Hot in the City

We have had a wonderful April with cooler than normal weather. But now it is hot! Today must have been 150 degrees! Well, maybe that is not quite right, but it might as well be that hot. I think the computer said it was 103 degrees, which is only 39.5 for those who only know celsius. I think 103 sounds much hotter.

I always have a hard time at the beginning of the hot season. My body takes a long time to adjust to the heat. So today I turned the a/c on and brought a mattress into the dining room (where the a/c was) and just laid there for a while. I won't tell you how long. Micah and his friends were in the front room without a fan even on. I went out there and asked them if they needed it. They didn't sound like they cared, but I turned it on anyway. Then one of them said that it hurt his wasp bite to have the wind blow on it, so I turned it off and laid back down in the other room.

The mattress was hot! It seemed like it could burst into a flame. Then I thought that maybe I would burst into flames at any moment. But alas, I survived. I think I may forget about cultural acceptance and wear shorts and a tank top. Look out Delhi, hear I come. Prepare to stare!

Easter Eggs

Yesterday, Micah and friends colored Easter eggs. Today they were hid and the kids found them. For some reason, I took two of them to church with me. I don't know why, but Micah didn't want to eat these two. So I thought, "I will give them to the beggar kids on the way to church." But whenever we bring food to give to the kids, there aren't any. So ended up with them at church.

Luckily, our church is next to a small slum area. There are always kids playing outside the church. So I just had to go give the eggs away. I saw a small group of boys playing with sticks and decided to give them the eggs. I made the mistake of asking, "who wants eggs?" So all the boys ran over to me with my two eggs in my hand. They all grabbed them and squished them out of my hand. Seriously squished eggs. One kid tried to eat some of the squished egg but then decided to throw it at his friend instead.

I walked away a little amused and a little annoyed.

It's a Juggle Out There

I am learning to juggle. It seems that a lot of skateboarders (I know of two or three) are also jugglers, so since I am learning to skateboard I also thought I should learn to juggle.

Twitter

I signed up for a Twitter account a few days ago. I wanted to see what was so cool about it. Turns out that it is stupid. But I am still Twittering to see if it gets fun after a while or something. I think I need to take a Twitter course or at least listen to a Twitter tutorial. Maybe then I will understand why I need a Twitter account.

Got Turbo?

Over the years, Steve's dad has had many cars. I think there is a different car each time we come for a visit. I remember one time that he told us he was trying to cut down on the car expense so he sold one expensive car and bought two old Mercedes (I think that is right). We were always shocked at the cars, which were almost always nicer than any car we ever dreamed of having.

On one of our trips to visit Steve's parents, we were surprised to be picked up at the airport in a new, red Dodge Ram truck. This was a big truck with the four wheels in the back (if I remember correctly). We climbed in and I am pretty sure I had to sit on the back bench seat thing that is smaller than the backseat of a Pinto. He needed a truck because, 1. men like trucks. 2. he hauls things. and 3. he just got a boat so he needed something to pull it with.

On this particular trip we were lucky enough to be invited to go to Mexico with Steve's parents to a resort. So after a very stressful day of trying to leave (there was an interruption to the plans and we ended up having to help someone move, someone went to jail, and the police raided someone's house), we left around 7PM for our trip. Steve and I got the back, bench seat, like little kids. We had to sit sideways for several hours. It is funny how the driver never has to experience his back seat to know how horrible it really is. So off we went to Mexico.

The resort was a huge disappointment and joke of a place. It was in ruins. The bedrooms were dirty. The golf course hadn't been taken care of. The pool wasn't open and the hot tub was filthy. But there were free drinks to help you forget everything. We made the best of it for a couple of days of relaxation and then made our trip back to L.A. We had to stop to try to find some prescription drugs that are cheaper in Mexico, which meant trying to find a quack, I mean doctor, who would help write a prescription. After doing that, we headed for the boarder. There was a huge line up of cars waiting to cross so we ended up sitting in the truck (bench seat again) for several hours.

It was at the boarder crossing that we came side to side with another Dodge Ram truck that was just like Steve's dad's truck, only blue. So Steve's dad rolled the window down and started chatting with the driver about his truck. They both loved their trucks. Then the blue truck guy asked Steve's Dad, "How do you like the turbo?" And Steve's dad responded, "I didn't get the turbo." Mr. Blue said, "Yes you did. It says it right on the side of the truck." We all laughed and Steve's dad felt silly for not knowing he had a turbo. We sat a few more eternities there at the boarder until finally we drove home.

My spiritual analogy: The Holy Spirit is like our turbo. All Christians have the Holy Spirit in their lives. Many times we don't realize it though and we don't use the power that comes from Him being in our lives. So let me be the one to tell you that you do in fact have turbo!

Heart Attack

I have been doing the workout by Jillian Michaels lately instead of my P90X. I just finished an hour workout and feel great. I will get back to P90X again because I like the muscle building in it, but it is nice to have a change.

Micah has developed a fear recently. His fear is that I am going to have a heart attack while I am working out. Several people we know have died in the last couple of months from heart attacks, so I think his fear comes from that. So now when I work out he asks me how to do CPR. He wants to be in the same room as I am when I work out so he will see me collapse and be able to revive me. So I tell him how to do CPR because I really don't want to die either.

