I’m processing the survivorship conference…
Lots of things I’m thinking about- information I heard, ideas to make the conference better, being part of the panel (which went well, except I’m not sure if my thoughts were cohesive enough…), emotions/feelings/thoughts brought up by being at the conference.
Good experience though. I’m glad I went 
Well, we’ve made a decision about moving or staying. Actually, having the “to-do” with the evil credit card company forced us to decide. We chose to refinance our house and roll some debt (not above equity) into our mortgage. We don’t have enough money to roll the evil card’s debt in with closing costs and such, but we can roll another loan we have with a large monthly payment in, which will free up a few hundred dollars a month that we can apply towards paying down evil card’s debt. Plus, the new mortgage payment won’t start until July, so we will be able to take the money we normally pay to our mortgage and send it to them too.
But it means we won’t be moving anytime soon since we will be hitting up our equity. Guess I’ll have to learn to be stationary for at least another 5 years.
Deep breath and one less thing to have to decide…
The Beyond the Cure conference I am on the panel of survivors for is this Saturday in Ann Arbor. I’m suddenly feeling some anxiety about actually speaking on the panel. I tend to push the emotions I’m dealing with related to my survivorship away and I know that talking about them and participating in the conference in general will bring up the jumble of emotions I keep just below the surface.
Plus, I’m worried about my usual habit of turning 5000 shades of red while speaking, and all the other joys of public speaking, even though I’ve had the questions for a couple months now and know most of my answers pretty well. Yeah, I haven’t answered them all here on the blog but I have gone over them. If the spirit so moves me, maybe I blog the rest of my answers after Widget is in bed.
I am so excited (even if there are only 3 episodes left) but Rob Lowe is back on West Wing as Sam Seaborn. He has always been my favorite West Wing character with Josh Lyman/Bradley Whitford running a close second. Probably my favorite episode was when Sam was fixated on the penny and how many pennies are out of circulation or lost. The first two/three seasons were the best. I loved it when they all played cards with President and he would give some sort of history/economics lecture. I was so sad when he left because he was perfect as Sam.
I have to admit I slacked off on watching West Wing over the last couple of seasons because after Aaron Sorkin left, it just didn’t seem the same. It used to be my Wednesday night addiction- nothing was allowed to get in the way of watching the show from the season it started (well, other than Natalie once she arrived)! I missed a bunch of episodes because Alpha was on Sunday night, its time slot this season.
I am slightly disappointed that there wasn’t more of a tribute to Leo McGarry/John Spencer after he died. He was also a great character and I actually felt a great sense of loss when he died and that the show was not going to be the same without him. He is definitely a missing part.
It is probably time for the show to end with the transition to a new president but I will miss new episodes (as I still miss Friends two seasons later). I think I will ask for the first two seasons on dvd for my birthday next month. Then I can at least feed my addiction with the best seasons
Overall, I thought the speech/lecture tonight was good. It was a bit of a rehash of his book Searching for God Knows What but he did a good job of keeping it interesting even for those who had read the book. I was a little worried initially because he started out a little slow and with several “ummm…” (big bad public speaking no-no). As he got into his groove, it was a lot better of a speech and fairly cohesive.
Seeing/hearing a writer give a speech, sometimes, it seems the writing and the speaking are not on the same level. Or the personality of the writer turns out to be not what you expected from the writings but in this case, the things I have enjoyed the most from his books were certainly evident in his speaking.
Probably the most enjoyable thing is that he is not an “over-the-top” Christian. He does not come across in a holier than thou, pious manner. You know the kind of person I’m talking about… The one whose Christianity seems to be an act to be better than others. Nor does he subscribe to the idea of God/Jesus taking sides in politics or world issues. That drives me crazy- yes, there are morals and ethics that God desires us to follow but He doesn’t hold to Republican or Democrat views (or any 3rd party views either). So to imply that I am less of a Christian because I do not vote Republican (or Democrat) seems incredibly hypocritical.
The other thing I like is that Miller is very open that his journey to Christianity wasn’t easy or quick. He said it took him 8 years from the time he renounced his faith (he grew up Southern Baptist with a very traditionalist mother and essentially no father) until he could finally wake up without doubt about God’s existance. He really questioned the “whys” of things and eventually through his questioning ended up back to God and to Jesus. His writing talks a lot about his faith journey and gives a lot of interesting answers to the “why” questions he had.
