"Hotter than a pepper sprout." ~ Johnny and June Carter Cash

Good morning and welcome to another work-week on this Monday, another day in the neighborhood, and the only day we can do much with, this one on July 23, 2018. Each day when I sit down to come up with another episode I have to tackle the challenge of the 'blank page'. Those who write professionally have much to say regarding ways to deal with this challenge. What do I write about? How do I say what I want to say? And, perhaps the hardest of all, how do I make it interesting? I will be the first to say that I do not spend too much time dealing with those kinds of questions. I mostly just share. Thoughts. Ideas. Opinions. Observations. I get feedback sometimes about how random and disconnected my thoughts seem to be on some days. Okay. So be it. I guess that is my contribution to the box of chocolate approach to sharing. You never know, and, believe it or not, I don't always know either. When all else fails one can talk about the weather. Man, has it been hot, or what? I saw someone posting the temperature at 9 p.m. in one of the Houston suburbs, 93 degrees. I've been getting emails this month from our electrical provider asking us to do what we can to avoid the huge peak load demands associated with this current heatwave. I read that Texas has set an all-time record for electricity consumption this month. The bottom line, it is hot. I think the feels like have been over 105 and that makes it hard to breathe. The outlook for our area says no appreciable rain is expected before the end of the month. Now folks are seeking ways to stay cool. When I get in my truck at 4 p.m. to go home, it's so hot it literally takes my breath away. Literally. I cannot begin to fathom how it would be for a child left in a vehicle in these temperatures.

I would talk about the state of our political discourse in our country but for most, myself included, I would, at this point and time, just not want to hear any more about it. I figured out that so many people who have earbuds may not be listening to music, they are just trying to block out the incessant noise of hate and incrimination that is filling the airwaves, 24x7. Tuning it out will not make it go away. We are all aware of that. However, I do think it's time for those of us who are God-fearing citizens to have us a 'safe place' where we can go and be protected from so much meanness. Just joking. When I was in my formative years growing up, we had Communism as a major threat to our way of life. We actually studied Communism versus Americanism in high school. Today, we have folks who are given a major voice in our political world who call themselves democratic socialists. They want to see capitalism replaced and all wealth to be distributed to the masses. We used to study how those kinds of ideas are anathema to our free enterprise democratic republic, now we have folks who are running campaigns based on these anti-American principles. We do. I find that to be not only hard to imagine, but, it is rather bewildering when you think of our history written with the blood of those who died for our freedoms. America, where are you? Please come back home.

My wife is something else. A couple of weeks ago she came home from the first day of Vacation Bible School and said a teenage girl she didn't know had pretty much taken up with her. Really? How many times have I heard that story from Church camps, field trips, and youth sleep-ins? She is now on her mission trip. She first drove over to her sister's and someone in the community there had passed away. She accompanied her sister to the viewing. Next thing I'm told is that she is a part of the trio doing the special music at the funeral Friday morning before they left Friday afternoon for Buffalo, NY. Does that surprise anyone? She did her best to feed me every evening before she left for her trip. I appreciate her doing so. On Wednesday evening she had made some pinto beans with beef sausage cooked together. She served that on rice with a pone of freshly made cornbread. That was so good I almost got down on the floor. (Not literally.) We both were reminded of the days in the mid-1960's when I took a federal civil service job in Alexandria, Louisiana. The pay wasn't great and we were pretty much just getting by. However, we had plenty of jars of pinto beans canned by her mom. The wife would fix those, rice, and homemade biscuits. Some weeks we probably had that menu 3 or 4 times. We didn't have sausage for our beans back then, but, we both agreed those were so pretty wonderful times and God was good to have given them to us, together. I'm sure I will hear stories of new Yankee friends made as a result of her trip. At the end of the day, I thank God for her, even if she, at times, drives me up the wall. (Not literally.) Have a great rest of the day, Monday, and I will do my best to keep on keeping on. May God bless. Amen. ....More later.