Twinkie Showdown

If I turn on the television one more time or visit one more website that blasts an advertisement making wild claims of "fat will melt off" or "quick weight loss, no exercise needed" I am going to get sick on my chocolate chip cookie dough ice cream. LOL.

Surely the majority of adults today know that there is NO EASY WAY TO LOSE WEIGHT. Please don't say I'm the only one who knows this.

There are extreme options such as gastric bypass and lap band surgery but to consider those as easy options to lose weight is just ludicrous.

Has anyone spent their life counting calories and thought that was an easy way to lose weight? I'm a pretty smart cookie (oh food thought again) but even my own math skills aren't up to par enough to constantly twist and turn through calorie counting for every bite that goes into my mouth.

Without exercise, workouts, etc the weight loss is limited even with the best of diets and these days my workouts consist of very little that we can actually call a workout.

The sad reality is that society spends billions on potions, lotions, surgeries, pills, contraptions all of which hail the claim of helping a person lose weight. However there remains a problem with weight and this problem has escalated to our children at a very young age. Living at an unhealthy weight is something that must be addressed in our lives but we must realize that in order to properly address the problem we must first face the realistic fact that even the best of plans to lose weight are not "easy" and there is no magic product we can buy that will really make it easy.

The sooner we quit trying to magically melt the fat off and at the same time cram a twinkie down our throat we may finally change our eating habits in a healthy way and begin to lose the weight we want to. This doesn't mean we must forever deprive ourselves of the food we love, just learn how to eat in moderation. I am the first person that needs to practice what I am preaching :)

Do I Get Angry?

I had someone recently ask me if I ever get angry because they felt I always seemed so cheerful. Yes, I certainly do. I get angry over different things at different times. However, anger is not an emotion I willingly allow to rule my actions. I naturally have a terrible temper and over the years I've had to learn to control it. As a youth I couldn't control my temper and when I'd really lose it I felt totally out of control and I don't like that feeling. So I've worked hard as I've grown up to control it. Little by little I guess I did change because now looking back I don't get angry over things nearly as easily as I used to. Now my tendencies toward anger are really more like frustrations. I get frustrated over circumstances but it takes a lot to truly get me angry now.

This is not to say that I don't have my moments of total out of control anger. I certainly do experience that on occasion. Usually it is after I've become overwhelmed with things and have reached a point where I can't take anything else. Although there are certain topics and issues that I take very serious and those things can spark anger in me rather quickly. I've also learned to take anger when I feel it and turn it into something positive by allowing it to fuel my determination to survive in this world, to not let things get the best of me and most of all my determination to not allow anything or anyone to cheat me out of the wonderful moments of my life. Yes I have bad moments and bad experiences but I refuse to allow those to take from me all the good moments too.

Enjoying a beautiful day with mild temperatures. Relaxing on my porch. Bristol Tennessee is a great place to live.

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Another Sleepless night

I have a serious problem with sleep. Perhaps you could say I am a chronic insomniac. This is a problem I've had for as long as I can remember. Many nights I will go to bed, feeling tired as if I could easily fall asleep. Once reaching the bed, I'll close my eyes, try to breath with rhythm so as to become relaxed. Then as if I have no control over it, my thoughts begin racing about and I feel as though I can't lay there a minute longer and the urge to get out of bed and do something else is almost too much to ignore. I force myself to lie there but my mind just keeps thinking, quickly moving from one thought to another. My eyes pop open and wander around the room, trying to focus on what there is to see amidst darkness. Through the window the street light outside beams a dim light across the room. I lay there making out the figures of objects in my room and wonder why my eyes are open when I feel so tired.

I'll strain trying to hold my eye lids shut. My mind just keeps going over the days events, then skips back to yesterdays and from there something that happened leaps my memory into action concerning something else. I turn from one side to the other, beginning to feel as if I could scream. Sort of like it is when you have a sound driving you mad, like a drippy faucet. You just have to finally get up and tend to it before you rip the thing right out of the sink. It is that kind of feeling with nothing to yank out other than wanting to pull out a hammer and bonk yourself on the head to make you go to sleep <grin>

You lay there interrupting your constant thoughts with repetitive words such as "I have to get some sleep". I then try to count, I've even tried to focus on just one thought such as perhaps a happy event, writing something and go over that one thing again and again hoping to bore myself to sleep. Sometimes it works and I drift off to sleep. Other times it is fruitless. There are times that the things I try to do repetitively in my mind bring laughter. I'll say nursery rhymes thinking I'd get bored but I end up not being able to remember one and then my thoughts get active at trying to remember. Then I begin to giggle at myself.

