Sept26-30,2010

days in the life of a

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September 2010

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September 26, 2010

UNABLE TO RESUSCITATE

The call came on my cell phone as I was driving into town. It is rare that I get a call on my cell phone and I am adamant about not driving and talking on the phone at the same time, but my curiosity got the better of me and I dug my phone out of my purse to see who it was.

Data Doctors lab in Arizona...where my injured external hard drive has been undergoing a delicate surgical-type procedure to recover my photos from the last 2 years.

They've been calling me every few days with updates on the procedure and the last update I had been given was they were still looking for $210 in parts (in itself ridiculous, since a brand new drive was only about $70 when I bought it a couple of years ago).

I have to insert here that, although very frustrating, the whole situation has been kind of amusing. Data Doctors take their business very seriously, so seriously that sometimes it seems that they are operating on real live people instead of electronic devices. They even refer to my hard drive as the "patient." Now that's a little weird to me...

But this time the phone call was different. It was a woman and I could tell by her voice it was not good news.

She even (no, I am not making this up!!!) asked if I was in a safe place where we could talk. So I pulled the car into a parking lot and she gently broke the news to me.

The drive was DEAD. Even the highly-skilled Data Doctors, despite their valiant efforts, were unable to resuscitate it, even temporarily, to recover the data (aka my photos).

I don't know how she thought I was going to react....break down in a crumpled mass of sobs or what?

IT'S AN ELECTRONIC DEVICE, for crying out loud...NOT A BELOVED FAMILY MEMBER!!!

Of course I'm aggravated and frustrated and annoyed and disappointed, but I'm certainly not grieving!

The good news is they are not going to charge me the extra $950 it was going to cost to retrieve my photos.

The bad news is, obviously, the photos are forever lost. Well, they really aren't "lost" because I know exactly where they are, but (in her words) "our present technology is just not sophisticated enough to recover data with this type of extensive damage."

The box with the corpse arrived back at my house this week.

Apparently me clumsily dropping it on the kitchen floor caused the drive to sustain "severe physical damage" (sure doesn't look that way, does it?) which proved to be fatal.

All is not lost. Dana has DVD copies of photos I took of the grandbabies which she is allowing me to copy. Anique and Kamaron have wedding photos from the photographer which I'm hoping they will let me copy as well.

As for my safari photos, my Land Rover friend and fellow Nikon photographer Sascha is graciously sending me a DVD of the photos she took, many of which will be just like mine since we were standing only a couple of feet apart photographing the same animals. We even shared camera lenses several times, so I have a feeling she will have very similar shots to mine.

I still had our vacation photos on my SD card and I have hard copies of my India photos. The rest of the photos are not all that important.

They are only photos.

I shall survive.

But my hard drive was not so lucky. May it rest in peace.

(Actually, the drive itself is still under warranty so I'm sending the corpse off to Western Digital for a replacement drive. Just in case you're wondering where hard drives go after they expire...)

September 27, 2010

ANSWERED PRAYER

"Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything,

by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving,

present your requests to God."

Philippians 4:6

For over 2 years, I've been praying for God to grant me my heart's desire.

Prayer is a mysterious thing, one of the most incredible gifts God has given His children. But it sometimes takes me through a rollercoaster of emotions.

There were seasons that I just knew God was hearing me and the glorious answer was just beyond the horizon. There were other seasons when I wondered if He was getting my message or just getting tired of my same old prayer. And then there were seasons when I honestly doubted if He was really listening at all.

I know in my heart of hearts that God ALWAYS hears my prayers. The Bible promises that and I know that it is true.

Once in awhile, in my weakness and humanness, I allowed doubt to creep in and my faith was a little shaky and I didn't see God working at all. Those were gloomy and joyless times. But thankfully God saw me through those brief seasons and gave me encouragement and hope and assurance that He was indeed still at work orchestrating the details in His own time.

I'm not patient. But I kept praying, even through the times I wondered if He was even listening, desperately hanging onto His promises.