All in all, it was worth the $5 spent and it is always cool to see a popular writer in person
I’m going to hear Don Miller speak Saturday night. I am very much looking forward to hearing him in person because I really enjoyed his books on Christianity. I highly recommend Blue Like Jazz and Searching for God Knows What for gaining some insight into Christianity and today.
Never open your credit card bills just before bed. Now I cannot sleep as I feel absolutely sick over bill I just opened from our Chase account. Now let me first say I am well aware I am miring away in my sh*t that I have created. Originally this card was owned by Bank One and when we used it to finance our daughter’s adoption, it had an 8.9% interest rate. As of today’s statement, it is now at 29.99% and we have $9500 on it, with no way to pay it off. Our minimum payment has now gone up an additional $75 and is MORE than we pay on our car. The interest rate has more than tripled since August when Chase officially took over handling our account.
Yes, we had have two late payments but not within six months and one was because I screwed up and was $4 short in my monthly payment, which I discovered and paid online at their site the day after it was due. The majority of the payment was early but nope, apparently, we now have to pay 30% interest.
Let me also say that we have only been 30 days late once on a bill in the entire time we have been paying bills- it was not to Chase but to a different company and that was because we never got a statement.
Our other credit card companies have NOT treated our account this way, even though we are overextended and I have been a day or two late on payments recently due to how we get paid.
I have thought about full-time work but now that I know how much daycare in my area costs for full-time (most of them require at least 3 days and at the rate you pay for less than full-time, you might as well use full-time), plus the rising cost of gas, lunches, clothing, etc, I would have to make greater than $28,000 gross to come out ahead of what I make working two days a week and not paying child care. My current pay rate does not get me that much if I worked full-time and there isn’t full-time work in my job, so I would have to find one that is willing to pay me more than I have made per hour on avg. for the last 3 years. I had just barely hit that mark when I left working full-time in 2003, so I doubt I could land a job that paid what I need very easily. And no, I don’t have child care for even one more day a week as I cannot rely on my mother (particularly since she is having a lot of back pain that is not improving even with the physical therapy and muscle relaxants she has been on).
How on earth do they expect us to try and pay this off?? Oh wait, they don’t want us to so we can pay scads and scads of interest….
T and I attended church twice yesterday and spent the morning celebrating Christ’s resurrection in two very different ways.
The first service was at the church we have been attending, contemporary and uplifting.
The second service was at my parents’ church (where we used to attend), traditional and joyful.
I left the first service with a renewed sense of hope in my life and really discovering what the resurrection means. I have to admit we missed the video they showed at the beginning as Widget thought otherwise about getting dressed, although a small part of me is relieved because it was apparently a reflection of a family who lost a son the year before at Easter, or shortly after Easter. Those we talked to said it was a very powerful message, so I am sorry to have missed it.
The second service, other than a sense of thanksgiving and love from being with my family, did not do a ton for me spiritually. I did enjoy singing the traditional Easter hymns (”Christ the Lord is Risen Today!” “The Strife is O’er”). I have a great nostalgia for good hymns, and was slightly sad that we did not sing “Lift High the Cross” I love the chorus of that hymn: “Lift high the cross, the Son of God proclaim! Til all the World adores His sacred name.” They don’t have to be played by an organ or piano, even the contemporary versions with the traditional melody and words fill me with intense feeling. I guess you could say those hymns give me a “rush”!
It was good to go back to Zion and to visit but it no longer feels like my church home. When I need a boost of church hymns and traditionalness, I know where to go. Now, if only I could find a way to “convince” our new church that celebrating the church year IS important, I’d be all set 
Alleluia!
The Lord is Risen!
He is Risen Indeed!
Alleluia!
Apparently now you can get health care for minor injuries, allergies, etc. at a few of the local Meijer stores. There is a little blurb about the newly opened health clinics on one of our local news channel’s website which I ran across while checking out the weather for Easter (not as nice as I hoped but slightly less risk of rain which is good).
I’m not sure what I think about this. Certainly gets across the point of “one-stop” shopping and it sounds like they are working in conjunction with a local hospital but all in all, I think I prefer my health care to be done in a health care setting, such as a doctors’ office or hospital. I should think the liability of having such a clinic on site (even if it is not run by Meijer itself) would be quite high and Meijer prides itself on “low prices”.
So now, you too can get your Starbucks coffee, your hair cut, your child’s picture taken, your groceries and that cough that has been bugging you checked out all in one place…
