Jen told me about a funny conversation that my two boys had the other day.

The kids were watching Enchanted and at the end of the movie there is a kissing scene, after which, everyone lives happily ever after. It was after the kissing scene that Jen heard the following conversation between Charlie (7 years old) and Nathan (9 years old)

Charlie: *groan*

Nathan: You know when you get bigger you will have to do that

Charlie: No I won’t

Nathan: Yes you will!

Charlie: No I won’t!!

Nathan: Yes you will!

Charlie: I only kiss Momma and on Mothers Day!

With that, Nathan ceded the point.

I had to attend a City Council meeting in Leesburg last night to talk about some FEMA mapping issues that they City is facing.

This all came up last Friday and has consumed my time since then. Basically it boils down to FEMA issuing new flood maps that have floodplains being extended into areas not previously in the floodplain. This means that 70+ residential properties will have to purchase flood insurance at an average cost of around $800 per year. The developer community is upset because this will lower the value of some of their lots and of other property they own within the city.

Since the areas in question are in an A Zone, there are no base flood elevations (BFE) available. In order to prove you are not in a floodplain, you need to have a BFE established. Unfortunately, FEMA requires a detailed study to develop a BFE. Detailed studies are not cheap.

I had a day to gather some information and put my head together with some of my coworkers to come up with a rough…and I do mean rough…cost range for doing the detailed study. There are 3 basins which would need to be studied and the City would come out ahead by doing them all at once. Economy of scale and all. We compared what we spent to do a similar study within the area and we determined that the engineering cost would be between $40,000 and $70,000. The unknown is the cost of field run survey. After meeting with a local surveyor, we decided that the total cost for the study would be between $75,000 and $100,000. My guess is that it would probably be much closer, if not lower than $75k. But that would only be known if we could spend more time developing and refining a scope, which we are not willing to do until the City decides if they are going to do the study or not.

With all that in mind, I was asked to attend the City Council meeting last night. All the big name developers attended as well. This thing is going to get very political as the City does not have the funds to do the study but the County does. However, the County has other plans for the money. This should be fun!

Anyway, here is my one mention in the local paper today:

Mike Talley, an engineer with H&H Resources, gave the Council more bad news: A cost estimate of “from $75,000 to $100,000″ to complete a study of the city’s three basins.
—
Asked by Council member Sidney Johnson where the county stands on the ruling, Planning and Engineering Director Bob Alexander said county officials had not seriously discussed the matter.

“The impact on the county is negligable [sic] ,” he noted.

But Quinn replied, “I think we should talk with the county about the possibility of using SPLOST (special-purpose local-option sales tax) funds for this study. This is part of the county.”

That last part about “this is part of the county” cracks me up. Local government is a wonderful thing to watch. You see everything you can imagine. Most of the time, not all of the time, County and City governments do not get along. So it’s always funny that when the City needs money from the County, they all of a sudden feel the need to remind the County that, Hey, we’re part of the County too!!!!

We shall see how all this turns out.

Hate Mail!

Yay!!!

It’s been since July 14, 2005 since I last received hate mail. Wow…that was a LONG time ago. I feel so unloved.

Anyway, I got me some hate mail last week!

Here’s the set up: WunderKraut.com was once a sound site. Yep, that’s right. I originally started this website to show off my Simpsons sounds and various other sound files from some of my favorite movies. Back then I didn’t have the rabid following I now have *cough* so I submitted my site to various Sound Rings and other sound file referrer sites. When I changed over to blogging, sometime after the last ice age, I forgot all about the places that still had me listed as a sound site. I also forgot all my logins and passwords to correct the issue. My solution? Do nothing!!! You should try it sometimes, it is very freeing.

Here we are in the wonderfully futuristic year 2009 and someone tried to access my sound pages from one of the referrer sites I mentioned above. For some reason, this person was really, really, REALLY upset that the promised sound files are not to be found on this site. Actually, the dirty secret is that they still exist, I just don’t have a direct link to them anymore…

Shall we begin?

wunderkraut

do you even know what it means

why are listed on the top 50 wave list

while you do not have any waves

only stupid pics about some charlie kid or what ever

you fake german descendent

First off, I just love his refusal to capitalize the first word of a sentence. He is not one to be hemmed in by the “rules”.

