Well since I'm always away from this keyboard on Sunday morning due to an early load in for BridgePoint Church at the college I'll catch up on Sat. and Sun. info. We of course still had our overnight house guests who arrived Friday and we had a grand time at the beach, then some fine eatin' and finally some card games. Saturday we actually slept in until 7'ish then since I was taking them to Port Tampa to meet their cruise ship we didn't do any sight seeing except on the way there. They saw more cars on the road in an hour than they see all year in Sparta.
We had a eat what you want for breakfast which mainly was fruit and those delicious oatmeal cookies Nancy made the day before. Yikes, even I could not stop. I did some gardening while they packed and got ready to head to Tampa. We left around 11'ish and made it to the ship in about an hour or so. I let them off with their bags and then we were out of there. This ship was huge and was supposed to be carrying 2500 passengers or so. Many in our life group have finally convinced Nancy to take a cruise next year, so a group of us will go. There is even pickle ball on board which is exciting for me.
After dropping them off it was get ready for a family dinner with Amy and family as well as her brother Eric and his son Austin and family. Meghan was sick so we sent a plate home for her. Aunt Betsy was civil so she came as well and stayed late. We had a grand visit and the food was delicious as usual with grilled marinated chicken breast slathered with fresh rosemary along with parsley(out of the garden) white taters and I introduced to many the addition of fresh jalapeno's on the taters and ALL loved the flavor, broccoli, garden salad and crusty bread. Amy had made brownies for dessert with ice cream. We men had a glass of vino to get the gastric juices flowing. The fare was ever so good and enough leftover for a supper for Nancy and I on Tuesday when we travel to a track meet and then our class the Blessed Life at the rec. at 7. Whew what a busy life we lead but we or I love it.
I was up earlier than usual on Sunday morning and along with 30 or so volunteers who weekly meet to unload this huge box truck with everything we need to turn the college auditorium as well as the commons into a church like setting. We give away free 12 dozen Dunkin Donuts as well as coffee, tea and bottled water each an every Sunday. Our attendance is awesome as our messages are so enlightening with beautiful praise and worship music. We do not drag anything out as we run two services that start at 9:30 and 11. We are changing that come March when we will meet a half hour earlier at 9 and 10:30.
We are still hoping and praying for our own facility but for now the college is perfect but does require a lot of work each Sunday. Nancy and I both love volunteering both services one of which we set in to hear the message but the meeting of so many different folks is awesome and this week we had many first timers. We love the stories that each person has to tell and the transformation in their lives from knowing Jesus. It's all about love as he commanded us to love others as our self and to love GOD first and foremost. We seldom stay for the load out as its usually 12:30 before we can get away to a local eatery. We headed to Willie Jewels for some barbecue which to us is very tasty and reasonable.
We invited our server to visit us at BridgePoint and she was very receptive. Nancy had the smoked brisket with fries and very well seasoned green beans and I had the pulled pork sandwich which is topped with creamy Cole slaw with Brunswick stew for my side and all that came to less than 20 bucks with a 5 buck off coupon from the local paper. Nancy never eats all of hers so I order less but really what I had is a meal and that held us or me all day until about 7'ish when I had a bowl of vanilla ice cream for a change. I usually skip dessert as I did the night before and I'm staying right around 185 which really is my goal. 180 is too hard to maintain but 184 to 186 is easy if I stay away from the desserts, oh well.
We got back to the house around 2'ish so I set the garden sprinkler for the next couple hours. The humidity is back with a stiff breeze and I didn't want to fiddle with hand watering. I finished up a book while watching the Daytona 500 and wow what a finish. The main portion of the race was boring (so I read, glancing up for the lead status)but the final miles were anything with some major crashes and lead changes. WOW what unbelievable wrecks and no one was hurt. I like Joe Gibbs and his team won over my Fords which were in position with the fastest cars but the Toyotas got the win. Anyhow he was chocked up as the car was dedicated to his son who died this year and he all but said it was a GOD thing. Such sadness in the losing of his son, but I'm happy for him as he is a good guy and a strong Christian, LATER
