If I recall rightly the last letter was just after Zachary's baptism. I threw a migraine on the Monday, which sounds like bad news but having done almost a fortnight without one and then only getting one for a day, I was actually pretty pleased. It is not ideal but it is lots better than one a week often lasting more than one day which is what it was at its worst. However it meant I missed writers and I had actually done the home work. In fact the previous writers had also clashed with migraine (the bank holiday meaning that there was a fortnight between). Now all I need to do is write something for this weeks homework.
I think the rest of the week was uneventful on the whole. I was doing a piece of semi-qualitative analysis at work and found it absorbing and draining with the level of concentration required. I could only do a couple of hours at a time and then I was drained. Wednesday Cliff and I spent about half an hour playing with the sound system. We managed to turn the organ on and we could recreate the feedback. Then Cliff switched the organ off and the feedback disappeared much to his surprise. The question therefore was how was the feedback being created. In the end we traced it to the fact that the organ and its speaker were both earthed which meant that an electrical loop was being created and this was then picking up the signal from the audio loop and transmitting that out of its speaker which is behind the pipes of the old organ and therefore behind the microphones. Hence we were getting feedback. Arrgh, three bits of kit working together to produce problems.
The weekend was a writing weekend but with a lot of other bits and pieces going on as well. Friday I had thought we had Greek in the morning as did Sarah. It turned out that Ted had either not registered the time or we had not picked up his apologies. However as Sarah was around, she decided to stay for coffee. I think we both felt it was time we did a catch up. In some ways it is quite different being a participant-observer in a congregation to being a member. There are boundaries which I have had to keep. I cannot expect the congregation to provide pastoral care for me, but that means I need to keep in with the system at my home church. I am fortunate in having a minister who understands what participant observation entails and elders who have gone out of their way to sustain the contact. Late afternoon I saw the cranial osteopath and then I deliberately took the evening off and baked a ginger cake.
Saturday I had a Tescos delivery and I imagine something else but I cannot quite fathom what and there is nothing in my diary but Sunday I felt I really had to get over to Chesterfield as it was a month since I had been at a service. I decided that I preferred to go to the evening service. The thing that I found remarkable is that I had both the essays written before I went to the service on Sunday. I had Monday morning booked off but I had to be in work on Monday afternoon. As there were two essays I sent one to Ruth and one to James and both were promptly returned. James doing his after being released from hospital on Tuesday morning. The thing was that writing for a change came easily and was not a struggle. This is unusual, I normally require over two clear days and I only got one and two bits of other days. Moreover I wrote quite a bit on the Friday, I just wrote it, but on my first day writing I rarely do anything good, yet this time when I had very little available time I did. I don't know what makes that the case.
Actually one of my meetings on Monday was cancelled but I still got to a meeting which was about me putting things up on the web. Then got complements on what I wrote for writing group on the evening. One person called me brave, I suppose if the people I had written about had been me then that would have been brave, but they weren't me, just imagined other me-s, if you get me. They both revealed and hid bits of me. I wasn't them but I did not state how I wasn't them.
Tuesday was just a work day, nothing particularly interesting going on and anyway I was tired so not up to creating things to happen. I did shop but really shopping on a tuesday is a bad idea, Waitrose always seem to restock on a Wednesday. However Wednesday was housegroup. I end up arguing with someone who said he had a "full" understanding of eucharist, if he had used the word "sufficient" which I think is what he meant I wouldn't have argued but a full understanding of eucharist is a lot to ask. The more time I spend listening to people talk about eucharist the more I am persuaded we are talking partial models and the big problem is when we think our models give us more than a partial understanding. Of course we would need to tease out what sufficient is, but that is not the work of a housegroup. I took Wednesday off work as I was tired.
Thursday was another quiet day although I finally got the book of photos I'd ordered from my holiday. Let me do some explaining. I spottend that Photobox, the firm I often use for prints, now will make up books from photographs. I thought rather than forget to put them into an album I would just order them straight as a book so ordered the smallest number of pages A4 book they do. It was posted the Wednesday before last and should have arrived on the Thursday. However the packaging meant it would not go through my letterbox. So the postman took it back to the depot but only put the card through on the Friday. So on the Saturday I asked them to be delivered to my work address by the internet on the following Tuesday. They did not manage to but delivered it last wednesday to the wrong address but the person receiving it recognised my name (we are actually in the same department). So left a phone message on my voice mail in work. I then rang her on Thursday and she brought it over, the address if only next door to the actual building.
Friday was also quiet though I got to have a good talk with Jean Dickson at the breakfast. She'd only got to bed at 2:00 a.m. and because she had the bananas for the Broomhall breakfast and could not bear to have to throw some away she came down for the 8:00 a.m. start. She was just going then to do a shop at Waitrose having not got one done the day before. There were plenty of staff at the breakfast. Then on the evening I had a evening off and got to bed by 8:30 p.m.. I was shattered even if Jean could manage on less than six hours sleep. Actually I hope she got a nap later on in the day.
Saturday was a shock to the system. A day with nothing planned. So I got up, shopped for a bit, came home got myself lunch, did some painting as I had an idea for a piece that I wanted to do, spent some time on the internet and then went for a walk with my camera, and end up by preparing a reading for today. A busy day but no "have to"s in it. Well if you except the reading.
Today I had my parents over as Dad was preaching at St Andrews Sheffield. Dad turned up just after 10 a.m. so as to be at church by 10:30 a.m.. So I gave him and mum a Green tea and finished my breakfast. Then we walked up to church. Dad is walking so slowly that I was not prepared to try and cross Upper Hanover Street without a pedestrian crossing even if the traffic had major redirecting as they were retarring by the tramstop. The sound system worked perfectly this week. I am not sure why as there are two options, one I deliberately put the lectern at 45 degree angle to the front of the church. This means the microphone is not pointing at the Organ speaker, or Douglas put the wires around the other side of the organ. I know that turning the lectern helps but does not cure and so it may well have been moving the wires. On the other hand as Derek pointed out it was a very simple service to mike. I also briefly demonstrated how to use the battery tester and how to use the lolly pop microphone.
James and Jean Dickson had invited my parents and I to join them for a meal at Antibos. As James was still in hospital at the time (yes he managed to be admitted twice in one week), Jean asked Derek along. Antibos is an Italian restaurant in West One and reliably does good food. The meal was pleasant and although there was background music it was not intrusive. While we were at the meal, Jean got a phone call from James saying he was now home having been discharged (Graham their son had collected him from the hospital). Dad thoroughly enjoyed going there after the service. I hope they are as good in a fortnights time when we go there to celebrate Dad's 50th anniversary of ordination. Mum and Dad stayed onto about six then drove home getting in well before dark.
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