Imagine the scene. You've been a victim for years. You wake in the morning stiff and bruised, the recipient of repeated beatings and verbal assaults. You struggle with feelings of inferiority and insecurity. Then one day a knight in shining armor comes on the scene and plucks you from your misery. A respected police officer, he takes you to his home and you become part of a family. For the first time in your life you experience the balm of encouragement, love, and protection. You find...

I've been running across miscellaneous Christmas trivia today, and thought some of it was really kinda cool. A couple of these little known facts were things I hadn't heard before, and some I did know, but figured that many might NOT know... so this thread is meant to be a collection of little known Christmas facts. I'll list mine... feel free to share yours Did you know.... That "Bethlehem" means "House of Bread"? What an appropriate name for the birthplace of the One who ref...

Ok... for the record, I have nothing against the phrase "Happy Holidays." At least I didn't until this year. I never thought a thing about it... until it became a substitute for "Merry Christmas" in a blatant attempt to eliminate religion from Christmas. Goodness knows we wouldn't want to offen the what? 8 percent that have a problem with Christmas? One of my friends is a Science teacher at our local High School and he told me the staff were informed in no uncertain terms that under no ci...

Merry Christmas anyway! I'm not partial to the peace sign (which is NOT to say that I'm not partial to peace), but I love the rest... Enjoy the show!

Thanks to Ted for the spark that ignited this contemplation... Link I've come to despise the effect communication technology has on my life. Do I own a cell phone? Yes. I have one. Hubby has one. Teenaged daughter has one (and is not allowed to drive the car without having it charged and on her person). It has come in handy when I am out and have forgotten what I needed to pick up at the grocer's... and when I'm sitting on the side of the road because my car battery died. I re...

My washing machine broke down last week. It's a relatively new machine, so I doubt that it's anything major... but after doing a week's worth of clothes at the laundromat yesterday (a family of five - not fun), I decided that I didn't want to wait for the repair guy. I figured I'd see if I could handle this myself. I searched the internet to see if I could get a handle on what exactly is wrong with it. General scouting told me that since it's not spinning, the most likely culprit is the m...

*quits singing* I might be missing it, but I was looking for links to personal webpages. Do you all have personal pages? Famiy sites? Mine is below... but be warned, it desperately needs to be updated. I thought it would be fun to get to know you all a little better by exploring your personal "homes" on the web. So how about it? Anyone have a personal website to share?

I absolutely LOVE living in New England. I don't care for the harshness of the winters here, or the blazing heat and humidity of summer... but Autumn is that wonderful in-between time that makes it all worthwhile. We don't really have Spring here, we just have "mud season." New England is in its glory in the Fall, though. When I was younger, this was my favorite season because it was a time for gathering with family that I didn't see often at other times of the year. Over the years, it has...

After hearing you talk about missing the changing of seasons, I wanted to share New England Autumn with you, so hubby and I took a drive Monday and I captured these with you in mind. Enjoy! Happy Harvest!

I'm sitting here chuckling. After responding to an article earlier this evening, I just now returned to the article to find my reply gone, and left with no option to add a comment. I didn' t get some message saying I'd been blacklisted, but could someone explain to me if that's what happened? I find this very interesting. My post was not offensive, did not demean anyone (or even speak to anyone in particular), or do anything else that I can think of that would cause someone to disable my v...

It saddens me how the politics began even before the people of the Gulf Coast were rescued. It saddens me that no one seems willing to take responsibility but would rather pass the buck. It saddens me more hand are busy pointing, than helping - at least this is how it seems to me. But every so often, there is something -- a gesture, a word, an act of compassion -- that reminds me that there ARE people who care... that the heart of God is at work among souls here on earth. There are people w...

Each day as I head into Curves, there is a dry erase board with a brain-teaser written on it. Sometimes they're simple, others are more challenging. Either way, for a few minutes, they take my mind off the fact that it's 6am and I'm not only up, but exercising. Ugh. Here are a few of the ones I remember... do you have any to share? 1) HARMgood 2) ......mad mad you mad ...... mad 3) home..........................home ...

A new report from the Center for Consumer Freedom details the specifics of how PETA is targeting America's religious faithful. They see the religious right as an obstacle to be removed... or brainwashed. "Considering the level of religious interest in the United States, it seems unlikely that we'll achieve animal liberation without mobilizing, especially, Jewish and Christian progressives, and perhaps also many of the conservatives." (PETA vegetarian campaign director Bruce Friedrich in "D...

I’m becoming my mother. This transformation is a subtle thing, but it’s there just the same. When I first noticed it, I was… chagrined. At times, I am dealing with my children and certain phrases pop out of my mouth: “This house is not a gymnasium!” “Do you hear me?” “Did you grow up in a barn?” As I utter the words, I can almost imagine that my voice turns into the voice of my mother. There’s an edge to it, but not a course or brittle one, just different. Her voice is a little deeper...

Nope... we're not talking about driving under the influence here, but dialing under the influence. Virgin Mobile is now offering a new service to its customers: Dialling Under the Influence. For 25 cents per number, VM will blacklist certain users from your phone, so that you can't get drunk and then go off calling in a stupor. You just enter 333 before the number you want blacklisted, and they won't put any calls through to that number til after 6am the next morning. As far as I k...