The Wise Woman, A Double Story, The Lost Princess

No matter the chosen title, The Wise Woman, A Double Story, The Lost Princess, this little big story has invaluable lessons on being conformed to the image of our creator Christ which is the highest calling of you and I His beloved children!

  first published in 1875 as The Wise Woman: A Parable, is a fairy tale novel by George MacDonald.The story describes how a woman of mysterious powers pays visits to two very different young girls: one a princess, the other a shepherd’s daughter. It has been regarded as ahead of its time in its approach to parenting.

I recently completed an audiobook reading of this publication and enjoyed producing it very much. George Macdonald is a true friend of mine from beyond the grave and His writings are an inspiration to my faith in our shared master Jesus!

Here is the link to the location on Archive.org.

Little Voices From The Past.

Cram some headphones on your cranium and give this a listen!

These little voices are long gone. It is not just the grow of the Larynx that changes the tenor of the voice but the spirit behind the utterance is more often than not tainted. The knowledge of evil, if not kept in check by the Truth of God's Word (Philippians 4:8) can rob us of the wonder of childhood that God intends for us to enjoy our whole life long!

 Recording at Ballast point church campus October 2008!

Traveling Through Time

Did a little time traveling last night with cousin Dawn. Lots of old yellowed images burned onto tattered rectangles of paper with far away places and long gone people from a time lost to history.

We started with Salmon, slaw and sweet potato!

Most of the family in the photos I had never met but my favorite photos were of my father. He used to record audio for us which I now cherish.

Being a family is so much fun!

Unbeatablesale Inc.

A Haws replacement rose set is needed. To the internet, try amazon first. There is one!

Amazon has one but the shipping is high, it is not prime and is fulfilled by a marketplace vender named unbeatable sale. Who is going to beat amazon’s price $19.07 shipped? Order button clicked.

An hour and a half later ………….. You know that item cannot cost more than $2.00 to manufacture. There has to be a better price. Search again for a different vendor.

That is much better, about $6 cheaper. Let’s go back and cancel the order from amazon. Cancel order button clicked. An email is sent to the unbeatablesales. An automated reply is sent. The order is not cancelled. A day later the amazon cancel button is still active and a second cancel request is sent. Another automated reply. Take a closer look at unbeatablesale inc. policy page.

Once an order is received it cannot be cancelled. How can this be? amazon has a policy that gives the option to cancel if the item has not been shipped. unbeatable sale has a policy that is in direct conflict with amazon’s and yet they are allowed to sell in the market place.

Time to leave a seller review!

Review left, resigned to paying more than necessary.

The phone rings the next day!

more than happy to issue a full refund……………the system will not allow me to proceed with the full refund while your feedback is present………….we sent you an email with instructions on how to remove the feedback!

Wow these jokers are slick. check email.

Well lookie there, what clear and concise instructions. If they are followed there is the promise of a full refund and you get to keep the item!

Do you delete your review warning your fellow citizens of policy conflict or remove it and keep the item at no charge?

Package arrives.

Wow, it is from Bosmere where I wanted to buy the item at the lower price of $12.54 shipped, not $19.07 shipped. That is over $6.00 more to have unbeatablesale inc. place the order for you using their obnoxious process.

The real offence here is amazon and other online retailers continuing to allow another business to have a policy that makes their own good policy invalid while still representing the item as having the protection of that policy. It is easy to see how it generates big profits but it is an offence to the customer.

Stay savvy citizen. The less we fall for these kinds inefficient business practices the stronger our nation and economy will become.

UnbeatableSale.com, Inc.
195 Lehigh Ave, Suite 5
Lakewood, NJ 08701

Always be suspicious of items with lower purchase prices combined with higher than average shipping prices!

Always avoid internet businesses headquartered New Jersey!

President(s)

Mike Martin, President

Vice President(s)

Eli Blumenthal, Director / Vice President of Marketing

Ray Berman, Vice President Marketing

Director(s)

Eli Fisher, Director of Marketing

David Russo, Director of Sales

Four Little Grumps

The little Screech owls have made it this far through many challenges. Their very proficient parents are keeping them protected and fed. Just a couple more weeks and they will be flying around the neighborhood!

The audio below was recorded at the nest box 10pm last night.

Voices from the Past

Time

1. the indefinite continued progress of existence and events in the past, present, and future regarded as a whole."travel through space and time"

Time passes with or without us. Our time here with each other is limited and when we are no longer present in our bodies we are quickly forgotten. Billions of people over thousands of years of recorded history are no longer in our plane of existence their bodies long since turned back into the dust they came from.

This week I am reminded of what it is to live in time as I rummage through a pile of old audio cassette tapes my father used over the years to capture a glimpse for us of our early life as a family. Over the last two days I have been taken back to a different time and have been blessed to relive a bit of my early history with new eyes.

A friend has provided me the use of an old Marantz pmd 502. I have it plugged into my Sony PCM-M10 to capture the analog signal and convert it to digital. It is all working very well and I am delighted to hear the strange and wonderful audio from my families past.

