Our beige house

For those of you back home we thought we'd finally put some pictures of our furnished home up here. What I've realized after putting all these pictures on the computer is that our home is very beige. I guess we are the kind of people who need to be more adventurous with color.

Up until Saturday (2 days ago) we lived in this house with no blinds or curtains. We put a navy blue sheet on our bedroom window the night we moved in and just left all the other windows uncovered. I had thought that covering the windows would be a priority - we planned to do it right after buying the appliances....but somehow it just never seemed that important. We loved the windows and they brought color into our place a little. I just ignored the fact that the neighbors could see straight into our home. I really didn't even think about it.

Well we finally broke down and got temporary blinds on Saturday. We had wanted to get blinds before we left for Christmas but we weren't ready to buy real ones yet. All this time we had been resisting buying temporary ones because we couldn't stand the idea of spending money on something disposable. Finally, we decided to use a Home Depot gift card we had gotten for buying an energy star refrigerator and we got the temporary shades. They cost $60 total for the whole house. Yes, we're that cheap. I don't know why we didn't do it sooner. We'll leave these up for a good long time to make that $60 worth it!

So now we have privacy but our house is even MORE beige and I miss the windows and the color and light they brought.

So here are some pictures of the house before we covered it up with cheap ugly temporary blinds.





And if you want to see even more of the beige-ness, here's an album full of house pictures.

Our house

We get to meet her in a couple of weeks...

Our newest niece: Sophia

Sameer makes me laugh

The other day Sameer sent me an email that said only this:

"You've never seen a burrito as big as the one I am about to eat. Pray for me."

The humor broke the monotony of a very dull day.

As it turns out, he survived the burrito.

Let All Mortal Flesh Keep Silence

Let all mortal flesh keep silence,
And with fear and trembling stand;
Ponder nothing earthly minded,
For with blessing in His hand,
Christ our God to earth descendeth,
Our full homage to demand.

King of kings, yet born of Mary,
As of old on earth He stood,
Lord of lords, in human vesture,
In the body and the blood;
He will give to all the faithful
His own self for heavenly food.

Rank on rank the host of heaven
Spreads its vanguard on the way,
As the Light of light descendeth
From the realms of endless day,
That the powers of hell may vanish
As the darkness clears away.

At His feet the six wingèd seraph,
Cherubim with sleepless eye,
Veil their faces to the presence,
As with ceaseless voice they cry:
Alleluia, Alleluia
Alleluia, Lord Most High!

from the Liturgy of St. James (4th century)

Taking advantage of the University

Last night we went to hear Handel's Messiah at Duke Chapel. Thanks to my parents who played recordings of this quite often during my childhood it is very near to my heart. It is also extremely long and after it was over I had to promise Sameer that in the future we will only go to performances of "selections" or "highlights" of the Messiah.

In spite of the uncomfortable pews it was a perfect way to begin the Advent season. I couldn't find my CD of it this morning but thanks to the world wide web I am listening to various performances of my favorite selections online.

"Worthy is the Lamb that was slain, and hath redeemed us to God by his blood, to receive power, and riches, and wisdom, and strength, and honour, and glory, and blessing. Blessing and honour, glory and power be unto him that sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb, for ever and ever. Amen." Revelation 5:12,13

Missing the little pup

After our puppy sleepover (that involved more playing than sleeping) we had to put him in the neighbor's back yard in his make shift house with our blanket. It was so sad. We hated to leave him out there but the neighbor said someone was coming to pick him up that day. We worried about him the whole rainy day while we were at Duke but we hoped someone really had picked him up. We found out that our neighbor is severely allergic to dogs and that's why she left him outside.

When we got home he was sitting on our back patio pressed against our door and of course we brought him in. For about 20 seconds we considered keeping him but then neighbor came over and told us someone should be coming by that night to get him. We got to keep him for the evening until around 10:30 when a nice girl who seemed to really want him came and got him. It was a sad goodbye but we're very happy he found a home. We were so torn - we really wanted to keep him but we're gone for 10-12 hours a day and that's no way to raise a puppy.

We've been missing him ever since. He was such a sweet little thing.

puppy update

In the late afternoon we put him back outside with a blanket for a couple of hours. When we saw lights on at the neighbors' house we went over and talked to them. She said someone was coming to get him tomorrow and she had forgotten he was still in the backyard. We asked if we could keep him for the night and she heartily said yes.

