Momentum

R S T L N E


Those are the letters the winning contestant is given in Wheel of Fortune's bonus round to start out guessing the final puzzle. The contestant supplies three consonants of their own and a vowel, and then they're given, I believe it's fifteen seconds, to solve the puzzle. Catching up on some of my reading for fun -- which I'm trying to encourage Sarah and Jeffrey to do, their Reading At Home calendar starting up Thursday -- the titles of two books I'd read occurred to me as starting with R and S respectively, followed by two I finished beginning with T and L. But it's no big deal to me that I couldn't find a good book to finish that I hadn't read already beginning with N and E subsequently.


Me, I'll just read.


AND I will learn to not bring the kids to visit Martha at one of her jobs in the future! Saturday I offered to bring them by Burger King and it doesn't matter why else we were out there, Martha just wasn't happy about it because she bought Jeffrey that strawberry shake. Yeah, I didn't encourage them to want anything. And quite honestly, if the only thing either Martha or I are led to see is what a drain the kids are on our finances ... it's not worth it to step out of the house unless we absolutely have to. We could just stop using lights and unplug that waste of Internet too if she wants. Seriously, honey, you complain about me giving in?


Dance Moms that I had something good to say about last week is turning into Dance Monsters.


Can't go to Holiday or Shell or whatever that convenience store by the original Marketplace is calling itself this week anymore because of one really rude clerk. I can understand prepaying before you pump gas, but their not now allowing you to pay by more than one method (so unless I bring in ten or twenty certificates with gas stamps I can't use them, or I pay with JUST a debit card or JUST cash) is not helping their business, unless they think "the magic of thinking big" only applies to people who spend big amounts of money. But it's a convenience store, who'd want to?


I used to work in one. I can understand people's disdain for them.


But I want to keep mine -- my disdain for anyone or anything -- down to a bare minimum. And it's not easy, especially on Sunday mornings getting ready for church. If my family really doesn't want to go (or if they feel they're getting little or nothing out of it), they can just say so and sleep in, I think in darker moments. But this Sunday morning was our annual service in the Scandinavian Heritage Park, outdoors and next to that replica of a Norwegian church, with a potluck dinner afterward. It was fun to be there and ... I just don't like being yelled at the minute we get home. I do not want our jobs to become our vacation from that. Martha, Sarah, and Jeffrey deserve better than that.


So do I, I think, in lighter moments.


David