Hobbit-Sense at OneFreeGarden.com

Another quick takes.  I wish I were taking notes for this all week — maybe having to scramble like this will train me to be better prepared.  On the amazing side, I actually have finished these the night before – lucky since I’m working all day Friday!

1.   It never ceases to amaze me just how well organised God is.  Somehow, despite all my “best” efforts, I end up right where I’m supposed to be.  Of course, I should know this by now, but oh well.  My first buy at the gold stand was with a woman with whom I connected on a faith level.  I made a big mistake on a buy, but the person who benefitted had just had hours cut and had rent coming due.  I also have really enjoyed getting to know the folks at the kiosks near me.  I think I’m there for a bigger purpose than buying gold.. I know God can use me for that anyway.

2.  I think I’m going to start freaking the people at the Apple Store out, because I keep glancing over… I popped in quickly yesterday for the first time – I spent all of two minutes in there.  I don’t know why after drooling over it so much I was so sheepish about actually going there.  I clicked one of the click pads on one of the new MacBooks… and walked right out.

3.  I love the MacGruber/Pepsuber commercial(s) from the Super Bowl.  I especially loved that the real MacGyver (Richard Dean Anderson) was in it.  Pepsi has had good ads lately.

4.  Has anyone else noticed all the stroller contraptions out there?  I don’t have any kids, but having a large number of siblings younger than I am, well, I’ve got a better than average familiarity with them for someone my age.  The other morning in the paper the comic Baby Blues revolved around the idea of a “stroller system” and I’ve seen tons of newfangled ones…  I can tell you they may be able to switch from stroller to rocker to car seat, and are generally ugly.  Some doubles also do weird things like having one kid effectively under another…. wow, that’s a great view.  I think the designers are trying too hard.

5.  Brrr, it’s cold!  And nasty!  I acquired a fair bit of sludge driving home Tuesday night that froze behind my front tires, which is how I discovered it Wednesday.  Every time I turned, I heard a disconcerting grinding noise.  Luckily I was able to get the giant gross grey ice blocks off (eventually on one of them).

6.  I’ve started playing “A Living Prayer” by Alison Krauss and Union Station obsessively this past week.  If you haven’t heard it, it’s simply beautiful… I can listen to it and sing along with it endlessly because it’s gentle but really meaty prayer-life-wise, and has a lovely melody.  I especially like the last line of the chorus: “Take my life, and let me be a living prayer, my God, to thee.”

7.  I mentioned in #1 that God seems to have put me in the kiosk for a reason.  Well, I also feel like he sends people my way to help me out.  I’m not the most naturally assertive – I have a hard time starting the conversation, but I feel pretty confident once I’m talking to someone that I make a good case.  I don’t want to be the worst buyer, and while I’m planning my budget around the base pay, not the commission, it really helps.  So I sit there, a bit reserved, and just start asking God for help.  And amazingly, he gives it to me – I have been doing pretty well courtesy the “Big Man Upstairs.”  Lucky for me, he doesn’t mind that I keep asking.  

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Well, that’s this week!  Working on a post about the ideas of generosity and desert (as in, deserving something, not an arid region). 

Thanks for reading!