No, we didn't get a dog

So we have this adorable puppy wrapped in a red blanket sleeping on the kitchen floor right now. Over the weekend we noticed that there were 3 adorable puppies learning how to walk in our neighbors' backyard. There is no fence between our yards so it seems more like we share a backyard. Last night I saw the three little ones cuddling and this morning they were there too. It's getting kind of cold now and it's been raining off and on. This morning while we were watching the puppies from the window we saw the neighbor come and pick up two of them and go inside. She left this one in the backyard. When we got home from church this little guy was still there all by himself. He was getting brave walking around and I was worried he would wander out to the street and get hit by a car. Sameer went out to visit him and a few minutes later it started raining. He (the puppy - not Sameer) started crying. We couldn't resist. One thing led to another. I held him in my arms for a while and he seemed so content. I rang their doorbell to see if they were home. All the lights were out. No one answered. We just couldn't leave this little guy out there in the rain without shelter so we brought him in and he's warm and happy; dreaming his puppy dreams. I left a note on their door. Hopefully we didn't ruin some grand dog training plot. I actually have a feeling that he's not their puppy - perhaps they are dog sitting. We told them once that we wanted to get a dog someday and they said they didn't like dogs....


So maybe we did the wrong thing. We couldn't resist. I know, I know - we should probably return him to the patio.

Last weekend

Roadtrip to New Haven. Little traffic. Many tolls. Sermons and Music. View of Manhattan. That smell in New Jersey. Crazy drivers in CT. Bakalava from Sahara. Christ Pres Coffeehouse. Happy reunions. Friendly faces. Buffalo wings from Archie Moore's. Tropical Storm Noel. Suddenly broken umbrella. Cold fingers. Beer at Richters. Lance and Cassie. Claire's Lithuanian coffee cake. The Wine Thief. The Green. The old man who wears the red hat. Autumn colors. Sunsets. The Owl Shop. BAR. Joel and Tiffany. Pizza with eggplant. White pie with mashed potatoes and bacon. Worship at Christ Presbyterian. Communion with the church. The walk to lunch after church. Drive to the top of East Rock. View of the haven. Koffee Too. Books. Copper Kitchen breakfast special. Watching squirrels. Walking through the green once more. Delightful. And it was only a weekend. And yes, that was quite a bit of eating for "only a weekend".

Sometimes I feel like I live in the zoo

From 8 to 5 on weekdays, at least. My "corner" of the office is almost completely surrounded by windows. I love that I face a wall of windows and that I can see the sky and trees. To my left are another 2 large windows that face an inside hallway of the Divinity School. A few times a week one of the people from Admissions will be giving visitors/prospective students a tour and they'll come and stand right in front of those windows for a few minutes. I'm sure she's telling them all about the Institute on Care at the End of Life (where I work) but as I sit there trying to make sure I'm exhibiting good posture and excellent typing skills I imagine that she's saying, "And here we have one of those strange office workers that has to wear two bulky wrist braces as she types..." and then they all just stand there for a while and I feel awkward and paralyzed and can understand why those monkeys at the zoo we visited last summer kept trying to hide.

The Bible Bus

The first Sunday morning that we lived here I saw a yellow school bus pull up to the house across the street from us and pick up a few kids. A man in a suit went up to the door and knocked. Then the kids came out. My first thought was, wow, what personalized service and isn't 9:00 kind of late for a school bus? Then I remembered that it was Sunday and we were getting ready to go and visit a church. Then I read the words on the side of the bus and realized it was a church bus. That bus comes here every Sunday morning and picks up those kids. I love seeing that bus.

**Update: The family who gets picked up by the "Bible Bus" just rang our doorbell, introduced themselves and invited us over to dinner at their place. They said a bunch of people from their church were coming over. I see them now going around to all the houses on the street. (we have no window coverings yet so it's really easy for us to spy on everyone and I'm sure they're spying on us too...) It's nice to see this kind of neighborly outreach going on. I think we'll go over and get to know our neighbors tonight.**

Security?

Everyone in our neighborhood seems to have a home-alarm system installed, with the reassuring little sign out front warning any prospective no-goods that they had better not come-a-thieving, because "This House is Protected by ADT!!" or some such.

A guy from an ADT competitor company - "Vector" - had come by and talked to Whitney before about getting one installed, you know, because he was terribly worried about our safety. Well, we talked about it, but thought, "nah - civil society is based on trust" (i.e., "We can't afford $50/month!!!!").

