November 23, 2007

• I have Returned Victorious

  from the thing I swore I would never do.  I went shopping at 5 a.m. on Black Friday.  I must have been insane.  In this little town there aren't a lot of options.  There's no Best Buy, no JCPenney, if you're gonna go out and act the fool about schtuff, there's only one game in town.  

  Walmart.

  Everyone in town was there.  My Junior High School choir teacher, whom I loved and who gave me encouragement and kindness during the time of my life when I was the most difficult to get along with, stood in line next to me as we waited for our chance to purchase crockpots for $2.98 and cd's for less than half price.  My friend, Becky, looking more asleep than alive and wishing that she was in Baton Rouge with the men of her family, hugged me and asked what I've been up to lately.  Susie, who's been Tucker's Sunday School teacher during the summer for the past three years was behind me in line at the checkout.  It was more fun than I expected to have at that hour.

  Okay, I'll be honest, it wasn't the cd deal that got me out of bed.  It was the Garman GPS for $125.  I've been wanting one of these little babies ever since Mimi and I rented one last summer to guide us to South Carolina when my uncle died. 

  There were some other things on my list, but the GPS was my gold ring, and I grabbed it. 

  Seemed a bit ... well, unsportsman like to dance about in triumph and leave without even wrestling even one old lady for a George Foreman grill, but I didn't need further trophies.  I did my slow victory lap around the store, feeling smug and superior as all the people who didn't get there at 4 freaking o'clock this morning tussled over Bratz and digital cameras. 

  And in the end, I kind of felt sorry for the poor little crockpots, no one seemed to want them even for $2.98.  So I picked one up for my brother.  It's only 6:22 in the morning and I've already finished doing what I need to do for the day.  So I'm going back to bed to finish out my rest before the Ark/LSU game this afternoon. 

  It's D Mac's last chance at the Heisman.  And I'll be in my chair at 1:00 rooting for him. 

  I haven't been posting the War Weasel Report this week and there's a very good reason for that.  My average word count per day since I arrived in Arkansas is less than 500.  I'm gonna have some serious writing to do when I get back to Albuquerque.  I'm making progress so slowly here that it feels like I'm going backward on the deal. 

  But I've been working out a lot of stuff in my head, and since Fugitive is my inspiration for a lot of the scenes in the book, I've been taking notes.  I won't say that's begun to annoy her, but she's starting to give me the look whenever my pen comes out. 

  * * * * * * *

  If you haven't yet had the opportunity to view my friend Jim's story, please check out the link below.  I'll be honest, it takes about 25 minutes for him to tell it, but it's worth every second to hear about what he's gone through with his family, and what he brings in the way of life lessons is simply incredible.  I don't think it's possible for me to learn all he's trying to share about choice, responsbility, freedom, and forgiveness, but the story is so powerful that if I can take away any part of it and allow it to inform my decision-making, then I will owe him a debt beyond paying.

  If you don't have Quicktime on your PC (all the Mac people may be excused from this part) you'll need to download it.  The video is in MP4 format which Windows won't recognize when you try to open the file.  Tell it that Quicktime created the document and you shouldn't have any more trouble after that. 

  Jim's pastor makes a LONG introduction, but you can slide the timer over to the 7 minute mark and skip that part.

  I watched it on my Mac laptop, if you have an iPod you can download it there, and I also downloaded it to the 2 desktop PC's here in my folks house, so I've tested it on multiple platforms and no one's system crashed in the process.   

   

   

  • 7:42 am
  • 8 Comments