Secondly, yes I know what “wunderkraut” means…sort of…from Babelfish it means “miracle herb”, but I’ve also heard it translated as “wonderful cabbage” and yes, euphemistically, I know it is slang for the ganja. That doesn’t matter to me. Go read my “Why WunderKraut” section.

And finally, I am not German, nor have I ever claimed to be, but I wouldn’t mind having a little bit of German blood in my family line. After all, my unhealthy love of sausage, sauerkraut and dark beer had to come from somewhere.

So to you Mr. Kees Holleman – Bedrijfsleider (manager in English) who apparently manages three websites, one of which translates as a “bric-a-brac shop”, I apologize for not having the sound files you requested readily available. However, I would appreciate it if you didn’t call pictures of my son Charlie, stupid.

That is all.

PS: Mr. Holleman appears to be Dutch. I guess he is still upset about Germans overrunning his country 70 years ago.

20 years ago, I was but a lad of 16, yet I remember watching the TV. I remember seeing the video. I remember the crack down.

Watching CNN, I watched as a college student played chicken with a tank:

Then I watched in horror as sporadic and chaotic video emerged of screaming, running and gunfire once the Chinese government had enough.

19 years later, my wife and I would stand in Tiananmen Square:

It was hard for me to imagine what it must have been like. I whispered to our guide, asking him if this was the spot where it all happened. All he did was nod his head. There I was. It happened right where I was standing.

I love freedom. I believe it is something that is inside every human, the urge to be free, to express themselves, to live their lives free from fear and intimidation. Yet there are 1.5 billion Chinese people who do not know true freedom.

I can’t wait to go back to China in 8 years. See, we have decided that if Mei wants to, we will go back to China when she is 10 years old. This time we will be able to take our time and plan our journey through the vast expanse of China. My hope and desire is that real freedom will continue to come to the Chinese people. That their leaders will throw off the chains of fear and embrace all that is good about Chinese culture.

It is only 8 years away, yet I hope the change will be evident.

Unfortunately, today, the Chinese government is up to it’s old tricks again:

Chinese police aggressively deterred dissent on Thursday’s 20th anniversary of the crackdown on democracy activists in Tiananmen Square…
—
The extraordinary security moves come after government censors shut down social networking and image-sharing Web sites such as Twitter and Flickr, and blacked out CNN and other foreign news channels each time they aired stories about Tiananmen.

Dissidents and families of crackdown victims were confined to their homes or forced to leave Beijing, part of sweeping efforts to prevent online debate or organized commemorations of the anniversary.

Just thought I’d put up a random post about things I like and that bother me on the internet.

Adds
Pop-up adds are from the Devil. Luckily, the blockers have really cut down on the number that show up on my computer. Still, whoever thought of them should be beaten.

One type of add particularly bothers me. They are the adds for refinancing that have some dancing girl, ala the dancing baby from back in the “Ally McBeal” days. Really, come on, is that the best you can do? Seriously??? You think I’m going to trust a company with something as large as my mortgage when they advertise with a dancing girl on an animated add?

You know what? I think that dancing chick wants me to refinance my mortgage

Facebook
I like Facebook, I really do, but not for the reasons you may think. I don’t really keep up with my friends through it. If I am close to you, I will be seeing and talking to you in person. It may be how you stay in touch, and that is fine. I do for people far off, but that’s not the main reason. No, to me, the main benefit of Facebook is to satisfy my inner desire to see how people turned out. Not in some, “I’m better than you” way, more of a “I’m really glad you made it” sort of way. I ran across someone last night who I have not seen or heard from in 17 years. It was great to see and hear that she’s made it and is doing well. Honestly, we have nothing in common, save for memories, so the chances of getting reacquainted are just not great. After the initial “I thought you were dead” and “Wow, you did time in prison?” back and forth that is usually about it.

However….

The adds on Facebook drive me nuts. I’m not sure if they use some targeted add program that knows I am male or that I’m an engineer. But some of the adds are pretty ridiculous.

The current batch of adds that are bothering me are the “See who’s been searching your profile” ones. The first preys on fear, the second on sex…well preys on sex isn’t really a concept…how about uses sex?

Here is the first:

Dirty, old, crazy men are searching your profile!

Here is the second:

Hey there big boy

The second one cracks me up. What does an image looking up at a young, large chested woman have to do with finding out who is looking at my profile? Oh I see, MAYBE said young, large chested woman is searching for me!!!!!!!!!! I better click RIGHT NOW before she finds someone more hip and attractive than me!!!! *cough*

Viruses
Virus creators should also be rounded up and beaten. Though since I changed over to Norton from McAfee, things have gotten better. McAfee kept letting in the little Virus Scan 2009 bugger. That was a nasty little one. But I know how to get rid of it now.