That didn't stop this concerned citizen from continuing to come by and leave Vector signs and literature on our door, reminding us that we could have the edge over any scurrilous curs who dared to breach our hallowed sanctuary and sully our utopian domescticity. Ok so that's not what the signs on our door actually said - but that's what they meant.

Anyway, so we came home from school today and found THIS inside our house:



Uh... did that guy just break in to our house to leave this thing here? At first I thought perhaps he shoved it through the door and it fell onto the carpet, but I don't think it fits through the door, and we found it way over by a piece of furniture a few feet away from the door.

I took a good look at that sign and wondered whether being an "authorized dealer" authorized this simp to trammel my haven. It advertised "Quality, Integrity, Customer Care" -- I think to be more accurate it should have read, "Vector - we KNOW crime..."

"Things that make you go hmmmm"

There are lots of things in North Carolina that make us go "hmmm..." I'd like to share with you this morning's "hmmmm...".

I was driving to work and listening to some random radio station that did NOT happen to be a Christian radio station. In between songs some church has a commercial slot where they share "wisdom and encouragement" with listeners. Today's went something like this (with soft piano music in the background): "Naomi thought God wanted a change in her life so she quit her job and started taking classes, reading her Bible and praying all day long. After a while she was discouraged because she wasn't sure what God wanted her to do with her life. Then her friend, a new believer, had a conversation with her and gave her this amazing piece of wisdom, 'Naomi, be patient. A pickle don't get made in a day.'"

That was it. Then the next song came on.

Water Conservation (on a lighter note)

One of the reasons that our home qualified as a "Green Home" is because we have one very special toilet. When we had our "walk through/homeowner orientation" with the builder, they pointed out that our toilet has two flush buttons. One for "solids," one for "liquids." It took me a second to understand what the guy was saying. It's a very special toilet indeed.

Our agent suggested we label the flush bottons "1" and "2" to avoid confusion. What do you think?

Analysis: Our Refrigerator

**I wrote this last Saturday but didn't post it because blogger wasn't allowing me to upload pictures for some reason.....so I'm posting it here even though this picture is awful. (as if the other pictures on our blog are great) What is that bright light in our freezer? It's kind of creepy.**



A picture of the happy fridge, as per Catherine's request. I guess the freezer doesn't look very different from the empty picture below but it does happen to contain the first piece of meat that has been brought into this home. We've been vegetarians at home since we moved in for reasons that were more financial than dietary. It's actually been great. Vegetarian recipes are fun and colorful. In the refrigerator you'll notice the eggs - those are the first eggs that have been brought into the house. I just haven't had occasion to use them yet but a spinach/pine nut quiche is on the menu this week so they were a must. At the top of the fridge is the first bottle of milk this kitchen has seen (wow, what a splurge at the grocery store this week - lots of firsts I had been avoiding for a while.) Also at the top of the fridge is one of our favorite treats: Fage yogurt* (Greek yogurt) with honey. We eat it with walnuts. It's delicious. I wish we could eat it everyday. What you can't see is the bottom drawer of the refrigerator. It is completely full of grapefruit, tangerines, oranges, lemons and limes. Sameer is developing a serious juice drinking problem. He squeezes it all by hand and it is excellent. It's bordering on excessive but I keep buying his citrus for him because I'm sure it's good for both of us.

*A note about Greek yogurt - I don't even like yogurt (it makes me gag) and I love this stuff. It's the best dessert. Last spring I was at this little store in New Haven looking for yogurt because someone had scared me about osteoporosis and the fact that I don't drink milk (don't worry - I eat a lot of dark green leafy vegetables). All they had was Fage yogurt and it looked weird so I didn't buy any but a week later I decided to try it and I am now a fan. It is strained so it's really thick and not watery like regular yogurt. Try it!! (You can find it at Whole Foods or Trader Joe's but it's way more expensive than your "everyday" yogurt)

Shopping

So, I was thinking that maybe I should go grocery shopping today. Not sure. We could always heat up that frozen spinach, sprinkle some lemon juice on it and wrap it in an old whole wheat tortilla. I'm sure that would be fine for dinner.

