boston commoner.

welcome home

I haven’t seen my poor little apartment all week. I have been home helping my mom, who has her own busy schedule at this time of year, by watching my younger brother in the evenings. It doesn’t make sense to go back to Boston just to sleep and wake and come back here at 8am, so I’ve been sleeping here, instead. Saves gas money and morning aggrevation. Kind of. Anyway, a couple of days ago I caught the tail-end of a news report about an apartment building that burnt down in Boston since I’ve been away. I seriously wondered for a while if it was my building. I’m still not sure it wasn’t. If it were, it would make last weekend’s fiasco look like a walk in the park. But we’ll cross that bridge if we come to it… (more…)

Here is a recent picture of my Pastor’s family (or, at least, part of it). The old, bearded man is Pastor Bill. The pretty, much younger-looking woman is his charming wife, Deb. The tall, handsome, still younger man is Dave, their youngest son (the two older brothers are long gone and married; I’ve never met them, but I’m sure they’re as great as the rest of the Edmondsons). And last, but certainly not least, is the baby of the family, Linda. She is delightful, and always invites me for Sunday lunch, even when her parents don’t ;o)

These are great people. Pray for them!

It was one just of those weekends. We’ve all had them. Some more than others, and some to greater extents. At any rate, we can all relate to those days, weeks, months, in which it seems nothing will jive, when life has cosmically alligned the great bulk of the month’s responsabilities with a series curve balls and minor, but time-consuming inconveniences to converge on one important weekend. And even though you volunteered yourself for most of those responsabilities, you didn’t see it coming. It hits you hard, several times, sqaure in the nose, until it runs out of destructible tissue and decides to attack your ears, eyes, jaw bone… When it decides you’re almost beyond suffering, it comes in for a final blow to the temple, but by then you’re not really feeling it anymore.

My temple blow came last night on my way home from our Sunday evening Bible studies, in the form of a red battery light on my dashboard, a rather unorthodox “clunk” under my hood, and an overheated engine. We were in Allston, at that point. The tow cost 150 smackers. (more…)

Well, Lisa is out of the hospital, as many of you already know. It sounds as though she’s doing very well, but will need another, smaller surgery at some point in the future to remove a small remnant from the tumor. For those of you who did not receive her e-mail on the subject, I’ve included it below. (more…)

1) A Miracle on 34th Street (Admittedly not my favorite, or even a holiday necessity, but I needed a 10th, and we have to start somewhere.)

2) Frosty the Snowman (“Happy… B-b-birth-day!”)

3) Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer (If only to make fun of the wool-and-clay animee.)

4) The Homecoming (A Walton Family Christmas…”G’night, John-Boy!”)

5) Scrooge (The Albert Finney version, of course.)

6) White Christmas (Because Bing Crosby looks like my Grampa.)

7) How the Grinch Stole Christmas (MUST be the old-school version, complete with songs and funky, 70’s-style, psychadelic color schemes.)

8) Merry Christmas, Charlie Brown (“Loo, loo, LOOOOO, loo, loo, LOO LOO loo (gasp) LOO LOO LOOOOOOO loo loo loo loooo…”)

9) It’s a Wonderful Life (Jimmy Stewart is my hero.)

10) And last but definitely not least… A Christmas Story (“You’ll shoot you’re eye out, kid!”… “Jinger Bears, Jinger Bears, Jinger Are da Raaaay!”…I could go on…and on and on…this is my all-time favorite Christmas Comedy Classic. It just isn’t Christmas with Ralphy.)