NOTE: This is a repost of something I wrote back in 2006 after reading a great book about Omaha Beach. Since today is the 65th anniversary of the Normandy landings, I felt it was fitting to repost this.

As Mr. Bingley points out, let’s also not forget the brave men who won the Battle of Midway on the same day two years prior to Normandy.

Then there’s Patton’s famous speech as it was really given. Stop by and give it a read.

I just finished Omaha Beach by Joseph Balkoski.

Wow.

It is amazing that any of our guys made it off that beach alive. That battle is a testament to the spirit of America. The American military has always been wonderfully adaptive. Personal initiative is highly regarded and it showed on Omaha Beach June 6, 1944.

With Captains and Lieutenants dead and with the invasion plan in the tank, Sergeants, Privates and Navy and Coast Guard Coxswains improvised. They adapted to the conditions and ultimately won the day.

Amazing.

Balkoski puts the casualties at 4,700 men killed, wounded or missing. 4,700 men in one day. Strewn across less than 5 miles of beachfront.

Here is a portion of a letter written a few days after by Capt. Joseph Dawson, Commander, Company G, 116th Infantry, 1st Division:

What I’m trying to say is that justice can never be properly accorded to the magnificent fortitude and heroism of the fine American soldier and man. He is without peer, and these past few days have implanted in the hearts of all a realization of the true greatness of these men. I say this because I’ve had an honor never to be equaled in being part of a group that will ever stand as a symbol of greatness to all who witnessed or know how they measured up to the supreme test without faltering or wavering. I cannot say more for my heart forbears it, but God is my witness that the men of my company lived, fought, and died in true glory.

I am forever indebted to the brave men living and dead who have fought for this great country of ours.

Thank you.

Went to go see Dad yesterday in Columbus, Georgia.

Ft. Benning is about to open a new infantry museum and Dad is one of the volunteers. He really enjoys what he does and can’t wait till the whole museum opens up in a few weeks. We definitely plan on going back once it’s open to get the WunderDad tour!

Anyway, they have an IMAX theater at the museum and they were showing Monsters vs Aliens in 3D. We’ve seen the movie before, but not on the 5 story tall IMAX screen. It was amazing!

Today is our 14th Wedding Anniversary!

I can honestly say that I am more in love with Jen today than I was the day I married her. It’s been an amazing 14 years. Full of ups and downs and tons of good memories.

My how times have changed since that day in June 14 years ago. We woke up this morning with a baby in the bed and a 5 year old on the floor next to our bed! I wouldn’t change things for the world.

I love you Baby! You are my best friend and you have my heart.

For a longer recounting of life with my amazing wife, see here.

Today is Madi’s 5th birthday! I can’t believe she is this old!

Happy Birthday!

Picture by Joanna

I guess it was “Bring Your Goat To Work Day”?

Everyone needs a hero and I just found me a new one…sorry old and busted heroes of yore…this guy is full of hero win!

A man was grilling sausages on his grill when he got struck by lightning. Surprisingly, he lived to tell the tale and had this to say:

He added: “I was told the only thing I could say as I was drifting in and out of consciousness was ’sausages’.”

You sir, are a true hero, my hero, our hero.

“Sausages”

My comment filter has gotten much better over the years as I’ve continued to add spam words. The list would make you blush and is a mix of pharmaceuticals, tons of pr0n, gambling and a whole host of other terms which make me question the mental health of my fellow man.

This list also gives credence to what is known as Rule #34: if you can think of it, someone has already made a porn of it…no exceptions.

*sigh*

Just trust me on this one.

XKCD had a great comic about Rule #34. See here.

Also, this picture sums it all up.

So, in summary. Spam is bad. It is evil. It is often times graphic, violent and disgusting.

And I’ve gotten over 6,000 spam comments in my years of running WunderKraut.com and that’s just the ones that actually got caught by my spam list. It doesn’t include the thousands of spam comments that have made it through the filter over the years.

Death to spammers!

We can all agree that I am a Geek.

But I do have a dirty little secret…Until last week, I had never, EVER seen a Star Trek movie…

There…I said it.

Nope.

Never seen one.

