The most recent challenge:

Write a story (or scene, or poem, or what-have-you) that puts two or more of these lines into a context where they actually DO make sense:

• Too bruised to bear the knowledge of his kiss…
• the consequence of Peter’s burning dog…
• the waters crash against his cold mustache…
• shellacked to a table, unable, stuck….
  

My entry follows (with some edits):

Peter hears the commotion, and runs through the snow to the toolshed. He opens the door.

splash The waters crash against his cold mustache, the emptied mop bucket clattering to the floor—along with the shelf on which it normally sat.

His eyes peruse the room, finally noticing the orange shape between the fallen shelf and his workbench: his friend, covered in varnish: “Shellacked to a table?” he gasps. He runs to his friend’s side, and lifts with all his might. “Unable—stuck!” It is no use.

Then he notices the smell. It sticks in his throat, nauseates him. He sees the burn marks at the base of the shelf, and understands what has happened. He bends down and touches his lips to the forhead of his friend, who is too bruised to bear the knowledge of his kiss.

He knows Indiana has not much longer in this world, and has now seen the consequence of Peter’s burning dog.
—
1 Peter 11:7
(Or should that be “I, Peter, on 11/7”? Probably.)

Friday night, I played (and didn’t win) Lord of the Rings Trivial Pursuit. So, in recent games, I’m 0 for 2. Which might surprise some people—even the ones I play against. But, even with as many times as I’ve seen the movies and read the books, I’ve still forgotten a lot more LotR trivia than I remember, and under competitive pressure, I don’t always do as well as I’d like. But, I had fun, and that’s the point of playing games (for me, anyway).

Saturday morning, I had a LCWM board meeting.

Throughout the day, I caught up on my SciFi friday tapes: recording 3 hours on SFC, and another 2 on CBS (all of which fall in the sci-fi/fantasy genre) made for a busy tape catch-up. This upcoming week, I’ll have 6 hours (though I don’t know whether or not using a math genius to help solve FBI cases qualifies NUMB3RS for sf or not… but it does qualify it to be watched by me). Fortunately, after that, SFC will be out of it’s summer half-season, so SG1, SG:Atlantis, and Battlestar Galactica won’t be in first run for a while

Saturday evening, I went mini-golfing with church’s young adults group. I came in second, at one under par (which is really quite good for me). The winner was seven under par—but he works at a real golf course, and frequently plays the game himself, so he has a bit more putting practice than I.

Sunday morning, I was at church.

That afternoon, I watched a couple DVD movies from my collection . I recently noticed that it would take me roughly 7 months to watch my entire collection—excluding tv-shows-on-dvd—at one disc per day. And yet, I keep adding to it. That’s part of the fun of a collection: it keeps growing.

Sunday evening, I went to the symphony. The Lord of the Rings by Howard Shore—which condensed/arranged the 6+ hours of trilogy soundtrack into a two-hour, six-movement symphony, accompanied by a video slideshow of drawings by Howe and Lee, conceptual artists for the epic movies. That was a blast. I’d seen the DVD recording that came with the RotK extended edition DVD gift set, but there’s just something about a live symphony orchestra… I can’t think of any such cultural even I’d been to since graduating from Bradley and thus no longer being in the concert band there, and I didn’t realize how much I’d missed it until arriving at the Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall last night. The last time I was there (at the Schnitz) was … oh, probably grade school for one of the “introduce school kids to classical music” field trips we did. (Note: I do have a deja vu sense that tells me that maybe I have been there some other time in the last eight years, but I cannot remember for what, so it might just be deja vu. If you know of that event in my life, please leave a comment.)

Not all have gone exactly as planned—let me re-phrase: none have gone exactly as planned, but some have deviated more than others. Some, I am happy about. Others, I wish I could change, but I know I cannot or should not. And at least one, I probably should change, but I’m still trying to figure out if I want to, or am willing to.

It would be so much nicer if I could see God’s big-picture for me right now. Or find a nice situation-specific map nearby. But God doesn’t tell us everything, no matter how much we want Him to: He’s God, I’m not, and I’ve just got to keep that in perspective. I’m just glad He’s around, because this would be much harder without Him.

But it looks like there will be some major decisions for me to make in the near future. So, please pray for wisdom and guidance, as well as the courage, strength, and ability to do what God requires.

Thanks for paying attention.

Oh, and, in other “life happens”, I’m an uncle twice more in the last couple months: Evan Jadon was born to Randy and Imelda in San Diego on April 19, and Sara Christine was born to Brian and Jennifer on May 10. Congratulations to my family and their new offspring. God bless!