Squirll the other, other white meat

So apparently squirrel is not only edible but seen as a delicacy in some parts of the world, say like in NJ!! Man I would have thought that squirrel eating was being practiced in"certain parts" of the US, but NJ? Well that there is reason number 25 I will not live in NJ. SO how do you like your squirrel in a stew, broiled, or over a salad? Which do you like better flying, Red tail, or grey?
NEW YORK (AFP) - Squirrel eaters in the US state of New Jersey have been told that the bushy-tailed rodents are likely safe to eat, after earlier being advised the unlikely delicacies could contain toxic metals.
The Environmental Protection Agency said earlier this year it had discovered high levels of lead in a squirrel taken from near a waste dump in the Ringwood area and advised people to eat the rodents no more than twice a week.
Officials have now said the test results were an error.
"A blender that was used to process the tissues into usable samples was defective and was identified as the source of the lead contamination," the Environmental Protection Agency said in a statement dated Monday.
The New Jersey Division of Fish and Wildlife describes squirrel as "good table fare," offering recipes for squirrel chowder, stew and barbecue

Update on Charity

God is totally awesome! Yes I saw some amazing stuff in India, but I guess it hits home when you see God answer requests that you have agonized and cried over for many days and nights. Charity is beginning to do so much better, THANK YOU GOD.
(Information from a phone call from Jeremy to Phil, Hope I get all the facts straight here. There are a lot of positive things going on I don’t think I succeed in reviewing all of them.) Anytime Charity can put more than one good day together with another is cause for great rejoicing. Jeremy is in Lincoln with Charity, while Sylvia and I with Sofia are in Kansas City. Sofia seems to be enjoying the visit in KC with grandpa and grandma. Jeremy says Charity was doing the following: Charity didn’t have any pain today. That’s getting close to a week now where I don’t think she has had any extra narcotics except for the Fentanyl patch. She was able to pick up a deodorant stick with her right hand a lift it to her face. She was then able to pick it up also with the left hand. She picked up a tissue with both hands Charity stood by the side of her bed three times with help from the therapist. She sat at the edge of her bed She had speech therapy and was working on making sounds. They are very weak yet. She needs a lot of work on strengthening her diaphragm. Jeremy was wondering if the Fentanyl patch might be holding her diaphragm back. We are in the process of asking them to taper her down, or off of the patch. Charity really wants to work hard, and more at therapy. She kept mouthing to Jeremy today, “I am awake”! Jeremy was able to give her some swabs with water. She took it well. During the day Jeremy was also working the bureaucratic routes to get Charity into more intense therapy. To qualify for Quality Living, Charity needs to be able to do at somewhere around 4-6 hours of therapy and activity. We don’t know how she’s going to be ready for that unless they start working her toward those goals. Give praise to God together with us for His wonderful grace in giving Jeremy, Charity and their family a day to treasure. Lord, prepare us and Charity as well for the days that may not be so bright.

The OLD OLD

I have to admit when I heard this term I was confused. I mean I thought that anyone older than 50 was considered old. Well here in the Hospital Old is considered 65+ and the OLD OLD 80+. I guess it should say something as a society, that a majority of our population can live to be 80+ where in the most of the world the age that most people "pass on" are around 60-65. Anyway I met one of the OLD OLD today and it was a real treat, for she was a solid Christian. I love meeting Christians that are 65+ because they usually have so many stories about how God has brought them through so much and how He has blessed them. This woman could have gone on for hours telling me how God should always be first in my life and how we should depend on Him for everything. And that's saying something coming from this lady as she has Congestive Heart failure, Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease, and Shortness of Breath. All of these cannot be pleasant and yet she continues to tell others about the faithfulness of God. Lord I pray that I have that kind of faith when I get to be that age.