And then, after two long years of watching and waiting and hoping and praying...

...GOD ANSWERED!!!

God, in His own wisdom and incredible timing, granted the deepest desire of my heart!!!

I can't disclose all the details yet, but let me just say that BIG CHANGES are on the horizon!

And I am PRAISING GOD for answered prayer!!!

"Don't fret or worry. Instead of worrying, pray.

Let petitions and praises shape your worries into prayers,

letting God know your concerns.

Before you know it,..."

(I LOVE this next part!...)

"... a sense of God's wholeness, everything coming together for good,

will come and settle you down.

It's wonderful what happens when Christ displaces worry

at the center of your life."

Philippians 4:6-7 (The Message)

September 28, 2010

BLAST FROM THE PAST

Looking through some old photos, I found a couple that put a smile on my face.

This one was taken in early 1992.

Kyler was 3, Kamaron 5, Kristoffer 9, and Emily 7. The little girl in the pink pajamas is Megan Smith, a friend of Emily's who also went to our church.

I rarely let the kids have a friend spend the night. It was just too much...with 4 rowdy kids of my own, the last thing I needed was MORE KIDS! But every once in awhile I gave in, and this is one of the few sleepovers we had at our house.

I just love how happy and carefree the children were! Those were some great times!!!

And Mama took this photo in Cracker Barrel in October 1991.

That's Kara K. beside Kamaron (looking a little ghostly here...) on the far left. I had just picked them up from kindergarten and taken them out to Cracker Barrel for lunch. I don't know why Emily is with us (she should have been in school!), but there's little Kyler in his booster seat on the right playing with his straw paper.

Pay no attention to the big-haired lady in red! Even the stern old man in the picture on the wall above doesn't approve of that hairstyle. WHAT WAS I THINKING???!!!

Emily's got her own poodle-pouf too...guess we were into the curly look those days.

Just a little photo blast from the past for your Tuesday!

September 29, 2010

RECORDS

The growing season is over.

And while the fresh produce was delicious and healthy, it was also a whole lot of work and I am always glad to see the garden (and Kim and me!) getting a well-earned winter rest.

It was a record-setting season...very hot and, after the flooding in late spring, very dry.

Our soybean fields surrounding our home have been harvested.

All is brown and barren...

...and once more we can look out our windows and see for miles and miles.

Just had a college flashback...

"I can see for miles and miles, I can see for miles and miles, I can see for miles and miles and miles and miles and miles....oh, yea..."

Love The Who!!! I was crazy over their records...

Oh, yeah...speaking of records, back to the topic at hand.

Although our bean yields were about average (for which we are very thankful, considering the extremely dry summer), we did set two records this harvest season.

I'm using "we" very loosely here, since neither Kim or I had any control over either.

First of all, never in our 28 years of farming out here has Ghost Rider gotten our fields harvested before the end of September. He even had 4 days to spare!

It was our earliest harvest ever.

And, we sold our early harvest for a record price (for us) of $10.73/bushel. Twenty years ago or so we did sell beans for over $9, but since then we've pretty much gotten the average market price.

Not that it really matters that much. Our harvest money is bonus money, a little extra for Christmas shopping.

A record-setting harvest is over, and now I'm ready to settle into cozy autumn!

September 30, 2010

WORK THAT CAMERA

My little 4 1/2 year old friend Ashley spent one day this week with me. Every once in awhile her mommy shares her with me for a play date together!

Ashley loves being photographed, so as part of the day's entertainment we did a little photo shoot.

It was great fun for both of us...she got to model and I got to practice my portrait photography skills.

Let me tell you, this little girl knows how to work the camera!

She brought a couple of costumes, but decided they were much too scratchy to wear for long. Oh, the burden of being a model!

Of course, no day keeping Ashley is complete without a stop at Mickey D's for a Strawberry Shortcake Happy Meal. I haven't eaten at McDonald's since the last time I kept Ashley...not my eatery of choice...