Never watched an entire TV episode either.

As a kid I really liked the first 2 Star Wars movies. Why only the first 2? Because even as a 10 year old kid I still knew Return of the Jedi sucked. Anyway, while I liked the movies and had my fair share of action figures, I never got that into the movies.

Case in point, while in college I had to write a paper about how technology was used in the Star Wars universe. I hadn’t seen the movies since they were in theaters all those years ago, so I borrowed my roommates VHS tapes to re-watch them. Half jokingly, I inquired if in fact Darth Vader was Luke’s father. My roommate about had a stroke and exclaimed that this writing assignment was being wasted on someone like me.

At the same time, I viewed the Star Trek movies as cheesy Star Wars knock offs. I know they have nothing in common, but that has been my feeling about the series.

But all that changed with the release of the new Star Trek movie. The previews looked amazing and the reviews seem to be positive. Not one to jump on a bandwagon, I decided that before watching the new movie, I would sit down and watch all the pervious Star Trek movies.

With that decision, I loaded up our NetFlix queue with all 10 Star Trek movies. There are 10 movies? Who knew?

Star Trek: The Motion Picture
Star Trek: The Wrath of Khan
Star Trek III: The Search for Spock
Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home
Star Trek V: The Final Frontier
Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country
Star Trek: Generations
Star Trek: First Contact
Star Trek: Insurrection
Star Trek: Nemesis

The first one was terrible. It seemed like they were going for a 2001 A Space Odyssey look for this movie and it just bored me to tears. It was an interesting premise, but honestly, the movie could have been 30 minutes long if they had cut out the long, LONG, boring camera sequences of the Enterprise.

The second one wasn’t half bad. Another good story line and this time the director canned all the artsy sequences and the movie flowed much better.

The Search for Spock was pretty good as well. I like how they continue to build on the story line of the previous movie.

We watched Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home Sunday and it is the first of what I fear will be a troubling trend. You know what? I enjoy going to movies because I like to escape from reality, from the news cycle…so movies that have blatant political messages really bother me. This is the movie where they go back in time to save the whales. This was all the rage back in the mid 1980’s. The movie was full of lines bemoaning the 20th century world and our lack of environmental thinking. Spare me.

We should get in the next two movies this week. Looking ahead on IMDB, it appears that there is at least one more political/environmental movie in which the Klingons lose their Ozone layer and face death. Boo Hoo.

It makes me want to rip open a box of 1980’s hairspray and have at it.

More pictures by Joanna.

Ever wake up feeling depressed for no real reason?

That happened to me Monday morning and it’s been a struggle since then for me to climb out of the hole.

It probably had to do with the fact that Jen and I had a wonderful weekend alone with not a care in the world and Monday morning rolled around and reality hit.

It aggravates me when I let circumstances dictate my mood. Coming home in a not fun mood sets the tone for the rest of the house. The kids only want to play with me and I can’t shake out of my mood. I hate it. Last night was better and I am determined to have a wonderful evening with the kids.

Life is full of choices and I strongly believe that I have a choice when I wake up if I am going be full of joy or down in the dumps. Choices require self control which is another quality I sometimes struggle with.

But I know there is hope. Per the Apostle Paul:

Gal 5:22 NIV – But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness,
Gal 5:23 NIV – gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law.

So, with the Holy Spirit living inside of me I have a powerful weapon which allows me to make good choices (self-control) and to have joy in my heart (umm…joy…duh).

Love this video.

If you have kids, its hard to watch these home movies and not think about your own kids. It’s crying shame that his life was cut short.

Yeah, so there was this class I had to take while in engineering school called Engineering Economy. It was a class full of present worth’s, future worth’s, P given F’s and F given P’s…all sorts of things that make a college student fall asleep.

Turns out I actually needed to learn that stuff…sort of…

Who knew?

Anyway, I was trying to calculate the value of something x number of years out starting with a given value and a given rate. I know how to do it by hand (spreadsheet) but see, the thing is, I’m lazy. I know there is a formula and that my calculator has it as a pre-programmed input, but who needs that when you have the internet. A few Google clicks later and I had my answer. The same goes with an amortization schedule for a home loan. Oh sure, I can generate one myself, I even wrote a FORTRAN program to do it for me (long time ago kids), but why use my brain?

I felt bad after being so lazy, so I looked up the formula:

Where F is the future value, P is the present value, i is the rate and n is the number of years.

