It Might As Well - 20 March 2021 - Plague Journal Day 373

Micah 6:8
Zechariah 10:1
Yes, your life matters.

We all are still sheltering in place, but I'm here to keep you sane and entertained.
One could hardly ask for much more than that, now could one?

Spring has sprung! Huzzah!
I was driving down Lakeshore today, and all the ice is gone from the lake. How timely is that? As soon as Winter has passed, so too has the ice. One can only hope there were no ice fishermen in their shanties who were dropped into the water at its sudden melting.

Keep Calm and Stay Away.
I'll be back tomorrow.
The mental health issues related to our lockdown and the pandemic are especially hard for people with depression. NAMI, the National Alliance on Mental Illness, has a 24 hour helpline: 800-950-6264.

Get Up! It's Morning! - 19 March 2021 - Plague Journal Day 372

Micah 6:8
Proverbs 30:29-31   John 18:26-27
Yes, your life matters.

We all are still sheltering in place, but I'm here to keep you sane and entertained.
One could hardly ask for much more than that, now could one?

 

Heidi mentioned to me the other day that she had heard a rooster crowing in the morning when she let Billie out. This past Sunday, I let her out and stood on the back porch to listen, and indeed, I heard a rooster somewhere pretty close by. That's an appropriate memory (and ongoing reality) today on National Poultry Day. It makes me wish I had some leftover coq au vin.

Keep Calm and Stay Away.
I'll be back tomorrow.
The mental health issues related to our lockdown and the pandemic are especially hard for people with depression. NAMI, the National Alliance on Mental Illness, has a 24 hour helpline: 800-950-6264.

Clocks, Chimes, and Bells - 18 March 2021 - Plague Journal Day 371

Micah 6:8
Zechariah 14:20-21
Yes, your life matters.

We all are still sheltering in place, but I'm here to keep you sane and entertained.
One could hardly ask for much more than that, now could one?

Today is Oranges And Lemons Day, and I've already had a glass of orange juice! "Oranges and Lemons," say the bells of St. Clement's. Takes me back to 1975 and my first visit to London. We were (partly) a handbell choir, so we made a stop at the Whitechapel bell foundry to see how they were made. (Our bells were American-made English handbells from Schulemrich in Pennsylvania, but it was still cool to see the place where they made bells like ours.)
 
That was a wonderful trip - four weeks driving around in a couple rented VW microbuses and camping (in tents!) mostly at horse racing tracks as it was the off-season. That was the first place I ever woke to find it raining inside my tent. The three of us (Tim, Rick, Charlie) made a quick dash for one of the vans where we spent the night. I have a picture somewhere of Rick wringing out a paperback novel in the morning when we went to recover our belongings from the flooded tent.

Keep Calm and Stay Away.
I'll be back tomorrow.
The mental health issues related to our lockdown and the pandemic are especially hard for people with depression. NAMI, the National Alliance on Mental Illness, has a 24 hour helpline: 800-950-6264.

The Wearing of the Orange - 17 March 2021 - Plague Journal Day 370

Micah 6:8
Numbers 21:4-9   Acts 28:1-6
Yes, your life matters.

We all are still sheltering in place, but I'm here to keep you sane and entertained.
One could hardly ask for much more than that, now could one?

Today is St. Patrick's Day - the day for the wearing of the Orange. Have an orange beer tonight!

In parallel, it's also Corned Beef and Cabbage Day (who knew that was a day?), and we'll be participating in that celebration tonight. I'm not clear on how corned beef - a staple of the deli scene - became part of an Irish celebration. Perhaps the Irish in New York and Boston stopped at the deli after their celebration for a sandwich to clear their heads. That's as likely as any other story we're going to hear.

For example, there's the charming tale that St. Patrick used the pickling brine from making a corned beef as part of his snake chasing arsenal. I'm thinking that's probably apocryphal, but it could be as true as any other part of that story.

At any rate, enjoy yourself responsibly. Try not to get any green dye on yourself (where it will show), nor any orange dye for that matter.

Sláinte!

Keep Calm and Stay Away.
I'll be back tomorrow.
The mental health issues related to our lockdown and the pandemic are especially hard for people with depression. NAMI, the National Alliance on Mental Illness, has a 24 hour helpline: 800-950-6264.

Back to Noon - 16 March 2021 - Plague Journal Day 369

Micah 6:8
Genesis 1:14-19
Yes, your life matters.