  Lord, thou hast been our dwelling place in all generations. Before the mountains were brought forth, or ever thou hadst formed the earth and the world, even from everlasting to everlasting, thou art God. Thou turnest man to destruction; and sayest, Return, ye children of men. For a thousand years in thy sight are but as yesterday when it is past, and as a watch in the night. Thou carriest them away as with a flood; they are as a sleep: in the morning they are like grass which groweth up. In the morning it flourisheth, and groweth up; in the evening it is cut down, and withereth. For we are consumed by thine anger, and by thy wrath are we troubled. Thou hast set our iniquities before thee, our secret sins in the light of thy countenance. For all our days are passed away in thy wrath: we spend our years as a tale that is told. The days of our years are threescore years and ten; and if by reason of strength they be fourscore years, yet is their strength labour and sorrow; for it is soon cut off, and we fly away. Who knoweth the power of thine anger? even according to thy fear, so is thy wrath. So teach us to number our days, that we may apply our hearts unto wisdom.
(Psalms 90:1-12)

My father, brother and I on another of his contraptions to foster family togetherness. No safety issues here! 

HD car radio converted into home stereo receiver.

HD "Hybrid Digital" radio takes broadcast radio and makes it three times better! I have had a digital radio in my vehicle for a couple years now and the sound quality combined with almost three times the programming choices has made it a purchase I have not regretted. HD radio is free and adds extra information and quality to any program you are tuning in!

Recently I finally got so frustrated with the radio in the house I decided to do something about it. I would come back from a drive and would miss the classical and jazz music stations that were only available on my HD radio. I realized that there was no reason to do without so I spent some time working around the problem.

Now I can tune in over 50 station and the audio in the house has never sounded better.

It amazes me how few practical portable hd radios are available but I suspect this is a result of technologies that will soon have everything broadcast over internet connected multimedia devices. Anyone hacking together one of these radios should be very cautious as it is a good way to burn down your abode. when not in use or left unattended any home made electrical device should be unplugged!

Breaking News!

There is now a very good table top HD radio available!

Insignia™ - HD Radio Tabletop Radio

• Model: NS-HDRAD
 
• SKU: 4635744
 

Rhea Briscoe

South Tampa Fellowship Women’s Christmas Dinner with Rhea Briscoe.

Last years with Jill Briscoe click here!

Attempt to stop predictive auto dialers.

I am using a disconnected phone line tone aka S.I.T. (Special Information Tones), at the beginning of my answering machine message.

The predictive dialer monitors the answers to the calls it places, detecting how the calls it makes are answered. It discards unanswered calls, busy numbers, disconnected lines, answers from fax machines, answering machines and similar automated services, and only connects calls answered by people to waiting sales representatives. Thus, it frees agents from the task of manually dialing telephone numbers and subsequently listening to ring tones, unanswered or unsuccessful calls.

We receive about 12 calls  a week which our answering machine picks up as nothing but white noise or on occasion some recorded message designed in some way to induce us to send money to the organization who is irritating us with said phone call.

Now if i need it I already have it or will get it without being told  by some slimy sales person I must have it. If something is worthy of my money which there is little of to begin with I do not need to hear a sales pitch to know I want or need it. Sales pitches are for items or services that are not valuable enough to sell themselves based on their own merits. In others word if someone is trying to see you on something that something is no good.

This is the first day of the test and I have received two calls as I write this post.

Uncharacteristically both calls were not followed by white noise but by two recorded messages. Also uncharacteristically both messages got stuck in a loop which I am going to surmise is a positive sign that the auto dialer might be cycling as a result of processing a disconnected number tone. I know this just might be wishful thinking but time will tell if the calls do indeed stop coming!

Altec Lansing Orbit iM237 speaker

This is a fantastic little speaker to use with any portable device that plays audio and has an earphone jack! It has very good sound for sharing your audio with the folks around you. I purchased mine for under $25 and use it with my sony PCM-M10 to review my recordings and also with my iaudio 5 mp3 player!

Very handy and inexpensive device!

Recording An Audio Book

Recording an audio book will drive you crazy but as with most difficult and time consuming projects the rewards are more than equal to the task!

I chose the book Gutta Percha Willie by a favorite author of mine George MacDonald. It was very frustrating but today all that is behind me and the audio is live on the web for the world to hear. Gutta Percha Willie is an excellent book for inspiring greatness in boys. If a boy takes the lessons in this book to heart it will have a profoundly positive impact on his life. If you have girls The Wise Woman is equally inspiring.

Any audio from www.archive.org is easily downloaded and listened to on any mp3 player.

The Way Awana Works

this is typical of what you will hear as an awana leader.

Nathan and Joe explain Hurricanes

 

Joe and nathan hurricanes by noshoes

John Wallace 325 Marathons 102 Countries

This day was spent at the home of John Wallace sorting thought a maroon duffel bag full of race bibs and marathon medals.

It was hard to believe that this bag held all these medals and bibs.