Micah has a heart valve issue that isn't serious. A few years ago he found out about it while we were at the dentist's office. I am suppose to let the dentist know about the issue so that they can prescribe antibiotics if they think he needs it. I guess one of the complications could be that a virus or bacteria will get into the blood stream and go to his heart. So anyway, he was shocked when I mentioned that he had this issue and became obsessed with talking about it. He calls it his "heart problem".

Today Micah asked me if kids ever have heart attacks. I said that sometimes kids that do hard sports that don't know that they have a heart issue may have heart attacks. But I made sure to tell him that his doctor specifically said that we don't have to worry about this with Micah's valve issue. It will not cause any problems when exercising. So now Micah thinks he can workout as hard as he can without worrying about a heart attack, but everyone else should be careful since they don't know if they have any heart issues.

Why is it that Micah takes after me so much? When I had the gym, I would be waiting for someone to have a heart attack so that I could perform CPR on them. One time a lady had pain in her arm and was very light headed and I was sure she was having a hear attack. I was just rehearsing in my head the correct breaths to chest pumps, preparing for when she collapsed. But she never did. Now, that is what Micah is doing with me.

Boaz

I am reading a book (that is on my bedside table and I am too lazy to get up to look at the title) about 4 women from the Bible. One is Rahab that prostitute who hid the spies of Jericho. I also just recently listened to a sermon on Ruth, preached by my dad. As I finished the chapter on Rahab, it ended by saying that she is the mother of Boaz, who married Ruth. I had never connected them before.

The sermon on Ruth talked about the faithfulness of Naomi, Ruth and Boaz. Boaz must have been a God-fearing, or at least a law-following man. He kept part of his field for the poor to harvest and he married Ruth, his dead relative's wife. So Boaz was probably raised by parents who were God followers.

Then I read about Rahab and how she was the mother of Boaz. So here is this woman who was "grafted" in to the people of God. She must have given herself fully to the law to raise her son to be the man Boaz.

I think of the girls we hope to help at Courage Homes who have been forced into prostitution. This gives me hope. They could become like Rahab, the mother of Boaz, grafted in to the family of God.

3 Ways

There are three ways to leave the house. One is to think through all the things you need for the day and walk around gathering the stuff before you walk out the door, often running here and there as your think of more things.

Two is the way Steve does it. He says good-bye and wonders around the house, says a few more "good-byes" or "I'm leaving" and continues to gather his stuff. Once he leaves I have to get up and lock the door. But I often times don't get up right away, because this second kind of leaving means that you leave two times. He usually comes back for something he has forgotten. If I lock the door too quickly, I will have to get up again to let him in.

The third way of leaving is the way I do it. I get my stuff together and walk out the door. Once I pass through the door I don't come back. If I forgot something (and I usually have) it is just "sorry Charlie" for me. I get to the car and realize it would be nice to have sun glasses, but too bad, I have left already. Once I am out, I don't go back.

You are a Dog

Not one of my best moments.

I was riding in the car with some friends when we came to an intersection with street kids. There were about three boys who appeared high. They weren't begging, they were just being irritating. One pretended to hit the window with his stick in his hand. Another opened the driver's door. Then he called me a dog. I reacted immediately with, "No, you're a dog!" It came out as trying to be funny, partly, but also with anger. Mostly anger I guess.

Why is it that my Tourettes hits when I am with people? Now I will probably be fired from my job with trafficked girls.

Worst $4 Pedicure

Yesterday I and my friend Chrissy went to have an Indian experience of a pedicure. I had never gone to the local beauty parlor so I thought this would be a good chance to try it out and see how good it is.

We walked up to the very small shop and there were three ladies sitting outside on the massage table/bed thing. I asked if we could have pedicures and they started scrambling to help us. They had to clean off the chair on the inside of the shop and make room for another chair to be brought in. The day before, the shop had been painted with some strong smelling paint and everything was out of place. There were boxes of old supplies everywhere.

So we sat down while the ladies looked for buckets for our feet to go in. They dug through bags to find their files and soap. I really wanted to walk out and go somewhere else, but I hate making people feel bad by saying that their business is gross, so we stayed. We thought we would just get high off the paint and not care anyway.

The ladies had a small electric water heater, like to make two cups of water at a time. So they heated up water and poured it into our buckets. Then they added some cold water. Then they cut open a packet of shampoo and dumped that in the water. We didn't really soak our feet much, but they started taking off our old nail polish. The owner stood over the two ladies working on our feet and barked her orders, not knowing that I could understand her. She told them what to do like they had never done a pedicure before. Again I wanted to leave.

My feet were scrubbed first with a razor file. I thought for sure I would bleed. But even with all that scrubbing, my feet were not really that clean at the end. And then Chrissy got the same file, without it being cleaned off. So I figure if I have hepatitis that she will now get it too. I wonder how many people have had their dirty feet scrapped with that file. Anyway, probably not many because they did a lousy job. Our toes still have old polish on them.

Finally, my lady finished my feet and asked if I wanted anything else. I looked at my bare toes and said, "Color?" She hadn't painted my toes. So she searched through every bag and box in the very small room and wasn't able to find any nail polish. She yelled for the owner to tell her where the polish was, but she didn't know either. So the owner sent the girl to the store to buy a few bottles of polish. She brought back 5 for us to choose from. I chose red and Chrissy chose purple. We got one quick coat of paint and tried not to rush out of the place in disgust (but I wanted to).

Our feet don't look extremely nice, but we are probably the only ones who will notice. Soon we will re-polish our toes. And if I can find the card reader for my camera I will show you what the place looked like. Check back later for pictures of the worst $4 pedicure ever.