Life Review: Lessons Learned in Moving- Finish

I am old, but you can teach old dogs some things if not tricks.

In moving I have done some new things. I have hung my first barn-style door. I have hung 3 ceiling fans, and though I have done that before, these required relocating them and changing the wiring-- new aspects to the task. A lot of what I have done has required twice, or maybe three times as long as it should have. Sometimes this has been my fault, other times not. But, it takes what it takes.

Here are a few lessons learned:
1) Take time to think, analyze and plan before trying to resolve problems. When I "sleep on it" i see more clearly and make fewer mistakes.

2) Pace yourself-- note that whilst I have learned this, I still fail to apply it. I have trouble slowing my pace, even at my age.  I feel it more when I over-do.

3) Hire things out- when your time or expertise are limited. Previously we did NOT have the funds to do this, but now more often we do.

4) An investment in time to ORGANIZE things pays off later in saved time. I need to repeat this to myself multiple times.

More things will likely come to mind, as we continue to unpack the last few boxes, but that's a start.

Running Behind

Since I began this blog in 2012, I have NOT been this far behind.  A post is due tomorrow, and I am presently writing this on the day before. This is NOT like me.  I hate deadlines, and avoid them as far as I am able.

I am behind because of ONE big issue-MOVING!  If you haven't moved recently, good for you, and G^d may have enabled you to forget how much is involved. It seems that we have been moving since right after Christmas. On Monday 12 March the professional movers from Two Men and a Truck cam to move the 5 big items we did not feel safe moving. They did a superb job, and got our bed, Brenda's dresser, our big, big bookcase and the oak sideboard and my folk's china cabinet moved to the new place. We spent our first night there. Yesterday, 23 March, we helped our daughter and son-in-law and 2 grands move into the super-clean house we had moved out of scarcely 2 weeks earlier. IT was nice to be far enough along in our move to have the time and energy to help them. They had 8-10 folks helping them, so it was considerably easier than our 3-man team.

We have all the boxes unpacked except for those in the garage. We are finding good places for our things, and we are better organized than in many years. This house is spacious, and we are filling up those spaces rapidly, but at least we know where things are--far the moment, until we forget.

There is an organizational plan, so maybe this will come out better than our past moves.

There were a few hitches in the plan, but we will save those for later.  Oh, and the "to-Do" list is shorter than it has been since early Jan.

Have a restful day!

Moving Fun!!

Brenda and I have been moving to the new house for some time now.  And, just in case you might have forgotten, it's NOOOOO fun!  This is our fourth move in 3 years. In April 2016 we moved out of the big old house. In July we moved to Lynchburg, VA and in May of 2017, we moved from Lynchburg back to AL.

The good thing about the VA move was that we weren't well compensated by the Uni., so we only moved an 8x12 U-Haul worth of stuff up, and two U-Haul loads moving back. The latest move, within Northport wasn't quite that simple.

First we had to remodel the new place--another post will talk about that. Then we had to clean up from all the remodeling. Then we started moving little stuff ourselves--with the help of some friends.
Like so many times before, I wish I had kept records of the move. I wish I knew how many pick-up loads of stuff. I am guessing about 18-20. On Monday the movers come to haul the few pieces that were too much for us: The big bookcase, the oak sideboard, the armoire, the big dresser, the white sofa (it's white) and my mom's old china cabinet.  Whew!

Meanwhile, the new house is stacked with boxes everywhere.  Remember?  No, don't do that, which is why I have made no photos of this move. Some things are best forgotten--in case you have to do them again.

But, we both are saying that this is our LAST move. The next move will be to the BIG house-- Thank you L^rd-- and that doesn't require hauling any stuff!

Rah, Rah for Raleigh

Our last Christian Faculty Conference for this series was in Raleigh, NC. This was the FIRST conference I know of that was initiated and administered by a Cru Student Team Leader.  Mike M is the team leader with a focus on undergrad students, but he apparently saw the value of engaging faculty in ministry.

This also may be the largest conference we have attended. The keynote speaker was our friend Walt B., and his wife Ann joined him in a panel discussion about ministry to students on campus. I gave a short talk on strategies to reach faculty, and spoke a bit longer about International Ministry. Then I was on two slightly different panels on Strategies to reach Faculty.

