browser life

A song with lyrics by a member of my congregation....


Just As I Am


Just as I am, I come to you.
I look to your life, in all I do.
I hear you calling to love anew,
Or Source of Love, I come, I come.

Just as I am, I wrestle about
With fear, apprehension, wavering doubt
I surrender all, now cast them out.
Oh Source of Faith, I come, I come.

Just as I am, impatient to be
The fullness of all you've breathed in me.
Open my heart, my eyes to see,
Oh Source of Life, I come, I come.

- Mona Wade

Check out Oprah's Fight Club! Hilarious!

This song always reminds me of The Kinks.

One of my FAVE videos of all time!

"He who wants to expand the field of happiness, let him lay the foundation of it on the bottom of his heart."

— Tao saying

"Kindness in words creates confidence.

Kindness in thinking creates profoundness.

Kindness in giving creates love."

— Lao-Tzu

Got these from Pete, a Facebook friend. Sometimes I find it comforting to see evidence that I am not the only liberal to think of these things, heh heh:

10 Questions to Ask Your Favorite Conservative

Crazy Conservative Contradictions

It has been truly surreal to move from a primarily liberal environment to an extremely conservative one. I have had a relative compare Obama to Hitler, and he wasn't joking. Another otherwise sweet woman told me that Obama couldn't be president because he was a Kenyan Muslim, and she wasn't joking either. Sheesh.

A communion prayer:


Living God, we thank you that in this sacrament you make yourself known to us.
From now on, whenever we walk in strange places, we shall find your footprints there;
whenever we meet with unknown faces, we shall see your image there;
whenever we face nameless terror we shall hear your "Fear not" there;
whenever we stumble into unexpected joy, we shall feel your heartbeat there.
Whenever we go we start from here and we go in the peace of Christ. Amen.

- Alison Norris

God of the shadows,
you know
how I have loved the darkness,
its enticing mystery,
its intimate depths.

And also you know
how I have longed for the light,
for the spark in the shadows
that brings vision and warmth.

Hold me together
in all my turnings
from shadow to sunlight,
from full day to night.

Bless me for loving
the quickening edge
and the hope that it offers
for glimpsing your face.

- Jan Richardson

This came out a few years ago, but it contains some good advice. Got it from her "Money Class" that aired on OWN the past six weeks:

Suze Orman's 10 Tips for a Fresh Financial Start

Speaking of the class, I watched the whole thing and just now took the final exam online. I passed! I now qualify to win $50,000! I promise if I win, I will use the money wisely.

glitter-graphics.com

"I used to think the worst thing in life was to end up all alone. It's not. The worst thing in life is to end up with people who make you feel alone."

~ Robin Williams

Got this link through Fibro TV. Maybe now we can get somewhere in terms of addressing fibro-fog?

Pain & Cognitive Function in Fibromyalgia

This makes a lot of sense to me. Because no matter how well-rested and not depressed I am, my brain fog is still disabling. That is, UNLESS my pain level goes down significantly, which unfortunately does not happen often enough or long enough for me to think normally.

I actually recorded the Super Bowl, then fast-forwarded through the game and watched the commercials. There were several good ones this year, which I will post as I find them:

Thought this was cute. Got it from the Sioux Falls Shopping News:


All I Need to Know about Life I Learned from a Snowman


It's okay if you're a little bottom heavy.

Hold your ground, even when the heat is on.

Wearing white is always appropriate.

Winter is the best of the four seasons.

It takes a few extra rolls to make a good midsection.

There's nothing better than a foul weather friend.

The key to life is to be a jolly, happy soul.

It's not the size of the carrot, but the placement that counts.

We're all made up of mostly water.

You know you've made it when they write a song about you.

Accessorize! Accessorize! Accessorize!

Avoid yellow snow.

Don't get too much sun.

It's embarrassing when you can't look down and see your feet.

It's fun to hang out in your front yard.

