Silver Dollar City

We went out to Silver Dollar City for a while this morning but it was cold and started raining so we headed to Little Rock.

Since we are trying hard to change our eating habits and eat more healthy we went to Ruby Tuesday's for lunch and enjoyed a great salad.

Since Lee and I both have formated the hard disk and reloaded our laptops this past week we met at the church to get ready for the broadcast in the morning. We think we are ready.

I also had a new 3' x 8' banner made that reads, Line #1 - "Live Streaming Video" and Line #2 - "www.CrystalHillBaptistChurch.com". Lee and I hung it in front of the church this evening. There was lots of head turning at the stop sign. I hope it will drum up a lot of new viewers for our broadcast.

Roy Rogers

We all went to the Roy Rogers show this morning. Now that was a fantastic show.

After the show the Crystal Hill Church folks headed back to Arkansas.

Mary and I decided to stay another night in Branson. We went to the Titanic Museum which was well worth the 40 bucks we paid to get in. We would recommend it to anyone.

Tonight we went to the Broadway Variety Theater. It was a very professional show and we really enjoyed it.

Branson Bound

I took a couple vacation days and Mary and I headed to Branson this morning. We met 35 of our church folks at the Branson Towers. We all went to the White House Theater for dinner and a show. It was a lot of fun. We throughly enjoyed the eveing.

First Family Church

Since there was no streaming video from our church tonight we watched the live streaming video from First Family Church. We really enjoyed the service.

Happy Birthday To Me

Mary came back to Kansas City with me yesterday and she took me out to eat tonight and celebrate my birthday. We had great food at Mimis and really enjoyed the evening together.

Honda Fit Gas Usage Update

It has been a while since I published my Honda Fit gasoline usage. So here is my 2007 Honda Fit Gas Usage update. It covers every tank of gasoline I have put into it since I brought it new in June of 2006. I can tell you for a fact that the gasoline mileage depends on how you drive it. You drive it hard and push it your mileage will drop big time. If I drive it very easy (not over 65 MPH) and do not push it I can get 44 miles per gallon, but I have to really work at it.

Lots of Spring Water

This morning the Mountain Valley Water Truck delivered about 25 gallons of Mountain Valley Spring Water to our house in Arkansas.

This afternoon Mary and I brought a few gallons of the water with us on our return trip to Kansas City.

ThinkPad Trouble

This morning while I was broadcasting the morning church service I notice that my laptop went to 100% CPU usage. I tracked it to rundll32.exe. I have run virus scan and AD Aware and I can not figure out how to stop this from happening.

Loading Software

I spent most of the day reloading software on my laptop and drinking lots of Mountain Valley Spring Water.

Reload My ThinkPad Again

My ThinkPad showed up on Wednesday. IBM reloaded the disk with their factory default load. Now I have to reload all my precious data and software again.

We got some Mountain Valley Water from Kroger this afternoon. It taste good. I called them and set up a delivery for Monday morning.

Mountain Valley Spring Water

I think I finally found our drinking water right here in Arkansas. Mountain Valley Spring Water has a pH of 8.35 and pretty good mineral content. I think we'll have to try it.

Water Problems

WOW! What a dilima! Last month we finally got out city water hooked up and was very happy with the water and the great pressure. Now we're reading "The 7 Pillars of Health" and our water is bad for us to drink and take a shower. I am looking everywhere trying to find a good spring water that has a pH of 8.0 or higher.

The 7 Pillars of Health

Mary and I are reading a book entitled "The 7 Pillars of Health". The first pillars that we are studying is about water. Today is day 4 and we were doing pretty good about drinking enough water. But after reading todays assignment I am afraid to drink the water from the tap. Day 4 ended with this:

POINT TO PONDER: It’s best not to drink water straight from the faucet, because tap water may contain toxins, heavy metals, pesticides, residual personal care products, bacteria, and other microbes. One of the chemicals added to our tap water is fluoride. Generally, there are two types of fluoride: the type added to toothpaste (sodium fluoride) and the type added to drinking water (sodium silicofluoride). The latter is the most toxic of the two.

ACTION STEP: To check your city’s water supply, go the Web site www.ewg.org and click on the bar labeled “Tap Water Database: What’s in your water?” Search under the tab “local findings” and select your city’s name; it will generate a local water system report including any contaminants found in the water supply.
I could not find the tap water database at the above url. I found it here. Tap Water Database.

VPN Problems

This morning I started trying to get into the Sprint network from home in Arkansas. I was getting a error message I had not seen before. I worked with the Embarq Help Desk for over an hour. Then I worked with evdoinfo.com support folks until about noon. I still can not connect to the Sprint Intranet but I have narrowed the problem down to my Kyrocera KR1 router. I have been using it for the past 6 months or so successfully but today it won't work.

Streaming with MultiMediaPros.com

This was our first Sunday to stream the live video using MultiMediaPros.com. Things seem to go well and we are getting by with $50 per month using them.

Unpacking

Our garage has been full of boxes since we moved to Arkansas Last spring. Today was the day for cleaning out the garage. We unpacked a lot of boxes but there are still boxes sitting all around the house for Mary to unpack next week. At least now we can finally use the garage again. This is the first time my little Honda has seen the inside of the garage.

Beautiful Drive To Arkansas

As I got into Arkansas this afternoon you could really tell that spring has come. The leaves are starting to bud out, the grass is greening up, and there are flowers everywhere.