The highlight of this conference was meeting a young Grad student of Indian descent, who had heard about the conference and driven all the way down with her sister from Fairfax, VA. She was a Ph.D. student who planned to teach, and seemed so happy for us to chat with her and her sister. She grew up in a Hindu family, but had come to Christ in college, then led her younger sister to Christ. She seemed quite mature spiritually, and committed to following G^'d leading. What a thrill for us.

We also met Gerald, and many many fine Christian profs. In looking back it struck me how many retired profs had felt G^d calling them back to work with Christian profs on their

campuses. This "gray army" seems to be becoming a major force.

Adventures on the Road, Greenville, Columbus

As I shared in the last post, G^d got us to Greenville on time.  In Greenville I got to share briefly with the assembled Christian Faculty about ministering to Internationals.  But, the highlight was sitting at the table with a group of Clemson Graduate Students.  Later I had this same group in a small group seminar on issues in Grad School.  It was a FUN time and Brenda and I were so encouraged to see the Christina maturity and commitment of these young folks.

We had a number of great interactions with the Faculty in the Conference, and had lunch with a couple of them On our way home to fetch clean underwear, we met up with some of our longest-time friends, Penny and Chuck.  We had a terrific visit with them, and rested a bit before the long drive home through downtown Atlanta on I-85 (and some may know what a challenge that can be!)  We made it through just fine, and made it to Northport (home).

We had 2 days at home before heading north to Columbus, OH. On the way up we stopped in Cincinnati to have lunch with my Freshman USNA roommate, George and a classmate, Fred.  We had a terrific visit and caught up a bit with them.  The time passed too quickly until we had to head east for Columbus.

The Columbus Conference was one of the warmest, most influential conferences we have attended, and think we were up to about 8 at that point. The stetting was ideal, the leaders were very warm and friendly, and the speakers good. I got to speak a bit about International ministry again, and then teamed up with a colleague to talk about legal issues for Christian Profs. Those were both fun sessions. Again, we met a lot of wonderful Christian profs.

We helped clean up Saturday night, then went to a dinner to debrief. That was a new, welcome addition to the conference.  Sunday morn we headed south. A bit over halfway the rain started and never let up.  Whew, that is tough for us old timers. We did stop in for a brief visit with our son and his family.  We drove on home, and began to pray for no rain whilst driving for our coming trip to Raleigh.

Adventures in Ministry

I wake on the alarm at 0530 on Thurs, 7 Feb. I look out our 2nd floor hotel room in Stillwater, OK, and see that the parking lot has been transformed into a HUGE ice rink. We will learn later that Wed night and early Thurs morning, it had: Sleeted, hailed (yep in Feb.), had freezing rain and ice fog, and the temp at daylight was 19F!  Hmm, We had planned on leaving at 0800 for a 1015-mile drive to Greenvile, SC. The forecast for the following day was 20F.  Burrrr!

A LOT of people were praying for us. No reason to worry. We went back to bed, slept well, and had a leisurely breakfast.  About 10 AM I noticed the sun was coming out, and a few minutes later called my local friend Dave for his travel advice.  He suggested heading east towards Tulsa, instead of south toward OK City. About 1130, we decided that the melt was good enough.  Keep in mind the temperature was still well below freezing and wasn't expected to warm up much. But the power of sunshine would be very helpful, and we decided to give it a try.  Sure enough, the first 5 miles were icy, icy, the next few were clear wheel ruts, and after that just an occasional ice patch until we hit dry pavement at maybe 20 miles down the road.  Whew!!  We still had a looooong drive, but at least we were headed east and later south so it was clear sailing.

And, we made it in to Greenville, SC the following day, after stopping the night in New Albany, MS. The Conference started that evening, and we got in just in time to check into the hotel and get to the prayer meeting before the Conference started.

G^d delivered us from the ice, for which we were VERY thankful.  And we paused several times to thank Him.  We tend to ask G^d for deliverance, and then when He delivers us, we forget and get on to the next thing.

Thank you L^rd for getting us to Greenville! 

Ministry Highlights OK

We arrive in Stillwater, OK, the home of Oklahoma State University, on Monday afternoon, in order to speak to their Christian Faculty group at lunch on Tuesday. The topic will be, Ministering Internationally. The talk goes remarkably well.