Turning on the television seems to work for some people in providing a steady noise which makes it easier for them to fall asleep. For me it just provides something to become interested in and give me an excuse to not go to sleep. I just have to continue the struggle with silence in the room and laying there and battling the long night's fight for sleep. Sometimes the sun is peaking through the windows before I manage to wonder off in restful sleep. Hopefully there will come a day where I can remain in bed way into the morning...

Prayer for those with an illness

Read John 11:4
"When Jesus heard that. he said, This sickness is not unto death but for the glory of God, that the Son of God might be glorified thereby."

Let us pray...

Dear our Father in heaven, please use our illness as a tool to glorify your heavenly name, to spread the gospel of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Please allow the illness to humble our hearts and make us more conscious of the type of love you behold for us. Lord please allow this illness to draw us closer to you, to make us more aware of how much we must depend on you for strength, courage and ability to get through difficult periods in our life. Lord we hope that our trials will bring great praise to your name and our difficulties in life will lead us to bring glory to you. We hope that the way we respond to our situation will show others that our strength to endure comes from the most high, our wonderful God in heaven. I pray that our actions show that we are walking the path through this life along side our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ and it is he who carries us when we are weary. Lord, I thank you for the medical doctors that have been given the ability to research this disease and ask that you be with them to open their eyes even more. Lord I thank you for the answered prayers we have seen time and time again. We thank you for all of the prayer warriors that day after day continue to pray for us. We give you all the honor and the glory for the wonderful results of those prayers. Lord, we ask you to be with those that are going through sad and difficult times. Lay your hand on them and give them the peace they need. Lord just wrap them in your arms and hold them close so they can feel your presence and glorify you by giving their situation over to you and relying on you to give them the strength they need to get through it. Please continue to use our situation to draw others closer to you Lord and to draw ourselves closer to you. Without you in our hearts, without you in our lives we wouldn't get through any of this. So thank you Lord for never forsaking us and always being along side us. We turn our lives over to you Lord, you know the reasons behind what we are experiencing, you know the greater scheme and meaning of our lives. Give us the patience to endure whatever we must, the courage to face whatever life gives us, the strength to hope for a brighter tomorrow and the love to share with others the blessings you have given to us. We ask all of this in the precious name of Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior. -amen

Todays Weather

So far today in eastern tennessee the weather is warm and sunny beaming bright onto the porch. Some rain is building to our west and may bring a few sprinkles this evening.

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Tonight's thought to ponder

Agree to disagree: Respect Diversity

"Just because others think differently about an issue than we do ourselves, does that mean they're right and we're wrong or vice versa?

I believe that we all are different and in many ways we each operate in our own reality. No one sees the world the same way as I do and the reason for that is that no one shares my own unique perspective on life and the world around me. Due to each persons own perspective I cannot expect other people to ever completely see things in the same way as I do. I have to accept this as fact and once I do that then I am better able to understand others and learn from them.

I shouldn't ever waste my time trying to make others see things the way I do. It isn't productive to argue with someone because they see something different then I do. I need to agree to disagree and respect their right to have a different opinion. I try to learn from the person and take note of what they feel about an issue and see if there is something I can learn from it. I've accepted that no one will be exactly like me, no one will think exactly like I think and no one will always agree completely with me. I wouldn't want to live in a world like that anyway. It would be so boring to live where no one had their own individual personality and thoughts. This is a diverse world and if we respect each other and look for the good in everyone then no matter how different we all are and how different we all think, we can always come together and be of support to one another.

Remembering 9-11-2001.

Little did we know on September 10, 2001 that we were experiencing the eve of a tragedy. A disaster that most of us had never imagined. Tonight I sit here in a total somber mood as I remember when an online friend phoned to alert me to what was being shown on the news. She knew that I rarely turn the television on during the day but especially in the mornings. I was dumbstruck when I turned on the television and saw smoke bellowing from the World Trade Center. While I stood in front of the television so shocked that I couldn't even break away to move to a seat I suddenly felt a fear like I had never felt when they showed another plane hit the other tower. Then within moments it hit very close to home when they announced that a plane which had been hijacked was headed to Washington DC. At that time I lived in Maryland not far from that area.

Before I could even digest that they announced a fire at the Pentagon and soon afterwords that in fact a plane had crashed into it. There was a fear that took over like I'd never experienced. It made me think of other people who live in war prone countries and who must live each day with the fear of bombs falling from the sky or planes flying over to destroy areas close to them. Even if they know they are likely not the target just as I felt that my home wasn't the target of a hijacked plane the uncertainty of what was going to happen was overwhelming.

