Happy Friday the 13th. No bad luck here. I'm alive and well and so is my family, so what more could I ask for? Well ----- I guess I could ask that it wasn't dropping freezing rain although I'm not sure that isn't just rain. It is 33 degrees outside and the rain is a "light rain" according to my weather channel app. That is a far cry from the 65 we had yesterday.

My backyard critters are happier this morning since they have food. I didn't get to the birdfood store yesterday but they still have full feeders of sunflower seed. For the squirrels, their challenge is to be able to climb the wet, cold metal poles. They have kind of been like yo yo's this morning; climbing up and sliding down. It's fun to watch. It might have to be a two coffee pot morning so I can set out here and watch my birds etc. The problem though is that it is cooler out here than is totally comfortable. I keep the sliding glass door open from the family room into the sunporch but that robs the house of heat and the temperature is still only 57 degrees out here. That isn't bad for me because I'm always warm natured but I do get chilly sitting here.

As I look around the yard I see the winds have knocked down several small branches that I need to clean up when it quits raining. I also need to cut the hydrangeas back to the ground. I realize that we are only three weeks into winter but spring will get here before we know it. Now that I am retired I will have a lot more time to work outside this spring. The biggest hurdle will be getting my butt out of the chair and actually doing the work.

I think today I need to bring up the containers and take down the Christmas tree. We didn't have time to do it before we left on vacation and we have only been home a couple of days now, but it is time to get it down and put things back in their place. It shouldn't take too long, it is just the getting the tree back down to the basement and put up in the storage. We have so much Christmas stuff. At one point in our lives, Ms. Kate put up several trees and it was a chore and a half to get all of the stuff out and then put back away. But, we only put up one this year and hardly any other decorations. I have already taken down the outside stuff and put that where it belongs.

Here we are at another weekend and God has blessed us all week and protected us. We need to decide where we are going to go worship this weekend. There are lots of churches out there to choose from, we just need to start walking in the door to some of them and try them out. After all --- I've always said that God doesn't have a denomination. But, Ms. Kate and I are traditional in our theology and we like a structured worship service verses what folks call "contemporary services". Besides, we are just "biding our time" until it is appropriate for us to return to Ft. Branch to worship at the churches that I pastored.

Take time this weekend to give honorand glory to God and give thanks for the salvation that has been provided for you through the sacrifice and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Peace.