Suburbia: A Drought of Conscience

Our water restrictions are now pretty severe. Back in August, we could only water every other day - then it went to 2 days a week (Wednesdays and Saturdays) - then it went to Saturdays only (between 5 and 8). As of last Tuesday, we can no longer water our lawns AT ALL. People can water vegetable gardens with a hand held container on Saturdays between 5 and 8. That's it. No washing cars, no hosing down walkways, no serving water in restaurants except upon request (those luxuries were prohibited long ago). Unfortunately, even with all these restrictions, Durham's water usage has only gone down 16%. 16% !! We are entering a crisis. On the city website I found a current lake/river level graph that compared our current state to the drought in 1933-34 (Dust Bowl years). We see people continue to water because they want their grass to grow.

We would like our grass to grow too especially because we just seeded our backyard and we live on a hill. Without roots, our land will erode and void the structural warranty on our new home (and because when it rains here it pours, part of our backyard slides into the neighbor's backyard every time it rains.) So, we are not watering. But we do continue to take regular and long showers, prepare a lot of tea and coffee, use our dishwasher, etc. What we have really started realizing is how strongly we are gripped by a consumer mentality. Several people around us continue to water their lawns (by far the biggest source of water-waste in the present climate), just ignoring the restrictions altogether.......All of us to varying degrees are just thinking "I can have whatever I want and there will always be enough" - it is sickening. Meanwhile every day people are dying in Africa because they don't have clean water to DRINK. And we are concerned about our yards here. Ridiculous.

As Westerners - and especially Americans - most of us see our basic necessities this way - like a grocery store full of unending resources without any consideration for the way that NATURE and the ENTIRE HUMAN COMMUNITY should put limits on what we consume and how often and in what ways. From that perspective, we have surely succumbed to the social conditioning that continually urges us to equate luxury with necessity, and so in our self-deception we GRIEVE when we can't water our lawns, buy our next appliance that makes our lives easier, or improve our "standard of living" etc. We experience the obstacles to reckless consumption as the loss of a BASIC NECESSITY - as a plight that forces us to act to attain e.g., a car with air conditioning with similar relentlessness as we would expect someone from Somalia to pursue the next meal.

Surely a sense of guilt isn't the answer - guilt *alone* seems to just absolve us of responsibility by giving us a cathartic sense of "see - I get it! I care!" and then, once our smitten consciences are pacified, we just turn back to our normal lives of selfish uber-consumption. So yeah, guilt isn't enough, but it sure as hell is a good start.

"For we have brought nothing into the world, so we cannot take anything out of it either. If we have food and covering, with these we shall be content. But those who want to get rich fall into temptation and a snare and many foolish and harmful desires which plunge humanity into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil deeds, and some by longing for it have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs. Flee from these things!!!" (1 Tim. 6:6-11a).

Capitalistic consumption? Environmental stewardship? It's not a conservative or liberal thing. It's a Christian thing.

Three Years!!!

Happy anniversary to us (yesterday). We went out and enjoyed a delicious dinner at Rue Cler in the strangely desolate downtown Durham. The weird thing was that while there was nary a soul walking about on the streets, looking into the windows revealed that the patronage inside the shops and restaurants was quite lively! How did all those people get in there, if they're so afraid of the streets? They may have been holograms, but we resisted the urge to poke at them with our cutlery.

But before dinner we were people on a mission. It came in the form of an electronic communique, but instead of IT self-destructing in ten seconds, *I* (Sameer) self-destructed in ten seconds. For, it was a note from DHL saying that the present I had arranged to have delivered to Whitney at work - at 2 CHAPEL Drive - had instead gone to 2 CHIPLEY Court. Chipley? What the $#@!?

DHL guy 1: "Hey Earl, this here package says, it supposed-ta goto Duke Divinity School on 2 Chapel Drive... Where in tarnation is that? What the sam hill is a s-c-h-o-ol?"

DHL guy 2: "Heck if I know, Clive - let's just drop it off at this here place - it's in a different zipcode at a house steaduva school, but Chapel sounds kinda like Chipley, don't it? *Guffaw*"

Anyway, after unclenching my fist and looking around to check if anyone at divinity school could see the blackness of my heart at that particular moment, I broke the news to Whitney that I sent her something that she wasn't going to get. But oh yes she was. We decided to drive to the residence, which was in a rough part of town in a low income neighborhood in East Durham. We drove twenty minutes out of the way to the other end of town.

We drove through the neighborhood really slowly - I slid the seat back, flossed the wheel and tried to play it cool, bobbing my head in a hip-hop sort of way and looking tough, even though there wasn't any music playing in the car. As we rolled up on the house, we saw our package neatly laying against the front door of 2 CHIPLEY court. We got out of the car, and walked up to the door like we was just chillin' - but then we grabbed it from the doorstep and hustled back toward the car as some high school boys came up the street looking at us like, "Uh-uh, No you DID-NT!" But yes we did. We drove it home and got out the scissors and opened the box. And this is what was inside. Isn't it lovely?