Always put your best foot forward.

There's no stopping you once you're on a roll.

I Was Never Able to Pray

Wheel me down to the shore
where the lighthouse was abandoned
and the moon tolls in the rafters.
Let me hear the wind paging through the trees
and see the stars flaring out, one by one,
like the forgotten faces of the dead.
I was never able to pray,
but let me inscribe my name
in the book of waves
and then stare into the dome
of a sky that never ends
and see my voice sail into the night.

- Edward Hirsch

While putting together a durable power of attorney document through Suze Orman's "Money Class" on the Oprah Winfrey Network, I came across a link to this site. Even though its focus is on end-of-life care, things like advance directives specific to your state need to be addressed while you are still healthy or at least of sound mind:

Caring Connections - NHPCO

I like that there are links for caregivers. They are usually overlooked when it comes to advice. Taking care of a seriously ill person is tremendously isolating.

Stumbled across this site by accident while trying to find the nutritional content of a brand of ham with which I was unfamiliar. It looks like it would come in pretty handy:

Shop Well - Healthy Eating Made Simple

You can do a search specific to certain dietary needs, like gluten free or suitable for diabetics. Each food is assigned an overall score, plus a color - red is the least healthy, yellow is average, and green is the healthiest. If you create a profile, you can put together a customized list of foods for your grocery shopping. You can also look and see if your favorite foods have healthier alternatives and "trade up".

"If we all did the things we are really capable of doing, we would literally astound ourselves."

- Thomas Edison

Movie Review: "One For the Money"

If you were broke, what would you do to earn $50,000? Would take on a job for which you had no training? Even if that job were potentially dangerous? Those are the questions answered by Katherine Heigl in the comedy/mystery "One For the Money", which hit the theatres January 27th.

Based on the prolific Stephanie Plum series of novels by Janet Evanovich, Heigl is Plum, broke and desperate after losing her job as a lingerie buyer. She goes to work as a bounty hunter for her bail bondsman cousin. Trouble is, she doesn't know the first thing about how to bring in a bail jumper. But with dollar signs in her eyes and a chance to haul an ex-lover into jail, she conveniently overlooks her complete ineptitude and goes about searching for her target, Joe Morelli, a cop charged with murder.

Plum is given some cursory guidance by a pro who goes by the name of Ranger. We learn next to nothing about him except that he's cool under fire, has deadly aim, and may or may not operate outside the law. He buys Stephanie a gun, an action he probably regrets later.

One person who is excited about Stephanie's career choice is her grandmother, played by the delightful Debbie Reynolds. The funniest scene in the movie involves Grandma and a weapon at the dinner table. I am hoping they make a film of the second book in the series because Grandma is has a larger role in that one.

While tracking down and attempting to bring in Joe Morelli, Stephanie encounters many other colorful and/or shady characters, including a brutal prizefighter, his slimy manager, and a couple of hookers. Lula, one of the hookers, has plenty of curves, an even bigger attitude, and a wig for every occasion. She becomes Stephanie's ally during the investigation and her friend afterward.

Plum finds out the hard way that bounty hunting is much more difficult than it appears, especially when your target is clever. Thanks to Mr. Morelli, Stephanie finds herself in situations that are embarrassing, such as being handcuffed to a shower curtain rod, and frightening, such as being shot at. Nothing like learning as you go.

I must admit I had a bit of trouble at first adjusting to Heigl as Plum, as she had not been who I envisioned when I read the book. But she eventually did win me over. The rest of the casting was fine with me.

Most of the profanity that was in the book was left out of the movie, and the violence was toned down so that there was more implied than shown. I am guessing this was done to gain a wider audience and to better sell the story as a comedy. Some of the time line of the book was compressed, but none of the major plot elements were omitted completely.

There are eighteen books in the Stephanie Plum series. I don't know if there will be sequels for this movie, but if there are, "One For the Money" is a pretty good start to the saga.