Unintentional radio silence

Hello? Hello? Are either of my two readers still here?

Sorry about the dearth of posting of late. Several posts were started, but either rambled badly off topic or came across a bit too rantish.

Quick takes:

- Women's mini-retreat at church Friday night/Saturday morning. Generally, these kinds of events don't make my skirt fly up; aside from being an introvert who quickly fades in a crowd, I'm generally not the typical audience (wife, mother) for these things. Mercy Hill, however, did it right. The speakers represented a great cross section of the church, all with a story to tell of God using brokenness in their lives for His greater purposes. New friends, great fellowship and (as always) wonderful food.

- My heart is breaking for a number of friends. Honestly, you don't need to look far or hard to find clear evidence that this world is broken, with sin running rampant.

- The cold luring around the fringe of my life moved in properly overnight. How can a nose simultaneously be stuffed up and running? Urgh. Laying low, stuffed with cold drugs today. The good news is that there are always five boxes of tissue around the house (bedroom, desk in the loft, on the lower shelves of both living room end tables and in the studio). Between those and the three boxes in the bathroom cabinet, it shouldn't run out.

- Everywhere I look, ads for seeds and garden catalogues pop up. It's a bit difficult to think of spring when the patio languishes under six inches of snow. Still, I'm curious as to how the hydrangea wintered. It's only four weeks until Daylight Savings, and something like forty days until the official start of spring. Time, I suppose, to make a plan for cleaning up the winter schmutz and setting up the patio.

- Today is the fortieth anniversary of a rather life changing event. A lot of people who grow up in families where faith is a central component of life can't point to a specific date where they made a real commitment to yielding their hearts and lives to Christ. Those of us who didn't have that advantage, however, often can pinpoint that moment. For me, it was forty years ago tonight, at a youth ice cream sundae event. While a lovely young lady led me through a prayer of commitment that evening, I was so sure about my decision that when I went home, I prayed again on my own, just to prove the original decision wasn't just due to peer pressure. Maybe some thoughts on things in a post later.

Time to make the doughnuts, or at least the coffee. I cooked an egg casserole for the retreat yesterday...cooking at six in the morning - without coffee - meant I didn't clean up after myself as well as I usually do. While the coffee drips I can make some progress setting things to rights.