We all are still sheltering in place, but I'm here to keep you sane and entertained.
One could hardly ask for much more than that, now could one?

Yes, I'm back on the time zone and Daylight Saving Time question for Michigan.
I don't know what I was thinking when I updated my post a few days ago with "further research" that indicated EST is the most appropriate time zone for Metro Detroit. Frankly, I just read the times incorrectly when I was looking for local noon.

At any rate, having looked again at sunrise/sunset times here, I've changed my mind. Tomorrow's data indicate 11 hours 59 minutes between sunrise and sunset here - sunrise at 7:41AM EDT and sunset at 7:40PM EDT. That puts local noon at about 1:40PM EDT or 12:40PM EST. I think I'm back to my half-hour increment recommendation. Were we on CST, noon would be at 11:40AM - not too far off (and closer than EST), but if we went to a half-hour between (and there are many such zones - just google a time zone map of the world to see it's not just Newfoundland), we would find ourselves with noon at 12:10PM MST (that's Michigan Standard Time - I've just made it up). Could we learn to live with television announcements like, "Tonight at 9, 8 Central, 8:30 in Michigan?" I think we could - and we should.

Please share this with those who are working on the death of Daylight Saving Time - why not fix everything at once?

You're welcome.

Keep Calm and Stay Away.
I'll be back tomorrow.
The mental health issues related to our lockdown and the pandemic are especially hard for people with depression. NAMI, the National Alliance on Mental Illness, has a 24 hour helpline: 800-950-6264.

Beware! - 15 March 2021 - Plague Journal Day 368

Micah 6:8
Romans 14:5-6
Yes, your life matters.

We all are still sheltering in place, but I'm here to keep you sane and entertained.
One could hardly ask for much more than that, now could one?

Beware the Ides of March! After all, 2,064 years ago it was a bad day for Julius Caesar, so we should all be very afraid. That puts me in mind of something I just "learned" (= heard on a TV show but I haven't actually confirmed it yet) - that Friday the 13th is considered unlucky because that was the date (October 13) when the Knights Templar were rounded up to be executed. I thought it went back farther than the 14th century, but again, I haven't done any real research to find out. [again, small sample size, use with caution.]
Also dying on the Ides of March (but in 1937) was H. P. Lovecraft. What an amazing writer he was. His stories, without being gory nor overly descriptive manage to engage the imagination with horrors almost unimaginable. (Note - almost unimaginable. I don't think the imagination can imagine the unimaginable, do you?) Like all people, he was influenced and shaped by the culture in which he lived, but surely we enlightened moderns can read writings from the past with their original context in mind, can we not? (If not, how can we assert that we're better than they were?)
I highly recommend his writings. If nothing else, you'll never look at Antarctica the same way.


By the way, yesterday was not only pie day (pi day - 3/14) but also Albert Einstein's birthday. Happy Birthday, Al!


Keep Calm and Stay Away.
I'll be back tomorrow.
The mental health issues related to our lockdown and the pandemic are especially hard for people with depression. NAMI, the National Alliance on Mental Illness, has a 24 hour helpline: 800-950-6264.

Worship - 14 March 2021 - Plague Journal Day 367

Micah 6:8

Psalm 31:1-4
Yes, your life matters.

We all are still sheltering in place, but I'm here to keep you sane and entertained.
One could hardly ask for much more than that, now could one?

 

 

This Sunday is the Fourth Sunday in Lent.

With the COVID case levels settling down in Grosse Pointe, we've resumed our in-person worship!
Yes, we're going to be back in-person in the Sanctuary today. You'll need to register ahead of time to attend, and an email went out from the church with all the details!

In addition to a bell choir at the offertory time, Doug will be back at the organ and piano for opening and closing voluntaries based on familiar hymns - and we'll have a hymn for the congregation! We won't sing along, but rather read the words as Doug plays it for us. We're slowly getting back to real Methodist worship! Remember, we'll be streaming for all those who can't join us in person.

As usual, today's stream should just appear as the latest entry on our YouTube channel, here.
You'll find all our previous worship videos right there at that same place, and today's stream will stay there as a recording as well.

Keep Calm and Stay Away.
I'll be back tomorrow.
The mental health issues related to our lockdown and the pandemic are especially hard for people with depression. NAMI, the National Alliance on Mental Illness, has a 24 hour helpline: 800-950-6264