A little bit jealous

Could you imagine if all this rain was snow? I love snow. I love winter. I love playing in the snow be it skiing, tubing, snowball fights, whatever, snow is just so cool (pardon the pun). And yet we here in DE suffer mostly brown winters. We get plenty of rain and a little ice but not much snow. And you know what I just talked to Matt Grace the other night and they had 4 inches of snow in Denver!! Not only that but Matt and Bri had spent their one yr. anniversary (Woot) in Vale, CO and they had 8 inches there!!!!! So I am a bit green around the gills as they say. I so want to move out there and Lord willing I will.

How young is too young?

So how old should pastors be when they start preaching? Reagan started at 16, Graham at 19, but how about before they hit the double digits? How about at age 8 or 9? Can they really know the gospel well enough to preach it? Are they truly mature enough in their faith to be able to preach the word? What if they are being manipulated by parents? If they are a proven preacher should seminaries relax some standards and allow them to learn?
Well we have two kids that are doing just that? They are preaching the word to their congregations and in one case the kid is preaching to many churches. Is this some of the foolishness that Jesus warned us about would happened in the end times? Anyway here is the article, tell me what you think....
http://abcnews.go.com/2020/story?id=3717627&page=1

Praise!!

So if you had been ill, had to be fed via stomach tube, had not physically eaten for 150 days, how good do you think food would taste to you? What would you want to eat? It is something we take for granted but many of my patients who have been on a feeding tube say it is torture to not be able to chew food or taste what they are eating. Well Charity has been in that situation for a long time now, but no longer..read an excerpt from her web blog...


Charity had only one therapy session today. She was preparing us all for an unusual surprise!! SHE ATE NEARLY A WHOLE CONTAINER OF APPLESAUCE!! How would applesauce taste after nearly 150 days of not eating anything? Join us in giving thanks to the Lord for this special moment in Charity's life. This afternoon, Matt and Lori (friends of Charity) stopped by just after Jeremy and the girls had left for Holdrege. They offered to sit with Charity while Sylvia and I took a coffee break together. During that time Charity had her scheduled Speech Therapy. The therapist tried the applesauce and crushed ice again. Lori reported that Charity was swallowing good, and frequently the therapist would ask her to say "ahhh". She was clearing everything good. She tries crushed ice with her as well. The bigger chunks were actually easier to swallow (because they don't liquify as quickly). She ate nearly a whole container (the size of a small yogurt). It was quite a moving experience for Lori who has been with us through some of those most torturous days. At one point Charity was not swallowing the applesauce and the therapist noted that Charity was probably just "holding it in her mouth" to savor the flavor. Charity nodded her head, "yes" she was enjoying the taste! Later the therapist then asked Charity to say the names of her kids. She said, “SOFIA”, then “ELLA” for Bella which is a shortened form of Isabella. Then she was asked to say her husband’s name. With such clarity that it surprised the therapist she said, “JEREMY”. Then she asked Charity who the friend was in the room. Charity answered with “hori” for Lori. In the session Charity also said to the therapist, “I want more ice”. As we’ve mentioned before in our Journal, speech therapy is one of Charity’s most important sessions, today it was so good to see her not only producing speech, and eating but demonstrating good memory and cognitive strength. AN IMPORTANT PRAYER REQUEST Nearly every time something good takes place a setback happens. There is a concern we are monitoring this week-end. They x-rayed Charity’s abdomen today and there is an increased amount of free air in her abdomen cavity. She needs to see the GI (Gastro-Intestinal) specialist. We had the option to transfer her today to the hospital BryanLGH to check this out. So far we have chosen to keep her here at Madonna. Reasons: While somewhat uncomfortable she doesn’t seem to be in acute pain from it The GI surgeon who has followed her is not on call this week-end. We would prefer him to examine her since he knows her case history best. We would rather move carefully and do as little invasive work as possible. I will be “hanging out” with Charity overnight. So I want to have wisdom to know if there is anything of concern developing. As you pray, praise the Lord for this very special experience in such a long battle for her. -Phil

