Habits

As it has been over a month since my last blog posting, I have been thinking a lot about habits.  There are good habits such as regular prayer as I have been reading about in the book "Confessions of a Prayer Slacker" by Diane Moody. There are bad habits such as smoking.  Trying to write this blog has been a study of habits for me.  When I am doing the blog weekly it is an easy habit to keep up, but when I am home and there is little to talk about since I am actually talking to most of you I don't do it and when I try to start back up it is a struggle to find my blog voice again.  Also many of you have pointed out that I have not been in the habit of doing the Barnabas Bear newsletters or stories after the first year.

So I pledge to do a better job of keeping in the habit of my blogs and including Barnabas this year.

The trip home this year was again a great joy and chance to recharge my batteries as I commit to another two years (the max allowed through the United Methodist Individual Voluntary Missionary program).  I got to eat some really great food, spend some wonderful time with my friends.  In fact my first weekend back I got to spend with some of the United Methodist Men as they held their annual turkey fry fundraiser.  This is the type of fundraiser I always enjoyed the most because it was as much about fellowship as it is about raising funds.  The men getting together and spending time doing something.



I also got to spend some time with friends seeing movies and getting to play games like Pictionary and Settlers of Catan.  While I don't walk as much when I am home as I do here in Tanzania I did get a couple of great walks in with my dad's small men's group on Saturdays in the park.  Don't get misled by their age, the guys walk.  Over six miles in two hours every Saturday and up and down some pretty steep hills.  Between the cold, the hills and the fact they walk for pace whereas I normally walk avoiding obstacles like big holes in the sidewalk I had to catch my breath a couple of times with them.

I also spent some time watching TV catching up on some comedies and watching the final season of Justified.  I also found a new program I hope to keep up with during my visits home called Blindspot.  A lot of intrigue in that one which I like.  And yes I got caught up on Tiny House Nation on the FYI network to look for some new ideas for the Tiny House Tanzania episodes here.  Still hope they get wind of my homage and give me some creds.

While home I got celebrate my dad's 80th and mom's 75th birthday with over a hundred of their friends at the church.  It was great to see so many folks come out to see them.  The amazing part is church wide we just put the announcement in the bulletin for a couple of weeks and how many folks saw, read and marked out time to visit with them.

Also got some time to work on my dad's office replacing light fixtures and light bulbs.  Mom and I made a messenger bag out some of the old cement bags I had washed from Tanzania. 
I made mom a small table to sit beside her rocker in the Sunroom that used up some of the tiles I bought in Tanzania during my 2006 trip. 

All of this while the cat investigated everything we did from sewing to laundry.
Then one of the last things I did was clean out dad's old wire boxes in the garage.  Where I found he was still hoarding some very old computer artifacts like 5 1/4, 3 1/2, zip files and a black and white palm pilot. 

I also got to speak to great groups and deliver a couple of sermons.  The final of which was at my home church Mauldin United Methodist.  If you are so inclined and want to hear it you can find it at the following address:

If you are impatient and want to skip ahead to the sermon part it starts right after Froggy's children sermon which starts at 32:18 and since I give kudos to that in my sermon you really should start there. 

Now I am back where I have been getting used to the mid 80 temperatures, high humidity to boot and walking everywhere again.  Since being back I have managed to walk over 7 miles on 6 days and the others were normally cut short by rain days or driving six hours between Arusha and Singida.  On Monday I get back to the village and start the real work again. 

I appreciate so much the habits many of you have displayed at reading my blogs, commenting on things, contributing money and praying for me.  Asante-Thank you.

Location: Singida, Tanzania

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