Mary and I went to see "Amazing Grace" tonight. I had trouble keeping up with the story line as usual but we really enjoyed the movie.

Embarq - Disturbing News

There have been a total of 4 people on my development team for years. Today we were told that there is no work coming our way and that 3 team members are moving to other teams. That leaves me by myself supporting our application. I have been with these guys for many years and this is very upsetting. I'm not sure that I'm up to the task of what's expected of me in the future. I must pray more and just take it one day at a time.

First Broadcast with MultiMediaPros.com

Lee was able to set up Windows Media Encoder last night to use MultiMediaPros.com as the streaming hosting company. It seemed to work well and I enjoyed the service from my little appartment.

MultiMediaPros.com

While Googling for something today I discovered MultiMediaPros.com, a streaming company. I signed up for one month for $50 per month. That's $20 less per month than the sleepyengineers.com company that we have been using. If this works out I will discontinue sleepyengineers.com at the end of this month.

Back To Work At Embarq

Since I have not been here much for the past two weeks I decided to drive back to Kansas City yesterday afternoon and be at the office this morning. I feel very blessed to still have a job. I thought for sure I would be one of the ones in the layoff last week.

Disappointed with New Camcorder

While I was using the new Panasonic AG-456 to broadcast the early service I determined that the picture was not nearly as good as the one I was use to with Lee's JVC camera. In the middle of the offering I did a quick change out and put Lee's JVC back into service. I guess I wasted my $366 on this camera. Very disappointing.

Testing the Panasonic Camcorder

I could not wait until Sunday. I went to church this afternoon and hooked up the new AG-456 camcorder. It was kind of hard to give it a good test since I was there by myself but it's ready to go in the morning.

New/Old Panasonic AG-456 Camcorder

I won the bid on a Panasonic AG-456 Camcorder last week on eBay. The UPS man brought it to me today. For $366 it seems to be a lot of camera. It seems to work fine and I am excited about trying it out for the broadcast Sunday morning. Maybe Lee can take his JVC camcorder home now.

First Visit To Daddy's Grave

This morning Mary and I visited my daddy and mother's grave. I could not help but weep as I reminisced about our lives together.

Daddy's Funeral

I don't think the funeral service could have been any better. Bro. Bob Loyd conducted the service. He is the pastor at Crossroads Baptist Church where daddy was a member. For a man that never met my daddy he sure did a beautiful job with the service.

A Day Of Reminiscing

I spent most of the day reminiscing about life with my daddy and mother here on the home place. Most of what I remember is hard work. Daddy was definatly a hard worker.

Tonight we really enjoyed lots of friends and family at the funeral home. I didn't realize that daddy knew so many people.

Funeral Preparations For Daddy

I met my brothers and sister at the Roller-Ballard Funeral Home in Benton this morning to complete the arrangements for daddy's funeral.

This afternoon we all went back to the funeral home for the first viewing of daddy's body. We enjoyed a very close time together with the family.

To my surprise there was a huge solitary plant there by the head of the casket from the SODS, CLAS, and ARC teams. Thank you guys. I really appreciate it.

Tonight we all gathered at Delton's home, where we all grew up, to meet with the preacher from Cross Road Baptist Church, Bro. Bob Loyd. He wanted to talk to us about the funeral services on Wednesday.

After the preacher left we enjoyed a couple hours of very close fellowship. What a great God we serve!

The Way To Heaven.

My Daddy Passed Away

I went to church this morning even though I did not feel like going. I'm still coughing and hacking around. I know people do not like to be around other people who are coughing and sick.

Since my job is running the video and I sit away from most folks up in the balcony I went ahead and did my duty today.

Mary stayed home sick and watched the Live Streaming Services that I was broadcasting. She seemed to enjoy the services from afar.

This afternoon I received a call from Delton. He said that he had checked daddy into the hospital in Benton.

Mary and I dropped by from a few minutes. Daddy looked very poorly and was breathing hard.

We went on to church so I could attend to my video duties. After church we went back to the hospital.

I got to Daddy's bedside about 8:30 p.m. I read Psalm 100 and Psalm 23 to him. I spent a few minutes talking to him. I told him how much I loved him and appreciated the way he and momma raised me. I prayed with him. By 9:00 p.m. his breathing quit and he was gone.

I really thought that we were there for the night, but God in His mercy took him home. I am so very thankful for those few minutes that I had with my daddy before God took him home to be with my mother.

We know that daddy was saved and is now in heaven. What a great God to provide so great a Salvation.

City Water At Last

After a trip to town for a few more parts Scott completed the hook-up to the water meter. How wonderful to have lots of great water. I grew up with this hard water well. We really appreciate good water.

Scott got the first shower with it this afternoon and said it is thousands times better than the old well water.

Thank you Lord and thank you Scott for the new source of water.

The Big Layoff

I went to work today only because this is the day I thought would be my last day. I'm still sick and coughing. Instead of losing my job they gave me a raise. I then tried to stay for the big meeting at 1 p.m. but with all my coughing they sent me home. I headed to Little Rock.

God was so gracious to allow me to keep my job. I'm so undeserving but at the same time I am very thankful He allowed me to keep my job.

Home Sick With a Cold

I have been sneezing my head off all day and I feel really rotten. I need to go to the doctor but I just don't have the engery to get up and go. If Mary was here I'm sure she would drive me.