Saturday, September 13, 2008

The sticks

Tomorrow we'll return from Pocahontas. It really was a nice trip. My grandpa's health is really not the best, but he was in a great mood and told all of his funny jokes (even though I think Addison may have learned some new fun words). Pocahontas is interesting. It's really pretty, but it's definitely another world. Have you ever heard of a dry county? That means no alcohol in the whole county. We were at an Italian restaurant and the people at the table over brought their own wine in a paper bag. We passed a sporting goods shop and I thought "that's kind of weird for here," but I quickly realized that a sporting goods store is not sporting equipment. Well it is, but not footballs and jockstraps. Sporting goods = rifles, ammo and other hunting things. Heh.

I always ask to visit my great-uncle Gary's house because he is awesome. He has one of those great, thick accents, a pet raccoon and he spends the day tinkering around with tractors and other engines. His latest venture, though, is creating bombs (out of pop bottles, toilet cleaner and foil) and shooting off potato guns. He really is one of the sweetest, most lovable old guys out there. I don't think he'll be the next unibomber. He's too sweet.

Addison did pretty good on this trip. The car ride was much better than our last car trip to Colorado, thanks to this lovely device we bought: The portable dvd player. My daughter is probably quite a bit dumber than she was a few days ago due to the large quantity of Barneys and Thomases, but at least I didn't have to turn around in the car every 5 minutes to hand her a different toy. She's been testing me a little bit more with the new audience we have watching, but no big meltdowns. My dad's been in DC these past few months, finishing up his 29 year Army career, so Addison hasn't seen her gramps that much (he was in Afghanistan all of last year). You can't control how your kids act (duh) but it always made me feel kinda guilty when she was standoffish with my dad. He was here with us this weekend and she's been really sweet with him, giving him hugs and kisses and stuff.

I am feeling really stressed out about this hurricane stuff. I am just feeling really sorry for all the people whose lives are destroyed because of a storm. I know God works everything out for good, but why does He allow these storms to happen? I can understand how sin affects everyone, not just the person sinning, but storms aren't caused from sin. It's a weather pattern. It just doesn't seem right. Don't get me wrong, I'm not doubting God's love; I just get confused when I see such massive destruction. Does one of my smarter, more theological inclined readers have a good answer?

I am tempted to never stay at a Howard Johnson motel ever again. I saw on Fox News that one Howard Johnson motel in Texas tripled their rates this weekend because of the massive influx of people headed North. Um, isn't that price gouging and isn't that illegal? I hope someone sues the crap out of Howard Johnson if this is indeed true. I was frustrated to hear that so many people stayed in Galveston, even though the National Weather Service warned that Death was imminent. Well how can they leave if they're getting royally screwed by hotel chains?

Night night my friends.

2 comments:

lgraves said...

about the hurricane, that ticks me off too. why prey on those suffering?

Amanda said...

Hey! My family in Houston turned out fine. They all migrated up to stay with my aunt Melva. My dad called at about 3am that night and they all said they were doing fine. But poor Galveston! We spent SO many summers there and I talked to my mom yesterday and she would say, "Remember the (insert place here)?" And I'd say, "yah." and she'd say. "Gone!" We did this a couple times before I got depressed and moved on! Keep Texas in your prayers though because know they are having lots of rain and they are anticipating lots of floods. So, it's not over yet. Glad to hear you had a good time in AR. Aww..if we still lived there you could have stopped by!