Dessert

Now I love desserts! I blame my affection for almost all confections on my grandmother who at 86 still eats desserts on a regular basis. I love my desserts so much that if I get a dessert with my meal it goes down the hatch first. It doesn't matter if I have prime rib with shrooms and onions or grouper stuffed with crab imperial with dollops of lobster on top, that dessert is going bye-bye! Desserts must be a a good line item for most restaurants as I see sinfully, small slices of cake for the same price as a huge plate of buffalo chicken nachos or 8 wings. And while I love dessert, sometimes you can go a little to far...like paying$14.500..insane...
http://www.zimbio.com/The+Fortress+Stilt+Fisherman+Indulgence/articles/2/Most+Expensive+Dessert+World

Edit: I apologize for my misspellings. I confuse the spelling of desert with dessert fairly easily and for years I had it spelled correctly. Then, recently, I was challenged by someone in the teaching profession and thought, "Hey they teach, they know what they are talking about." I guess not.

Ouch!

So a guy who was pronounced dead in a hospital was not as dead as he had appeared!! Man that is scary...I definitely do not want to have to go to our morgue now.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/autopsy_dc

Should Marriage be over in 7 years?

So it would appear that a politician, thankfully not from the USA, in Germany thinks that marriage should be over after 7 years. She believes that, "The basic approach is wrong ... many marriages last just because people believe they are safe," she told reporters. "My suggestion is that marriages expire after seven years." After that time, couples should either agree to extend their marriage or it should be automatically dissolved, she said." Anyway if you want to read the rest of this trash. check out....
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20070921/od_uk_nm/oukoe_uk_germany_politics_marriage

My exercise regimen

So after having my Rower take up space in the living room for the last two weeks, I have finally put it together and it is ready for rigorous (I hope) use. Now that my Ultimate season is pretty much over I am going to need to work out to stay in shape on a regular basis. So for the foreseeable future. I will be working out on my elliptical and rower 4-5 times a week for up to 1 1/2 hours. Man I miss Ultimate already :P

P3

So I am midway through my first week of my residency. Orientation is over (Thanks God!) and so it is time to visit patients. My clinical assignment is Pain and Palliative and Pediatrics (or as I like to call it P3). And what that means is that I will be visiting Peds patients (ages from 4-24) that may be trauma patients, young mothers, etc and trying to support them and their families through their time in the hospital. For me that will be easy. The much tougher part will be the Pain and Palliative Units.

The pain unit is for patients that have chronic pain from an infection, surgery, cancer, etc that just will not go away and is so severe they have to come to the hospital to relieve it. Usually they are very hard to interact with as they need to have their pain brought down to a level that is bearable. Once they are at that level they still may be hard to support.... well b/c they are in constant, high level, pain. And if you have ever been in a high level of pain for a long time you would know that the last thing you want to do is talk to someone. Or on the flip side if you are with someone who is in a lot of pain, it is hard to be there as we as humans find it hard to be around someone who is in a lot of agony. However they still need to be supported both Spiritually and emotionally.

Finally, the hardest unit, is the Palliative unit. This is end of life care. Every person who is in the unit will die. They may not die in the hospital, they may be sent to Hospice, but they will die normally within 1-2 months. And they stay with us for that time, if the patient can not be stabilized to be discharged. This is hard. Death is hard. Even for Christians, whom have an amazing hope and future after death, Death is hard. Who here wants to loose a parent, sibling, relative, or friend? We all want them to be here for as long as possible and when we are told they are going or are gone even the strongest Christian will be brought to their knees; and that is OK....Grief is normal. It is hard trying to help a family deal with a patient who has suddenly become terminally ill/stroke/heart attack and whom they may not be communicative with their loves ones even unto their death. Thus their love ones will not have closure. It is hard for families whose love one has been fighting for years, whom they have been with each and every day (maybe hour) of the patent's illness, and yet they still do not want them to die. It is hard to tell families it is time to stop being aggressive in treating their loved ones and that we, the health care team, have done all we can do and it is time to say goodbye.

Believe it or not this is exactly where I want to be. I am thinking of becoming a hospice chaplain when I finish my residency next Sept. And so this year will be very hard but it will be a great training and learning experience for me. I believe God will be stretching me very far beyond my usual limits and I will be way outside my comfort zone (remember I am a introvert).