Citrus

Sometimes Sameer likes to make fresh squeezed juice. I like it when he does this - especially when he shares.

Yard Work is Hard Work

We don't love our yard yet (although we like the view) - it mainly consists of hard clay, tons of rocks and black beetles that hop. How do you like our patio? It's a little small.

Countdown to Extinction

Well, we just returned from a long unproductive day of car shopping. It seems that for the past few weeks, we have spent every minute of our free time -- plus stealing several hours of NON-free time from more important things -- trying to find our first good car. By "good" I mean something with fewer than 160,000 miles on it with an engine that doesn't sound like a boot in a washing machine, all the external mirrors are still atached to the car, the trunk opens, and prayer that it won't explode when you get on the freeway is not absolutely necessary (although its never a bad idea).

In any case, after squandering several weekends already encountering very unreliable cars and even more unreliable car salesmen, after Whitney spent countless hours hunting down leads on the Internet and running loan calculators every night after work, after I went from being a month ahead to being a week behind in my coursework -- we were determined. WE ARE ABSOLUTELY, WITHOUT A DOUBT GOING TO DRIVE HOME IN OUR NEW (TO US) CAR TODAY!!!

So after a loooong morning at a local dealership, we took a 45 minute drive to a dealership in a neighboring city to see a Hyundai that seemed very promising (i.e., not a ticking time-bomb, see above), and we were very hopeful that this would be the car. The manager had called us that morning to tell us that he would be getting it ready for us to look at it and we had reviewed the Carfax, which looked really clean. So when we finally got there and talked to the sales people, we were almost positive that this would be our car, and we were on the verge of celebrating as we drove out to the lot to give it a once-over. The whole thing went over great... except the fact that they had already sold it to someone else 10 minutes before we arrived...

Utterly dejected and forlorn, we did what anyone would do - we bought two rakes and a bottle of wine... oh yeah, and a shovel. Anything to redeem the day.

P.S. The rakes are to prepare our barren yard for some much needed professional aeration and seeding. The shovel is to bury the bodies of a few used car salesmen. If you've read this far with anything like an empathic heart you know very well what the wine is for --- to drown our sorrows.

P.P.S. "What have you been driving if you don't have a car?" you ask? A good friend has been letting us borrow his 1989 Honda... the odometer reads 249,000 and counting and every time I look at another mile roll by on the counter, I think the following:

"Dang, Sameer, remember Megadeath's album Countdown to Extinction? Man, I pray that when this thing finally does explode on the freeway that my brain doesn't start playing "Symphony of Destruction" in my head. I hate it when bad speed metal (forgive the redundancy) gets stuck in my head. Actually, I think I'd rather have *actual* metal stuck in my head, which is I guess what would happen if this thing DID in fact explode right now..."

P.P.P.S. Okay now I'm rambling. And we haven't even popped the cork on that wine yet!!!

Autumn at last

1 point for Durham - good Farmer's Markets!

We should have just left the eggplant on the table;

it was much prettier there.

I'll leave the eggplant recipes to the experts.

New blog

Yay! Catherine has a blog!

My trip

Some people shouldn't drive while talking on a cell phone. Apparently I shouldn't walk while talking on a cell phone. Yesterday morning as I was making the long trek from the parking lot to the Divinity School I was talking to Sameer on the phone. I had just been telling him how tired I was when I started flying forward. I tried to stop and catch myself and figure out what has happening and why my legs were way behind. The next second I was face down a good few feet ahead of my last step. My phone flew out of my hand and broke into 3 pieces and both my shoes were off my feet way behind me. This was quite embarassing - and yet so funny I just had to share it. I really have no idea how it happened.

Hymn

Rejoice, the Lord is King!
Your Lord and King adore;
Rejoice, give thanks and sing,
and triumph evermore;
Lift up your heart, lift up your voice;
Rejoice, again I say, rejoice!

Jesus, the Savior, reigns,
the God of truth and love;
When He had purged our stains
He took His seat above;
Lift up your heart, lift up your voice;
Rejoice, again I say, rejoice!

His kingdom cannot fail,
He rules over earth and heav'n,
The keys of death and hell are to
our Jesus given;
Lift up your heart, lift up your voice;
Rejoice, again I say, rejoice!