I think back about the lives that were still with us that day nine years ago but didn't even realize that they only had a short time to enjoy the life they cherished. I wonder if they knew how loved they were, I wonder if they knew how much they were needed. I wonder if their families had told them recently what they meant to them. So much unsaid, so many things left undone. This is what happens when tragedy strikes suddenly. In a flash a life can be lost and the whole world can be changed. On September 11, 2001 many lives were lost, many families torn apart and as a result I believe the world was changed. Not just here in the United States but everywhere. Every country now knows just how vulnerable they truly are to those who wish them harm. This date each year is an anniversary no one wishes to celebrate and everyone would prefer that it didn't exist. But it is upon us and we owe it to the lives lost to remember them and to remember their families.

In giving thought to that tragic day. It seems like it was only yesterday. I remember most those horrific scenes but today for the first time I actually saw the clear photos of people leaping from the towers at the World Trade Center. The images I had seen back on that date didn't show it up close or at least I didn't see those. One they showed today was so vivid that you felt you could reach into that television screen and somehow catch them and safely lower them to the ground. How horrified they must have been to have chosen to leap from a burning building. I'm sitting here mortified. I can't imagine that. I also can't imagine how it must have felt for those people to be running for their lives up the streets of New York as a plume of smoke and debris chased them. They didn't know what was inside of that plume, it could have very well been hiding the collapse of every building down the entire street. They did not know.

Then as I try to lift my mind from those images I remember how the world came together in their grief. The true human spirit amazed me. I wish that spirit was still so alive today. I fear that people are getting to complacent. They feel it is time we move on with our life. It is, that is true but if we move on before the job is done, a job that will safeguard us we'll only be facing another 9-11. It may be hard to watch all the ceremonies but the job is not finished to bring to justice those responsible and to safeguard our borders and tighten laws. The job is not done and perhaps by looking back on that tragic day it will remind us of what we are fighting for, of why we must not give up the fight, why we must not allow our government to move on without first keeping to their promises to make us a safer nation.

Enough lives have already been lost, lives were lost that horrible day, lives have been lost in battle fighting to defend us from another 9-11. Lives have been lost in wars to tear down terror networks. Lets not allow all those lives to have been lost in vain simply because it would be easier emotionally to just move on. I hope not. I pray not. To reach a place where we are safer and where the world is free of more terrorists If I must cry a tear every day by being reminded of that day, then that is what needs to be done. If those peoples tragic end is used to fuel our determination to fight on and win, then their death is serving a purpose.

JACKIE EVANCHO Opera Singer America's got talent

Tonight is the night we will learn if Jackie Evancho's amazing voice won her the ultimate title from America's got talent. I must say I like Michael Grim and yes even Prince Poppycock but all predictions are pointing toward Jackie as the winner. What do you think?

RIP Harold Gould

In later years he was known as Miles, the boyfriend of Rose Nylund (Betty White) on Golden Girls. I have memories of him from way back on The Mary Tyler Moore Show and Rhoda as the father of Rhoda Morgenstern.

Harold Gould passed away on Saturday 9-11-2010 at the age of 86
He had an amazing career appearing in many movies. Click Here

View a wonderful clip of him from Rhoda.

Must Read

Attention to those living in the Bristol TN/VA area. This happened at the local Applebee's Restaurant.


Police looking for peeping restroom photographer | TriCities.com

Trip To Back Bone Rock

I went with my brother and sister in-law for a drive to back bone rock in Virginia a short while back and thought I'd share some photos and descriptions.

The Sign at the stairway to climb back bone rock.

You can see the tunnel through the rock between the trees. 

The base of the very high, very dangerous stairway leading to the top of the rock

 

Continuing to the next level of stairs

 

The View From The Top Of Back Bone Rock

For those less familiar, this is a huge rock tunnel and they have created a stairway albeit a treacherous one so you can hike up to the top. As you can see in the last photo above there are no rails or safety precautions once you get up there but it is a beautiful sight. I must confess that due to my hip problems I did not climb to the top and just sent my camera up with them. 

Views From The Ride Home

 

 

Todays weather

It is a sunny and warm day here in the beautiful mountain region of eastern Tennessee. The nights are becoming cooler but the day temps are mild. A wonderful day to spend time with those you love among the outdoor beauty we are blessed with.

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The Power Of Forgiving Yourself

When I was first diagnosed with scleroderma I felt a sense of guilt as if somehow it was my fault. I reflected back on everything in my life that I had done wrong and immediately saw it as the reason I was ill. In times such as this we tend to hold ourselves to harsher judgment then we do others. Suddenly those little things we did that seemed so small before are now these glooming bright blemishes on our lives and we see them as unforgivable. These emotions can quickly snowball into a mess of trouble as they did for me. Suddenly I viewed everything and everyone I touched as if they were my victims. I reached a point where I had no joy left because all I could see through the fog was that I was ruining all the hopes and dreams of those I loved.