I ask for prayer. I have already had two deaths, one of which I was in the room for and I expect many more... right now I know of one that will be happening soon. And that is a lot different than my internship as I would normally come and be with the family after the patient had died. Now, a majority of the time, I will be with the family when the patient passes and man will that be hard! And man I CANNOT DO THIS WITHOUT GOD or your prayers, thus I thank you in advance.

Hey all,
Sorry for the lack of postings. I have been busy trying to figure out what exactly I will be doing for India and readjusting to being a chaplain after a three week hiatus. More posts will be coming soon.

And this is faith

This is an excerpt from the journal on Charity Goeorge's web page. This is from her father....

Charity arrived back at Madonna around 5 pm. It hasn't been as peaceful of a day as the previous two days, particularly her eyes and vision seemed to be bothering her. Even so she was quite responsive to questions asked of her. One thing we noticed the resulted from the abdomen abcess and her not being able to take medications through the feeding tube together with the transfer between hospitals is that her medication list got somewhat messed up. Some medications were dropped and some weren't resumed as we thought they had been. This however might give us a bit of an idea how her body responds to some of the medications. Because she was off the Celexa anti-depressant for several days (she is back on it) we are watching to see how that might affect her emotions. I arrived back in Kansas City near 10:30pm so that leaves Sylvia solo at Charity's side until Jeremy gets back to Lincoln later this week. We keep looking for answers, and hang onto hope for as long as the Lord gives Charity life. There still are some promising possibilities for her. We look for the Lord to allow, and guide all the pieces to come together to make those possibilities, realities for Charity. While this spiral of events in these last months continues to leave us all deeply wounded, perplexed, and uncertain of the future we cling to the reality that God is, He is sovereign and He is ultimately good.

Another year another piece of me gets older

So as I have gotten older pieces of my body have started to break down or need to be stretched before I do things. Such as before I was 29 I never had to stretch before sports or hiking unless it was a big game. However, now, unless I want to waddle like a duck for a few days I had better stretch before hand. Or my hearing slowly becoming worse over the years, but that might not be a bad thing because by the time I am 40 I wont be able to hear my wife {edited*} ask me to do things :). I kid.. I kid...Well I had to get my eyes checked for a physical recently and I did rather horribly. I use to have 20/20 but a week ago I found out that I cant see below line 5 in my right eye and below line 4 in my left. You know you are eyes are going when the doctor says "And they let you drive w/o glasses?!?" So when my insurance kicks in (My hospital insurance gives me an allowance per month) in Sept. Ill be getting some glasses. SO LADIES WATCH OUT!! Because my sexiness will increase 100 fold.

*nag

Nickel Creek: So long and thanks for all the fish

Well I got the chance to see Nickel Creek live this past weekend and they were really good. I heard most of my favorite songs and they mostly stayed away from their 3rd cd which is my least fav. album of theirs. Unfortunately the night was broken up by a few things. First, was the realization that this was their farewell tour. That is not cool! Second, was the drunken idiots who were heckling the band. Third, was Fiona Apple. Now to be somewhat fair to her the MANN did not have speakers pointed in our direction and as I am going deaf by degrees it was hard to hear what she was singing. And she had a great voice and probably would make an excellent blue singers instead of whatever genre she was in. However even if I could have understood her voice I would have still hated her performance because of her dancing. Her dance looked like someone dressed in a Salem witch outfit, on cocaine, animated by Tim Burton while moshing. Now this was interesting for all of 5 min. but to have to endure her weird music and her "dancing" for 45min that was unbearable and I will never pay $ to see her again.

Side note 1: If you go to the MANN do not sit in the balcony unless you really know the bands', whom you are going to see, music. There are no speakers up there.
Side note 2: If you know from what book comes the title of this blog, You win.

