I Am So Not a Carpenter

We purchased our house in September of 2003 and shortly thereafter began putting up a privacy fence. Well, it's now June, and I finally put up the rear gates. I can't express deeply enough my dissatisfaction with the job I did hanging the gates. In order to attach the hinges to the gate, I had to cut off a piece of 2x4 to screw into; I also did the same for the latch. I'm sure a double gate is more difficult, and maybe when I do the front (single) gate, it'll be a lot easier (And no, I haven't yet finished the fence), but I look out the back door and feel an overwhelming sense of shame. There are a lot of things in my life that I don't necessarily enjoy or do greatly, but I've come to the conclusion that I can't do carpentry.

Witnessed a Bad Accident

This morning on the way to work I was driving up I-65 as usual. A few cars in front of me I see this semi truck swerving and a huge dust cloud. It looked as if the semi was getting over into the slow lane and noticed there was a car there or something. As I'm watching the semi trying to regain control, I see a black car flipping up in the air seemingly into the cloud of dust. At this point, I'm slowing down so as not to become part of the accident. And next thing I know here's the truck in the grass on the side of the road; it's mangled and resting on its side. I pull off the road as do a number of other cars. Men are running up to the body that is lying on the ground outside the passenger window of the truck. Everybody else whips out their cell phone. It's at this point that I realize that mine is on the kitchen counter.

I'm not sure what to make of it all. As I see the cars behind me starting to back up and a horde of people starting to gather, I decided that my presence wasn't really aiding those involved, so I merge in with the rest of traffic and continue to work. How many times as I'm on my way to work do I ever think, "I may not actually get to work today"?

"It is better to go to a house of mourning than to go to a house of feasting, because that is the end of every man, and the living takes it to heart." (Eccl 7:2).

Swayze Synonym

My wife and I traveled to Toronto this past weekend to stay with some friends. It was there that David and I discovered a wonderful new word. We were looking for movies similar to genre of "12 Monkeys" and ran across the film "Donnie Darko". When I noticed that Patrick Swayze was one of the actors in the film I declared, "Patrick Swayze?! Doesn't he stink?" From then on, "Swayze" became synonymous with stinking. Sentences appeared such as, "That toilet is just plain swayze" or "There's a terrible swayz coming from that room". So spread the fun and give "Swayze" or one of its variants a try.