Tuesday, February 21, 2006

Back After a While

Hm. My blogging has been nonexistent for over a month. I guess I'm not addicted to it.

I have been busy, as well as dealing with illness. I'm not sure I have been sick in the past month but my wife caught a very bad cold. Between taking care of her and perhaps my body fighting off catching that cold I had been quite tired for about two weeks (Feb. 3rd through 15th).

My community college teaching did not happen on Monday, because it was President's day. It was nice to have some extra time to catch up on small chores. The whole month I have felt like I was just barely getting done what I needed to get done.

In retrospect, I should not have felt bad about that. My wife was getting a lot of my attention. My congregants have been receiving as much of my time as they want and need. Shabbats have been worshipful and nice. My math teaching is going well. I've had time to read the news and some interesting editorials. There must be many people for whom "barely getting done what I needed to get done" seems an unattainably high goal. But I had just felt very confined with no apparent cause.

I have been negligent in yard work, but the yard does not care. It also does not reward prompt lawnmowing. I've been diligent about keeping dandelions plucked. The grass can wait until it is about to go to seed.

I have not started taxes yet, but never do until March.

I have been praying regularly, but of course could always be praying even more.

I have not had a chance to watch the Lord of the Rings DVDs I received for a holiday present. (More LOTR humor here and here and here.) But my wife and I also received a box set of the Narnia books, and I've been reading them to her (we're in the middle of the third).

For my relaxing time that is totally unlike anything in real life I was playing an MMORPG, but now am reading e-books instead. I found the Cthulhu stories as e-books but they got old; the adjective "Herculean" has only limited robustness. Now I'm enjoying a lesser-known novel by Bram Stoker which is delightfully amusing as a product of its time.

More nice is that I upgraded my Palm's free Bible software and the new version has a built-in schedule for reading through scripture in a year (with links to tap and check-boxes). That's been a nice excuse to be reading parts of scripture I normally read only very seldom.

Well, now you know what I have been up to (and not up to). Besides collecting all those entertaining links during the past month I also have a pile of books and magazines with post-it notes marking interesting things to comment about. Most are ministry related but not fitting into any sermon or any Torah portion comments.

Let's see if I can get this act on the road. (Warning: last link has sound.)