John Wallace has "run more than 325 marathons in 102 countries, ...has completed marathons in all 50 states in the USA (two times), all 13 provinces and territories of Canada, and all 7 continents. He is the only runner to complete a marathon in every country in Europe."

Even more unbelievable is the fact that we were able to record images of each one.

Here are a few of John’s medals that I really liked!

Thank you John “Maddog” Wallace for graciously welcoming us into your home and sharing this unique pursuit. God Bless you and your family. Your contribution to marathonmedals.com is a real help!

www.thetroubadourmovie.com

I have a friend from church who is making a movie. No kidding he is producing a movie. For me this is a very foreign idea. I just never contemplating knowing someone who would make a movie it seems so Hollywood.

Make no mistake it is Hollywood in technical terms only. My friend like me is a disciple of the one and only Jesus Son of the Creator of the cosmos and the movie The Troubadour is executive producer Tim Paskert’s effort to spread the Good News of the gospel.

Tim Paskert: Executive producer

Curtis Graham:  Director/Cinematographer

Jeremy Williams: Actor

Rob Whitehurst: the production sound mixer

In small way the media machine has begun to get the word out.

Here is an radio interview with Tim on Moody Radio.

Here is a recent article from The Ledger.

As alien as this whole process is to me given the sheltered life I lead it is very entertaining to watch and I am excited to see the final outcome of Tim’s diligent work!

A Day In The Life of Frequency 453.500

Today was Gasparilla Pirate Fest 2009 and Tampa’s finest were very busy babysitting the tens of thousands of parade attendees. The audio below is a recording of the day from 6:30am – 10:00pm. It is a concentration of Tampa Police Departments communication. It is not in real time but instead it is recorded using a voice activated recorder so there are no time gaps as there were in the original time line.

 

To understand what is occurring use these two list of codes while listening

SIGNAL CODES

10 CODES

Hillsborough River State Park

Sunday afternoon was a delight thanks to a couple of adventurous families. It was at church that I was told I would be getting a call about taking a hike. Sure enough I got a call and by 3:00pm was in a car full of chattering children on my way to Hillsborough River State Park.

That was nice!

Light of Life Gala 2008

A Woman's Place ministries' annual Light of Life Gala at the A La Carte Pavilion. Pat Layton and this years special guests Pam & Bob Tebo eloquently spoke on behalf of those who have no voice the unborn and challenged the large gathering of  Tampa's leaders to put their faith in Jesus. Bob Tebo encouraged those in attendance to boldly speak up and bring the truth to our world. The event also celebrated the growing number of business, churches and individuals who are part of the Life Impact Network.

Past Galas

Walk for life 2007

2006

2005

2004

Vicki Kirkland

Our sweet sister is with our Father in Heaven and I will miss seeing her and talking with her at church and the house just down the road. I know that she however has never been more joyful, more at peace, or more excited for she is with the Lord and she anticipates our arrival when the Father calls us home too!

Vicki Sue Kirkland KIRKLAND, Vicki Sue, 50, of Tampa, went home to the Lord November 11, 2008, after a lengthy battle with cancer. Born in Albany, Ga., she graduated from Mosley High School in Panama City in 1976. She received her Bachelor of Science degree in psychology from Florida State University in 1981. She then worked as a marketing representative and sales manager with the Xerox Corp. from 1981 to 2000, when she returned home to care for her loving family. She loved cruising with her family, spending weekends at their lake home in Winter Haven, attending her three daughters' softball games, attending Seminole games and anything else that gave her time with "her girls." She was a devoted member of South Tampa Fellowship, where she was involved in attending and teaching women' s Bible studies, organizing the annual Autumn Fest and caring for young children. She was beloved by the women of South Tampa Fellowship for her love of the Lord and her faith and courage in the face of numerous medical challenges. She is survived by her adoring husband of 27 years, Jack W. Kirkland Jr.; her loving daughters, Hayley, Karlee and Jenna Kirkland; her mother, Martha Hartzog (Howard); her sister, Mitzi French (Kevin); her brother, Robin Knight (Mary); her dogs, Coco and Jimmy Dean; and many other adoring family members. Friends may greet the family 7-9 p.m. Friday, November 14, at Blount & Curry Funeral Home, 605 S. MacDill Ave. A celebration of her life will take place at 1 p.m. Saturday, November 15, at South Tampa Fellowship, 5101 Bayshore Blvd., followed by a reception in the fellowship hall. Graveside services will be conducted for family members only. In lieu of flowers, donations may be sent toSusan G. Komen for the CureSusan G. Komen for the CureSusan G. Komen for the Cure Susan G. Komen for the CureSusan G. Komen for the CureSusan G. Komen for the CureSusan G. Komen for the CureSusan G. Komen for the CureSusan G. Komen for the CureSusan G. Komen for the Cure, (www.komen.org/donate) or the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, (www.mskcc.org). The family expresses its heartfelt appreciation to Dr. Rand Altemose, Dr. Rick Weibley, Dr. Doug McFadden and the nurses and staff members at St. Joseph' s Hospital Cancer Center for their untiring efforts. Please sign the online guestbook at www.blountcurrymacdill.com.