Yep it works.

Also, I found a cool homework assignment that had a great summary and where I found the above equation. Reading through it brought back all sorts of latent memories…man I should have paid more attention in the class. One problem in particular demonstrates why they called this Engineering Economy and it also shows that this stuff is actually useful:

Exercise 2: Your engineering firm needs a rapid prototyping machine. The company gives you two options. In Option 1 you purchase the machine outright for $50,000, pay a maintenance contract of $1,000 per year, and expect to be able to resell the machine after 10 years at a salvage value of $10,000. In Option 2, you lease the machine at $7,000 per year and pay no maintenance, but receive no salvage. Assume that you will be able to take in $8,000 per year in income from this machine. Also assume that an additional option is not to buy the machine at all, but to put the money in the bank at 5% interest. Which option will be best for the firm?

I bet Ken will solve this for me…

Heh, just read this in the homework:

There was a time when every bit of that made sense to me. My poor dying brain…

Going to be hotter tomorrow…

Going on right now!

More kids to come.

Nothing says South Georgia like the heat….

I am thinking about writing again. Something bigger than this blog.

However, I have a slight problem….

Here’s the deal, Word sucks. Oh sure I use it everyday for work. I write letters and reports all the time with it and it works wonderfully. But I can’t imagine writing a book with Word.

Ever notice strange symbols in some blog posts, especially old ones? Yeah, well, I tend to write a post here in the WordPress post editor thing, then I cut and paste it to Word to check for spelling issues. Shocking I know. Then I cut/paste it back to the editor and hit publish.

That process works fine as long as I dont use ‘, ” or … because those seem to be special Microsoft Word encoded or something, in Word anyway…WordPress doesn’t know what it’s looking at and turns them into:

they’re
that’s
“moderates”

The odd thing is that WordPress doesn’t turn them into those odd characters until some time later. Not sure why it takes time. So, I am very careful to only change spelling errors in Word. Any punctuation changes I make in the WordPress editor.

Here’s my question: If I am going to be writing a 400 page book, or even just archiving my best posts, what should I use? I want something that is stripped down enough that it can be opened by anything in the future. So, I guess I need something a step above Notepad.

Any thoughts?

While looking into my question about text editors and word processors in my previous post, I ran across this awesome quote:

A text editor is to a word processor what a scalpel is to a giant heavy complicated sword which crashes constantly, uses a proprietary file format, and costs $300.

Heh.

I bought the kids the Wii game LEGO Star Wars: The Complete Saga a few months ago. Since it’s an older game, it was only $20. At the register (Toys R Us), the lady asked if I wanted to buy the protection plan for the game. I automatically gave her my standard answer of no. But then I hesitated and asked about it. She explained that it covered the game for a year. If anything happened, even scratches, I would get a new game.

Wow! What a bargain!

Kids are rough on DVD’s, CD’s and video games. I love DVD’s and CD’s but let me tell you, VHS and cassette tapes could go through hell and back and still work. I’ve even cut a VHS tape and spliced it back together. Not so with DVD’s and CD’s. One bad scratch and it’s over!

So, as expected, the Star Wars game (very fun BTW) got a big old scratch and wouldn’t work in the Wii.

No problemo, I have my $3.99 protection plan!

I ran by Toys R Us and they explained that since it had been over 30 days since I purchased the game, I had to deal with the protection plan people and handed me a pamphlet on the coverage.

Looking back, that is where I went wrong. Should’ve asked for the pamphlet prior to purchasing the protection plan.

Why?

You guessed it, damages due to accidental handling (i.e. scratches) are not covered.

The lady lied to me. Well that is a strong word. She mislead me.

I am left to call Toys R Us to complain about how I was mislead.

But ultimately, it is my fault on two levels. The first is because I let the kids handle the game themselves and the second because I didn’t ask to see details on the plan.

Oh well, one born every minute.

I am in the midst of reading two books right now. It isn’t like me to read multiple books at the same time, but my reading of choice has forced it on me.

First off I am reading the Federalist Papers:

Wow. I am only 100 pages into it, but wow. I tell you what the framers of our Constitution understood what they were doing. They thought it all out. Oddly enough, they didn’t mention all the super secret “rights” that modern day judges read into the thing.

*sigh*

Anyway, it is an amazing book, but it is hard reading. Very intellectual stuff and I want to really understand what they are trying to say.

