Good morning and welcome. It is Monday, December 21, 2020, and it's time to get real about our Christmas Day plans. Final arrangements have to be made. I will work on that today. Last Friday, the wife and I took the day off, (from our busy retirement schedule), to recognize and celebrate our 56 years of marriage. We started off by having a really inspiring breakfast from the Golden Arches. We then finished some final Christmas shopping. After that, we headed south towards Galveston. We stopped at one of the large outlet malls and went from store to store until our legs got tired. We then visited the downtown Galveston area called The Strand. More walking. We did find a nice item we purchased as our anniversary gift to each other. By that time it was mid-afternoon so we headed to one of our all-time favorite restaurants, Guidos. It is a legendary seafood eatery that has been in business for over 100 years. We've been eating there for some 35 plus years. The meal we enjoyed did not disappoint. I had the red grouper with lump blue crab topping and it was as good as any I had ever eaten. The wife had shrimp. Half grilled and half fried. They too were excellent. We were there for over an hour and once we left we visited Moody Gardens where we bought tickets to see a remake of the TV classic, Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, in 4D. The 4th D has to do with the chair shaking, wind blowing, mist spraying, and other mechanically induced special effects as we watched around a 10-minute remake of the original TV show. Even with the senior discount, it felt like a lot of money for such a short show. On the way back we made the obligatory stop at the Texas City Buc-ee's. We were both tired from our day but we so enjoyed and were thankful we were able to do all the things we did. A good day. Blessed. Amen.
We needed some rest for our schedule on Saturday. We once again showed up at the huge Blue Elf charity event as Santa and Mrs. Claus. This charity is sponsored by the Montgomery County Sheriff's Department and it provides toys for needy children. Because of Covid-19, this year was a drive-through event. Preapproved families were allowed to drive through this huge hangar-sized facility and we were up on the stage to wave and shout out Merry Christmas. For 4-1/2 hours, we were constantly smiling, waving, and loving on carloads of families. It was impressive how many gifts the officers and other volunteers hauled out to each vehicle. Amazing. The photo is of us up on our perch with department Chaplain, Sargent Mike Evans, who is also a full-time deputy in the public affairs office. This was the 4th annual giving program and we are very glad to have participated in all of them. We've made this photo each year and it is always good to see Bro. Mike as he was, back in the day, our pastor for nearly 20 years. We left that charity event and found our way to a small Church setting where they were throwing a Christmas party for 16 girls, aged 5-14, who live together in a foster care facility. The girls were kept outside until everything was ready. When they came through the door we could not have expected what would happen. They literally stampeded over to where we were seated and then they just mobbed the two of us. It was amazing. It is was heartwarming. It was gut-wrenching. These girls spent the next hour loving on us. Sorry. We couldn't do the social distancing as these girls wanted tender loving care. We will not soon forget our experience there. Say a prayer for these children. May God provide for them. Amen.
Needless to say, we were spent when we made our way home. We stopped at a red light and one innovative grandpa was able to get his toddler grandson up on Facetime and we waved and shouted out greetings from our window. Here's something that happened that was funny. We stopped by what can be called a more traditional throwback grocery store in search of raw peanuts for parching and we were also looking to see if they had any leftover stock of Butternut Hot Chocolate mix. We had gotten it there many years ago. We did find the peanuts and when we checked out the young fellow at the register, maybe 20, looked at me and said, "I guess you are going to tell me you are the real Santa. Right?" I reached in my pocket and whipped out one of our credit card style business cards. He looked at the photo and said it was really great but when he turned the card over he nearly flipped out. He couldn't get over it. Oh well, we enjoyed it and I hope you enjoy reading my stories because that's all I had for today. Have a blessed day and be reminded always of the Real Reason for the Season. (Hint: Luke 2:7 "And she gave birth to her firstborn son and wrapped him in swaddling cloths and laid him in a manger, because there was no place for them in the inn.") Amen. .....More later.
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