O the way, we got to meet with one of my former Ph.D. students who works at U of OK. He was telling me about his impact for Christ with two of his students, plus we got to catch up on his life and times. His wife, who he met at UA as a Ph.D. student came with him and Brenda and Tif had a nice conversation.

Tuesday Afternoon, I give a two-hour workshop on How to get Tenure and Promotion.

Wednesday at lunch Christian Faculty group at lunch on Tuesday. The topic will be, Ministering Internationally.  Wednesday early evening I meet with the Faculty Leadership team for the Christian Faculty group.  We talk about.

By Wed. evening, I am getting tired, and the bad cold I have has almost stolen my voice. But we have 1000+ miles to drive to the Christian Faculty Conference in Greenville, SC. We planned to leave Stillwater Thurs at 8 AM. At about 6 AM I look out the hotel window to see about half inch of ice covering everything. The forecast is a high that day of 22 F!  It doesn't look good, but non need to despair, G^d controls the weather.

I'll describe in the next blog how we escaped the ice, but now I want to talk about ministry. The people I met in Stillwater were terrific. The time was well spent, and this was simply the first stop in this missionary journey.

The highlight, for me, of our time in Greenville were the Graduate students we met and worked with there. The Grad students of today

G^d is good.  More later.

Best Hunting Season Ever!

Our Alabama deer hunting season ended on 10 Feb.  For me it ended on 26 Jan, because 27 Jan we headed out for our epic trip that wouldn't end before deer season did. I am going to talk a bit about sport hunting, so if you are squemish, you may want to stop here. Remember, this blog is mostly written to remind us about what has happened.

The season started 15 Oct. but travels and other conflicts meant I didn't get too serious about hunting until gun season started. It didn't REALLY start until Andrew started hunting around 18 Dec. He bought his license online, about 1100-1200.  We went hunting and within about 15 min of getting on the stand, Andrew shot a bobcat to skin and tan.  Just before dark, and less than 3 hours after starting his season, he killed a good doe.  the next day, about 40 min before dark, I killed a nice 8-pt. The next day it rained all day, but the following day, Andy and I went down to Greene County to hunt with a friend on his great deer reserve.  That afternoon Andrew shot his second doe, because the manager wanted us to help him reduce the number of deer.  The next morning, Andrew killed deer number 3.

Well, that brought us to Christmas, with worship and celebrations...and more rain.  I began to get a bit depressed with all the rain, clouds and gloom. One day in early Jan, Andrew killed a nice 8-point at about 250 yds--which is quite a long shot, if you don't know such things. We went back to Greene county where I killed my second deer, and Drew killed his fifth. Three of his deer were killed at OVER 200 yds.  My longest deer in about 50 years of hunting was 180 yards.

Well, my season was going to end on Saturday, 26 Jan, as I said. I had hunted a few times since Andrew returned to Arizona, but I sure missed having a hunting buddy. I planned to get up early, hunt until 10 AM or so, and then connect w my buddy Jeff to take down two tree stands. I didn't sleep very well and thought about sleeping in--but this was my last chance to hunt, so I got up, dressed and walked out into 29 F. It was a calm morning and so we had heavy, heavy frost. No one else was hunting at the hunt club, so I had my pick of stands. It was a tough call, but I still had a climbing stand to retrieve near Lower Spain hunting stand. I was about 15 min late, but I told myself this wasn't a job, it was for fun. I got in the shooting house and got ready for business. It's a good thing, because in about 15 min, a single deer came into the green field in the far right corner--from the creek. I assumed, based on experience, it was a spike or button buck. When it made a couple of steps, I saw that it was a good deer. It was moving slowly, and stepped between two trees of about 6 and 10 inches in diameter.  My target zone on the buck was framed by the tree trunks, and I got the scope to the right spot and squeezed off a shot. Fortunately, THANK YOU L^RD, he dropped in his tracks.

I hurried over, not sure how good he was.  He was indeed a GOOD one! He had a 20-inch inside spread on his antlers, and sported 10 points, with the two brow tines broken off from fighting. His bases were 5 inches.  Here he is:

He's my second-best deer ever!  Thanks be to G^d who blesses me beyond my imagination.  Thank you L^rd for a good deer and for a GREAT season of hunting.