Great Day

I had a great day in Pattaya. Completely un-scheduled, no appointments, no agendas, no objectives. What a blessing that is. I was able to watch a few of the World Cup Grand Prix Races, and walk around taking photographs. I was fortunate to capture this nice photograph of this cute little girl.

I am so grateful to be able to experience life and interesting people in so many places in the world.

Thailand, Green Stuff, Grand Prix

Well, I'm back in the land of smiles. It was a long, tiring trip but it went without a hitch. It was approximately 39 hours of travel from checking in to the airport in Houston to checking into the hotel in Pattaya. I barely had the energy to walk down the street for dinner. But the prospects of seeing the friendly people there at the restaurant and eating my favorite meal (fried sea bass with chili sauce) propelled me.

I was very pleased to see that they are on the last day of the World Cup Grand Prix Jet Ski competition, right here just a few blocks from the hotel. It is Sunday so the shop is closed and I have a day to recuperate. I get to go watch the races today! Wow, what an excellent, unexpected bonus!

I decided to try a new dish from the breakfast buffet today. I had seen it for some time at almost every breakfast buffet in Thailand, but it never appealed to me. It is thick slices of bread kept in a steamer, with a large bowl of green gooey looking stuff sitting next to it. I rarely see anyone get it, but I assumed one was supposed to get a slice or two of bread and spread some of the green stuff on it. The "stuff" looked to have the consistency of pudding and it had a homogenous pale green color. I was not sure if it would be spicy, salty, or sweet in flavor. Things are not always as they seem in foreign countries. Today I decided to try it. I understood why the bread was sliced thick, the steam made it so soft that it almost came apart when I picked it up. I slopped a blob of green stuff on it. I looked around to see if anyone was watching me, not certain if I was doing this right. After all, I wasn't even certain if the bread and goo were intended to go together. I could have been doing the equivalent of pouring maple syrup on spaghetti noodles, or putting ketchup on pancakes. I sat down, cut off a piece of the bread-goo combination, put it in my mouth, and it was...delicious. It was kind of a vanilla pudding flavor. I was too full for seconds, but I will get some more tomorrow.
Now I'm off to the gym and then off to the boat races!

Pile it On

What a day I had yesterday !
I am not saying that everything went wrong or I had a lousy day, I just had an "action packed" day that challenged my new resolve to keep focused on God and not get stressed-out or beaten down by the struggles of life. The pressures were actually due to having plentiful well-paying work, it just got a little overwhelming, like drinking from a fire hydrant.
Let me make a list and see if I can raise your blood pressure, I use terms like "client 1, etc." to avoid any legal issues:
1. Arrived at the office at 7:00 a.m. to wrap up details and attend a meeting for client 1 for project 1 so I could leave for my trip to Thailand for client 2 and client 3 for project 2.
2. At 7:10 I discovered that client 1 had an urgent project (project 3) for which I was qualified to do. It likely involved a trip to Vietnam in addition to evaluating numerous reports in the next several hours and days.
3. Went to meeting at 8:30 am, spent approximately 30 minutes defending my calculations to several very experienced Asian professionals.
4. At 10:00 am, apologized to meeting chairman for leaving meeting early to attend other meeting to discuss project 3 and project 4.
5. At 10:15 checked email between meetings and found out from distributor that I had to re-master the dvd for "Spirits Among Us" before leaving for Thailand in order to meet the January release date. I had made a mistake on the dvd I had sent earlier.
6. At 10:30 met with client 1 to discuss project 3 and 4. Found out that I may need to fit in a trip to Vietnam while I was in Thailand working on project 2. Also discovered that I needed to prepare a proposal within the next few hours to do project 3 and contact vendors to verify support for project 3.

Wait a minute! I just decided that it is not nice for me to do this to you. To wrap it up, the remainder of the day, which lasted until 6:00 pm went along the same lines as what you see in list items 1 through 6. I rushed from the office to the movie theater to have a date with my wife, which was a very welcome break from the hectic day. I worked until 2:00 a.m. after we came home from the movie so I could finish up the most urgent work. Then I woke up at 7:20 am so I could see the kids off to school and do the remaining work before leaving on my trip. Are you nice and relaxed now?

Now I am in the Los Angeles airport for a 5 hour layover. Five hours.

So what is the point of this rambling? Yesterday I called my client/co-worker/friend/counselor/brother in Christ to vent all my frustrations. He said, "great, here is an opportunity to see if you really believe Romans 8:28 as you say you do." He was correct. I had a paradigm shift at that point. I realized that:
a) I was stressed because I had bountiful work opportunities, even during a recession
and b) God would work out the "unfortunate events" for good, since I do love Him and I am called to His purpose.

My life is not "easy" but it is very good. God is very good to me. While I don't pray that those reading this blog are put through undue trials, I do pray that He blesses you through experiences that help you to grow nearer to Him.

I need to write a funny post, this one was too serious!

Renaissance Festival

We had a surprise event yesterday. We went to the Texas Renaissance Festival. A friend of ours had two free tickets, so we only had to buy two more for the whole family to go. As it turned out, our neighbors were going too, so we met up there and had a fun time.
The first three images you see below are of Megan on the bungee cord-trampoline device that gives you the ability to jump very, very high in the air. I didn't catch the name of the thing. You see from the sequence of shots that she starts with apprehension and ends with uncontrolled laugther.






The second three shots are of my son on the same device. You can see he had no fear. He immediately started doing flips. I think he spun three times in one of the jumps. I believe he had fun.





The following are a couple random shots, including our neighbor's daughter getting her head chopped off. It was a different kind of event, with different kind of people, and all very fun.

Thanks

We are in the fast-paced holiday season now. Once Halloween arrives it seems (to me) that time accelerates until we get to New Year's day. It is a great time of year, I wish it lasted longer. We just had our Thanksgiving celebration. We had my parents, my wife's parents, my nephew and his friend over to our house. We ate more than necessary. It was a nice time to spend together. I can't make a complete list of everything that I thank God for, but here are a few things that come to mind:
1. A wife to spend my life with
2. Two kids to experience life with
3. No major accidents or illnessess
4. Time to spend with my parents and in-laws
5. Plenty of good-paying work (even during tough economic times)
6. A growing relationship with God through Jesus Christ
7. Experiences and friends all around the world

I pray that I never forget to be thankful.

Happy Thanksgiving, enjoy the Holiday season!

Honor

We had a great evening. Our daughter was inducted into the National Junior Honor Society. We are proud parents. Not proud in the sense that her accomplishment reflects on us, or is proof that we are good parents. We are proud that she has worked hard and put her best into her schoolwork. She used her time wisely to do the job at hand (schoolwork) to the best of her ability. We are so pleased that she is honored for her dedication and accomplishment.
In an era where people become "celebrities" because their father is rich and they are spoiled, it is great to see a bunch of young boys and girls get recognized for doing their best at something that will have a positive impact on their lives and the lives of the community.

I Liked Waiting

For the first time, I actually was happy about having to wait in line. I went to the voting location at my normal time, 7:00 a.m. I have been voting there since we moved here in 1996. I have never, ever had to wait in any line. Today the line ran out from the voting room out nearly to the street. There were around 80 people in line when I got there, and almost that many when I left 40 minutes later. I did not grumble about having to wait, I was happy to see that people were exercising the privilege to vote.
I am definitely not a political activist, but I have to say that I encourage everyone who has not already done so, to go stand in a long line, then vote of course. I also encourage people to look beyond the marketing tactics and look at voting records, to see what these candidates are really all about.