This week

So this week is much more open and not planned. By the end of the week I fully expect to be stir crazy and wishing I had to go to work. My plans are: Read a few books that Brett gave me, work on my elliptical, mem. some vs for appropriate use in the hospital, Disc Golf and Ultimate, and read Our Greatest Gift: Meditation on Dying and Caring, A by Henri J. M. Nouwen and
Life of the Beloved: Spiritual Living in a Secular World by Henri J Nouwen. I also have a book coming via mail Getting Serious About Getting Married: Rethinking the Gift of Singleness by Debbie Maken which is probably not much different than some of the issues brought up in Passion and Purity,: Learning to Bring Your Love Life Under Christs Control by Elisabeth Elliot but Ill read it anyway because Ill get pie. And ladies and gents you can never have too much pie.

Recap on last week

So on Monday, my Bible study and I went kayaking down the Brandywine and it was a very relaxing time. I am sure though both Dave and I would like the river to be higher next time, so Mark get working on that.
On Tues. I did nothing but chill.
On Wed. I got schooled by Brett on the Disc Golf course and had to dish out some $ for dinner at Sofritos. It was a great day to be out but a crappy day to loose. Plus I lost two disks.
On Thurs. I met with Pastor Bo and told him how my internship went and when I would like to start working on my ordination. I also had a so-so day playing Ultimate.
On Fri. I went out to lunch with my Dad, read The Hostage by W.E.B. Griffin and played a new CPU game.
On Sat. I declined to go disc golfing with Brett and Brian (due to my earlier performance) and later was called by Brett to tell me it was a good idea that I did. The rough had been deliberately left to grow about waist high and so a course that normally took 1hr-1hr15min. to do took 21/2 hrs. Plus Brian lost two disks. Later that day I helped a new friend move into her house and then I went to see Nickel Creek.

WED Aug 15th

So The day has come, or will come, that I have been looking forward to for many a yr. My disc Golf partners and I have been talking about doing an all day disc golf tourney between us for a while now and we are finally going to do it. Tomorrow we will start at Cape Henlopen, then go to Killen Pond, and then to Lums. It will be Hot, it will be grueling (that is why I am getting a massage on Thurs), and I will be the victor!! Winner get dinner at a decent restaurant! Stay tuned and Matt sorry you can't be here to help pay for my dinner.

Chappie#5

So my internship is over and I have learned a lot. I plan to give a few insights over the next three weeks but for now I am enjoying my second day of my three week vacation.
What will I be doing? Well yesterday I kayaked down the Brandywine river with my small group, saw a good movie (review forthcoming), and ate at a new, new for me, Chinese Buffet. Today I am working around my room, reading Spurgeon, blogging, making dinner, and playing video games. Tomorrow I will be playing disc golf all day and Thurs I will be getting a massage and of course playing Ultimate. Fri is up for grabs and Sat. I will be going to see Nickle Creek.
So I do have some fun stuff planned, but I think the challenge for me will be to stay spiritually focused and to be preparing for the year to come.

Kite Runner

So I know I said I would have a review up a month ago, but my internship was requiring more and more of my time so I did not get a chance to put a review up.

I liked the Author's use of words and images. I felt that I could easily visualize where the main character was at all times. I especially enjoyed the first Kite tourney. I also liked the author's use of foreshadow and irony. Finally I enjoyed the frailty of the main character as I see any of us acting in the same way, in his situations, if we did not have God as our Rock.

However to me this book was not an amazing piece of literature and I have read books that are far harsher in their depiction of reality. There was no huge revelation at the end of the book that made me want to realign my views to the authors nor was there a challenge to any of my beliefs etc.

The reason I think that so many people loved this book was that it was their first time initiation to this type of reality. Sure this book is ficton, but I believe it depicts accurately the reality of Afghanistan and in many cases is much worse. I also think that many people were surprised at the fact that someone with Afghan roots could be a good writer, which I think is a shame.

Anyway the book was decent and if you need something to pass the time please pick it up. Or if maybe you are thinking of being a missionary to that area then this could be a good intro to Afghanistan.