OHIO STATE UNIVERSITY SOCCER CAMP

J recently attended a soccer camp at Ohio State University, in the Woody Hayes Athletic center, put on by the OSU Mens Soccer Team. OSU's mens team is usually in the top 5 in the nation and the guys really put on a good clinic. J had a lot of fun. These are just a few (kind of poor) pics I took of him running around.

Remember where your blessings come from

I'm proud of my family and thankful to God my Father for such a blessing. When it seems the world (or at least the USA) is going to hell in a hand basket, I look at His provision and love and am reminded of what is important and what is superfluous.
AMEN!

About the Buffalo, in case you cared

Overall dimensions:
Length = 634'10"
Beam = 68'00"
Depth = 40'00"
Capacity (tons) = 23,800 tons
Diesel engines horsepower = 7,200
Self-unloading boom = 251'06"

A site with interesting pics and history of the Buffalo.

http://www.boatnerd.com/pictures/fleet/buffalo.htm

The Buffalo (in Michigan)

I mostly grew up on Grosse Ile, in Michigan, an island in the Detroit River about 20 miles south of Detroit, between Trenton on the Michigan side and Amherstburg on the Canadian side. There are 2 bridges from the main land to the island. This is the north most bridge and is generally called "the toll bridge". The other one is....... yep, the free bridge. I came across this video of a freighter passing thru the open toll bridge and thought it was pretty interesting. I have not been back to Grosse Ile since I was in the Navy in 86 or 87. Watching this video makes me want to take a quick weekend trip to check out the old hood, etc.. Hope you enjoy the Buffalo as she wanders past enroute to pickup a load of iron orr.

Running Around

Apology

Like most red blooded Americans, I get worked up over things once in a while. I recently heard a basketball coach call it "passion". But occasionally the refs will tell to temper your passion. Well, my Father reminded me in much the same way yesterday evening. He did not actually tell me to "temper your passion", but instead reminded me of Who is in charge - of everything. The lession I learned (again) was to listen to my heavenly Father, to trust Him explicitly, and to always remember that He is in charge. No matter how you slice it, His will will be done (on earth as it is in heaven). Often the flesh we are wrapped in affects our weak little minds and gets us off track, causing us to look at the storm around us instead of looking at and trusting in Christ Jesus. When Jesus told Peter to exit the boat and walk to Him, across the raging water, Peter was doing fine until he looked away from Jesus and at the storm. Then Peter began to sink. I'm tired of sinking :-)

HAVA GREAT DAY

Politically incorrect? its my blog, i don't care

#1) Obama "stimulus plan". BOLOGNA, BULL, A LOAD OF _____. Obama "socialist nation transition plan" seems a lot more like it to me.

To help make a point, you should read and understand what Tax Freedom Day is. (Dad, if you are reading this, you are excluded. 50years of tax experience has it's benefits :-). As tax freedom day moves further and further out into the year, we move closer and closer to being a full fledged socialist nation. Something that I don't think our founding fathers had in mind, do you? What do I think should be done? Let businesses fail that are failing. Let the lawyers sue if those who got rich off of the failing businesses did so illegally in any way. Let the free market system work the way it is designed to do. But, no, our government, who's primary responsibility it is to protect us from invasion, has decided that no matter how you feel about it, they will freely take your money, and your kids' future earnings to (unsuccessfully I suspect) bail out and prop up broken companies because for some reason, our government thinks it would be too painful to let them fail. What is too painful is watching our nation turned into something it was never meant to be. What is too painful is watching truly clueless people talk about how this many billion or that many billions of dollars is going to fix all of our problems as a nation. yea, right.

Do you trust Obama, Biden, Clinton, et al to really know what to do? Do you trust a treasury secretary who forgot to pay his income taxes? Do you trust a man who promised "change" but has a vast majority of old Washington politicians in his administration? What a pitiful situation we are in.

I definitely have more whining to do but will have to do so later. Enjoy the rest of your day!

Poor correspondent

Well, as you can see, I won't be posting too often. I don't know if I just can't get motivated to post, or if I really have nothing to say.

Just a couple of things for today. First, a pic of our current dogs. Gracie is about 3yrs old now, she's the white Fox Terrier mix with black spots. Then, the relatively new addition to the family is Tiny, our Boston Terrier. Both are fanatical about laying in a spot of sun, but as sweet as Tiny looks, she always has to have the "best" spot and enjoys pushing Gracie out of the way. Just a side note on Bostons, they have terrible gas,, really. We have found a special concoction of rice, chicken or beef and veggies to cook up for her and it does help, a lot. So now her gas is mostly audible, but not quite so toxic. Thought you'd like to know.

Jake's basketball team is doing quite well. They won a tournament last week end and is playing in another right now. So far they have won their first two games, the first in OT 34-32 and the second in the waning seconds also by 2points. Jake has been playing soccer for almost 6years now (he's almost 11), so we've been to quite a few soccer games, but, I really think a tight basketball game is more stressful/exciting than the vast majority of soccer games. I know I'm biased, but more and more I see Jake stepping up to the plate and displaying real leadership qualities. He is an incredible blessing to our family, I could not more proud of him for sure!

I will try to write more tomorrow. J has a big game at 2pm against the Mason Comets Green, a select team from, yep, Mason. Gary, one of J's soccer team mates plays on that team so it will definitely be fun to see them both on the court tossing the ball versus kicking it! Good night and may God bless you. k