He sits at God's right hand
till all His foes submit,
And bow to His command, and fall
beneath His feet:
Lift up your heart, lift up your voice;
Rejoice, again I say, rejoice!

Rejoice in glorious hope!
Our Lord, the Judge shall come,
And take His servants up
to their eternal home.
Lift up your heart, lift up your voice;
Rejoice, again I say, rejoice!

Charles Wesley, 1744

Well - lucky me - I didn't have to choose. I was subjected to both situations at once - inane pseudo-intellectual conversation between two people
who punctuate their sophomoric babbling with inappropriate displays of affection...

Wooja Radder?

Maddy liked to play the game "Would You Rather...." (affectionately known as "Wooja Radder?") with us when we were in Idaho this summer.

Here is a real life "Wooja Radder?" from school today.

While attempting to study, and forced to sit next to a
couple of college freshman -- would you rather:

1) that they are having what they think is a deep
discussion about, like, philosophy, and stuff, where,
like, they are totally thinking about stuff like
whether reality, like, totally, is like *real*, or if it
is just, like, your mind thinking stuff but it really,
like, is just your *MIND* and NOT real... whoa.

OR

2) that they are an ultra cutesy couple
who are talking to each other about how
one thinks the other is really cute, etc. etc.
interspersed with ridiculous displays of affection
that are completely unjustified by the context (e.g.,
I just got back from the bathroom, let's hug, or, I
finished reading this sentence, let's make out)...

We just broke the law

There is a bad drought going on throughout the Southeast. When we were staying with friends who had cable we heard about it on the news a few times and learned that it was illegal to water your lawn more than every other day. Before we moved into our house we did hear that Raleigh was enforcing drastic water restrictions but we still thought it was legal to water every other day in Durham.

We forgot to water all weekend - or maybe we didn't really forget - we just neglected to because it's a muddy inconvenience to water an oddly shaped back yard and "2" front yards with nothing but a hose. (Californians with sprinkler systems have no idea.....)

So when we got home from work tonight Sameer immediately started watering the lawn. I opened the mail and got an advertisement from a lawn care company and called them about aeration of our yard. The salesman asked if we had been watering our yard and I proudly said, "Oh yes, we're watering right now." Pause...Awkward silence.... "Well, I certainly don't want to encourage you to break the law. You really shouldn't be watering today," he said.

We looked it up and sure enough, Durham is on strict water restrictions. We may only water on Wednesdays and Saturdays between 5 and 9. Oops. We also read that all citizens are to report neighbors who are breaking the law by watering. So now we're in trouble. And so is our grass. But at least we don't have to feel guilty when our grass dies. We didn't like watering every other day anyway.

How is one to find out about these new laws when one does not have television? Is it a crime to not waste time in front of the tv?

New Home

Well after quite a tiring summer we closed on our home and moved in the same day - August 31st. It has been a relief to settle down and we are loving our place. It is much bigger and nicer than our last 3 apartments and sometimes we have a hard time believing that we actually get to stay here. I guess it feels like we're house sitting or renting or something. It's just plain luxurious after having lived in grad student housing last year. We really really loved our New Haven apartment but while we thought it was very charming and cozy, it was a bit grimy and it lacked the modern conveniences of a garbage disposal, dishwasher, laundry room etc.

We just got internet access here the other day so I wanted to post some pictures of our place. These are pre-furniture pictures taken the week before we moved in. I took the outside pictures today - as you will see, our backyard grass is not coming in at all like it is in the front yard.

Out of touch

The house where we're currently staying doesn't have internet access so we're at "Coffee World" catching up on email and all things internet. The coffee at this place reminds me of my college days when I would make a pot of cheap coffee and just let it sit there and then microwave it and drink it a few days later even though it was disgusting - I just needed the caffeine and I didn't care how it tasted. Well, the coffee at this place is worse than that. It's like drinking acid with a little cream and sugar. The Starbucks across the street doesn't have wireless so here we are.

We visited our soon to be house yesterday and it is all finished and beautiful. We're still kind of holding our breath about the closing and I won't believe it's ours until we get the key. All this moving and job changing we've done over the past couple of years would make any lender a little skeptical.

