors, editors, engravers, friendships, lithographers, painters, papermakers, printers, publishers, tanners, theologians, typesetters, writers; Asia Minor; Boise, Idaho, Borgo Santo Sepolcro, Italy; Cleveland, OH; Eger, Hungary; Milwaukee, WI; Morra, Netherlands; Saint-Jean – Longueuil, Québec; Sansepoicro, Italy; Sundern, Germany; Taos, NM; Umbria, Italy; Wroclaw, Poland; against burns, poisoning)
St. Stephen's Day -- Eastern Orthodox, a public holiday in Romania
Third Day of Christmas
Visit the Zoo Day -- don't know who put this one in the middle of winter, but there it is
Watch the Children Day -- internet generated, a day to take a page from the book of the young and remember how to play like a child
Birthdays Today:
Heather O'Rourke, 1975
Masi Oka, 1974
Bill Goldberg, 1966
Tovah Feldshuh, 1952
Gerard Depardieu, 1948
Cokie Roberts, 1943
John Amos, 1939
Oscar Levant, 1906
Marlene Dietrich, 1901
Sydney Greenstreet, 1879
Louis Pasteur, 1822
George Cayley, 1773
Johannes Kepler, 1571
Debuting/Premiering Today:
"Knots Landing"(TV), 1979
"Howdy Doody"(TV), 1947 (first successful children's television show)
"Radio Roxyettes"(Now the Radio City Music Hall Rockettes), 1932
Today in History:
The Hagia Sofia of Constantinople is completed, 537
The Spanish Crown issues the Laws of Burgos, governing the conduct of settlers with regards to native Indians in the New World, 1512
The first public railroad using steam locomotive completed in England, 1825
Charles Darwin embarks on his journey aboard the HMS Beagle, 1831
Worst English avalanche kills 8 of 15 buried in Lewes Sussex, 1836
Ether is first used in childbirth in US, in Jefferson, Ga., 1845
The world's first cat show is held at the Crystal Palace, London, 1871
Carrie Nation's first public smashing of a bar, at the Carey Hotel, Wichita, Kansas, 1900
Unsuccessful attempt on prince-regent Hirohito of Japan, 1923
Stalin's faction wins All-Union Congress in USSR, Trotsky is expelled, 1927
Radio City Music Hall opened in New York City, 1932
The Shah of Persia declares Persia is now Iran, 1934
The World Bank was created with the signing of an agreement by 28 nations, 1945
Apollo 8 splashes down in the Pacific Ocean, ending the first orbital manned mission to the Moon, 1968
The People's Republic of China is granted permanent normal trade relations with the United States, 2001
Radiation from an explosion on the magnetar SGR 1806-20 reaches Earth. It is the brightest extrasolar event known to have been witnessed on the planet, 2004
Former Pakistani Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto is assassinated, 2007
Toyota Motor Corporation agrees to pay $1 billion to settle over a dozen lawsuits related to sudden acceleration, 2012
Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe visits Pearl Harbor, offering “sincere and everlasting condolences to the souls of those who lost their lives” and adding, “[Japan] must never repeat the horrors of war again," 2016
Thousands of union members in Argentina protest deregulation and austerity measures meant to revive their economy, 2023