So….when my brain hurts, I turn to my Father’s Day present:

Those of you that know me already know I love history and World War 2 in particular, so this book will come as no surprise. However, you probably don’t know the odd fascination I have with all things mundane and routine.

What I mean is that I do enjoy reading about battles, massive campaigns, amazing Generals, and strategic planning, but there is something that interests me even more than that.

I have an odd fascination for the day to day lives of soldiers in war. How did they eat, sleep, go to the bathroom, etc. When they fought, how did they fight. I don’t mean that Division A or Regiment X or Company B took such and such objective. I want to know HOW they fought. How did the move in combat? What formations did they use? How did they adjust to meet the enemy? How did a tank unit deploy for battle? What did it look like? How do you aim a mortar? How did the men stay supplied? What did the average soldier carry into battle?

You get the point.

When I find books that deal with the minute details of combat, I buy it. So far this book is just what I was looking for.

My Dad probably notices this because when I ask about his service in Vietnam, I ask questions like: What was your first day in country like? When did they put you in the helicopter on an actual mission? How did you learn to shoot from the helicopter? Did you learn by “walking” your tracers or were there other ways? When you say you were shot down, what did that look like? What was going through your mind?

I guess it goes back to how I enjoy history. I enjoy the broad knowledge, but I really enjoy the personal stories.

So, if you have other books that deal in this subject, please point them out to me.

Sunday our pastor, John, gave a message on the presence of God.

He made the distinction between the omnipresent presence of God and the manifest presence of God.

The omnipresent presence is that He is everywhere all the time. In any circumstance, He is there. No matter what you do or where you go, He is there. That is always a comforting thought because in reality you are never alone.

The manifest presence of God is something entirely different. It is born out of an intimate relationship with God. As examples John pointed to Moses, David, Mary and Paul. Each one of these people had a personal encounter with the manifest presence of God and it changed their lives.

Moses had his face changed. He glowed after encountering God on the mountain. It glowed so much that is frightened the people so Moses had to where a veil. Moses came to want nothing but the manifest presence of God. This is demonstrated in this passage from Exodus 33:11-17:

The Lord would speak to Moses face to face, as a man speaks with his friend. Then Moses would return to the camp, but his young aide Joshua son of Nun did not leave the tent.

Moses said to the Lord, “You have been telling me, ‘Lead these people,’ but you have not let me know whom you will send with me. You have said, ‘I know you by name and you have found favor with me.’

If you are pleased with me, teach me your ways so I may know you and continue to find favor with you. Remember that this nation is your people.”

The Lord replied, “My Presence will go with you, and I will give you rest.”

Then Moses said to him, “If your Presence does not go with us, do not send us up from here.

How will anyone know that you are pleased with me and with your people unless you go with us? What else will distinguish me and your people from all the other people on the face of the earth?”

And the Lord said to Moses, “I will do the very thing you have asked, because I am pleased with you and I know you by name.”

To know how much David valued the Lord’s presence, just read Psalms. He was a man ahead of time. He understood things that were for a later age and he gained a place in God’s heart.

Mary lived for the presence of Jesus. In the Gospel of John she pours expensive perfume on Jesus’ feet. When Judas gets upset, Jesus rebukes him and says that what she did was good. John 12:3

Then Mary took about a pint of pure nard, an expensive perfume; she poured it on Jesus’ feet and wiped his feet with her hair. And the house was filled with the fragrance of the perfume.

The clearest example of Mary cherishing the presence of Jesus comes from Luke 10:39-42

As Jesus and his disciples were on their way, he came to a village where a woman named Martha opened her home to him.

She had a sister called Mary, who sat at the Lord’s feet listening to what he said.

But Martha was distracted by all the preparations that had to be made. She came to him and asked, “Lord, don’t you care that my sister has left me to do the work by myself? Tell her to help me!”

“Martha, Martha,” the Lord answered, “you are worried and upset about many things,

but only one thing is needed. Mary has chosen what is better, and it will not be taken away from her.”

That one thing that is needed is the presence of Jesus.

Paul was knocked off his donkey by the manifest presence of the Jesus and has this to say in Philippians 3:8-12

What is more, I consider everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them rubbish, that I may gain Christ

and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ-the righteousness that comes from God and is by faith.

I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death,

and so, somehow, to attain to the resurrection from the dead.

Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already been made perfect, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me.

Seek the presence of the Lord. Every day, all day, in everything you do.