Sameer had his orientation at Duke last week and he starts classes on Monday. We've met a bunch of great people here already - in fact, we're staying with a really kind student named Melanie right now. She has very graciously opened her home up to us while the Givens have other guests in town. We still haven't found a church yet and I think we'll take some time visiting different ones before we settle - there are so many choices. So far we've visited a really vibrant Presbyterian church that is closer to the downtown area and then we visited an Episcopal church in Chapel Hill. Chapel Hill is a little too far away for us but the worship service was absolutely breathtaking. I have to say that I just love visiting different churches - it is so moving to see more and more of the body of Christ and to worship together with them. We're looking forward to tomorrow...

3 New Blogs

We've added 3 new blogs under "Friends and Family" - Chris & Heather Pelczar, Phil & Megan Camp, and Liz Ingham. Enjoy.

Our Hymn of the Week

Jesus Cast a Look on Me

Jesus cast a look on me,
Give me sweet simplicity
Make me poor and keep me low,
Seeking only Thee to know

All that feeds my busy pride,
Cast it evermore aside
Bid my will to Thine submit,
Lay me humbly at Thy feet

Make me like a little child,
Of my strength and wisdom spoiled
Seeing only in Thy light,
Walking only in Thy might

Leaning on Thy loving breast,
Where a weary soul can rest
Feeling well the peace of God,
Flowing from His precious blood

In this posture let me live,
And hosannas daily give
In this temper let me die,
And hosannas ever cry!

John Berridge, 1716-1793

A hymn for today...

All praise to God, who reigns above,
The God of all creation,
The God of wonders, power, and love,
The God of our salvation!
With healing balm my soul He fills,
The God who every sorrow stills,--
To God all praise and glory!

What God's almighty power hath made
His gracious mercy keepeth;
By morning dawn or evening shade
His watchful eye ne'er sleepeth;
Within the kingdom of His might
Lo, all is just and all is right,--
To God all praise and glory!

I cried to Him in time of need:
Lord God, oh, hear my calling!
For death He gave me life indeed
And kept my feet from falling.
For this my thanks shall endless be;
Oh, thank Him, thank our God, with me,--
To God all praise and glory!

The Lord forsaketh not His flock,
His chosen generation;
He is their Refuge and their Rock,
Their Peace and their Salvation.
As with a mother's tender hand
He leads His own, His chosen band,--
To God all praise and glory!

Ye who confess Christ's holy name,
To God give praise and glory!
Ye who the Father's power proclaim,
To God give praise and glory!
All idols under foot be trod,
The Lord is God! The Lord is God!
To God all praise and glory!

Then come before His presence now
And banish fear and sadness;
To your Redeemer pay your vow
And sing with joy and gladness:
Though great distress my soul befell,
The Lord, my God, did all things well,--
To God all praise and glory!

Johann J. Schuetz, 1640-1690

My Sameer, isn't he talented?!?

We're sitting here in our Hampton Inn Hotel room that we credit to our 3rd successful Priceline experience. (We credit the above picture to a fun night out with Danny, Lindsay, Tracie & Doug - someone was bragging about being able to hold a spoon on their nose, so Sameer one-upped them, promising he could hold one with his forehead...) We've been living with people since July 2nd - first with Sameer's parents - then with mine and then with the Givens family. We've spent a lot of time with people this summer and it's been absolutely wonderful.

There's something about having our own little space though that is so refreshing and relaxing. This little hotel room has given me the best nights of sleep I've had for months. The free air conditioning probably has something to do with that. (We had a record breaking heat wave here in Durham last week - we almost melted, literally.)

As soon as we got here I started my job and we began looking for a house. We found one quickly and we're supposed to close on August 31st if everything goes smoothly. Somewhere in the middle of that Sameer came down with a really bad inner ear infection that caused severe vertigo. Poor guy! I have never seen him so sick. Needless to say, it was a hard transition to Durham.

However, he is now climbing out of it and starting to be his old self. His verbose old self. So, if you dare, check out his new blog: Theoblogical Investigations It will serve as his ThD journal so if you're curious about what Sameer is doing/thinking about/studying, here you go! Just make sure you've got your thinking cap on and you have a quiet place to read.

Idaho Album

Pictures of our week in Idaho:

Idaho Summer 2007

We're staying in a hotel and Sameer's watching a Jet Li movie (not really my thing) so I suppose I'll organize our pictures and update the blog this afternoon.

Click on the photo if you want to see our "house" album.

THE HOUSE

Transition

6 weeks down, 3 weeks to go.

We've been living out of suitcases for 6 weeks now. If everything goes smoothly we'll be in this house by August 31st.