I felt as if I had single-handedly ruined the lives of my siblings, husband and children solely because I was ill. Similar feelings of guilt can be experienced by someone who has a family member pass away. All we can think of is "What if I had done...?", "If only I had been there..." or "I wish I had told them...."

How Long Does It Take:

Some people linger at the stage of blaming themselves for a brief time and some much longer. There are no rules regarding how long it takes to cope with emotions as strong as these. However, I had to realize that we must face these feelings of guilt to put them to rest. We can't ignore it hoping it will go away. One of my favorite sayings is "the only way to get past something is through it". We must travel through it to get to the other side. We can't side-step it or jump over it. Understanding this will lead us to understand that God will be there to hold our hand and guide us every step of the way.

Have You Made The Choice?

Before you read further take a moment to turn your life over to the Lord if you haven't done so already and ask him to take control and guide you in the way you should go. Even if you are a mature Christian this step is something that can be repeated, there is always room to grow and room for better understanding.

On The Road:

You can begin this road to forgiveness by taking a look at the situation at hand. What are the facts concerning it? Was it something you had control over? Did you do what you thought was right? Don't focus on the "what ifs" and "if onlys" because they don't exist for us.

Forgiving Is Not Something That We've Never Done Before

Have you ever asked for forgiveness from God, for the past deeds you are blaming yourself for. Have you ever had to forgive a child of a mistake or for breaking something? Do you remember the gentleness you felt toward your child or perhaps a parent or sibling? What about the forgiveness you have held in your heart for those who have wronged you?

It's funny that we can readily forgive those around us, yet we can not seem to find compassion in our hearts for ourselves.

Steps To Forgiveness Of Self:

Try feeling some compassion for yourself. Accept that God has such compassion for you and if you can find a way to feel that for yourself you'll be well on the road to dealing with this. Realization will allow you to see clearly the situation at hand and to see the potential blessing that has been bestowed on you. That's right blessing. Since all that believers do is to be done in a way that glorifies Christ, this too is a blessing. This kindness and generosity to yourself will be the groundbreaking event which will lead to moving forward.

Forgiveness Is Something To Be Sought After

We must search ourselves in-depth for the goodness we hold through the Holy Spirit in our hearts so we can see the whole purpose of our lives (to glorify God). We must know that even though we make mistakes, we have an illness, or we get off base God is there with his open arms to forgive us and instead of punishing ourselves in our thoughts and actions we should give it to God and turn around and commit ourselves to Him. We have an obligation to honor that goodness, the goodness the Lord has bestowed upon us. The good qualities we have and the heart of compassion we have been given. There is good in every situation we just have to seek it out.

The Blame Game Can Keep Us from Forgiveness

We begin to question God, to question the illness, the situations, we begin the "Why me" syndrome? Sometimes we get into this mode of blaming God for what is wrong in our lives as well as everything that is bad in the world.

In Genesis 1:31 it says "And God saw every thing that he had made, and behold. it was very good." What God created was all good. He was not the author of bad, evil, sin or all the terrible things that have taken place. What I'd like to address here is that it is true that we are all sinners and none of us live a life free of doing bad things. Jesus Christ came to earth to suffer for our sins. By God's grace are we saved and our belief , faith and love for our Lord Jesus Christ. We along with Jesus are guaranteed Salvation. That is the answer. God offers clear and unending forgiveness if you ask it of him.

The Important Question:

Don't you think it is time you offer forgiveness to yourself. If we say that somehow our sinful acts has brought about our bad situation, or illness isn't that the same as saying we don't trust in God's forgiveness?

Know This

Bad things happen in this sinful world and I could write a whole other story on the reasons they do but I'll save that for another day. What I hope you grasp from this article is this, that God uses the pain and suffering we all bear to do many good things.

People who have met great challenges have done tremendous things by the grace of God. They will testify that they have felt more blessings in their life than they could have ever imagined, even through adversity, and illness.

We are often touched by the stories from people who show what seems as such courage and strength to overcome adversity but it is God's grace that helped them get through it and the glory for their achievements should be given to the Lord. God will take a bad situation and turn it into something good for His glory. We must learn to look past the bad part of our situation and see the good that can come from it. Perhaps there is a hidden purpose for your life. Whatever life brings your way run to the Lord in prayer for his direction as to where this situation should lead you. Search for ways with your whole heart to glorify God through your life.

May you feel the blessings of the Lord in your life today and every day.

Welcome

I would like to take a moment to welcome all to come and sit on my porch with me and discuss daily living. We all have many things to discuss about life in general and what is going on in the world around us. Life experiences teach us all great lessons and by sharing those lessons learned we in turn may show others that they are not going through life alone. I hope you will join in the conversations and even share a few of your own life experiences.

Sherry