Hair Today.....

"Excuse me", he said, as he slid by me to get to the baggage claim. By all means.

Later that day, a milder version.

Immanuel - God With Us

Poop!

Hmmm?? They say you learn something new every day.....

Down with the Guvment and Can'tinental Airlines!

An expiration date does not an expiration date make.

I usually resist jumping on the bandwagon to rage against the machine but have to take my turn tonight. They tag teamed us and sent Antony packing. He was going to go witness the nuptials of his friend Brian in Honduras but they got all funny on us and rained on his parade. I was this close to having a John Q. moment there in terminal 6 of LAX airport.

Word to the wise - It seems that even if you have a passport that expires in June 2009 it doesn't mean you can just hop on a plane up until that point and travel with it. Some countries, or maybe it's Uncle Sam, have requirements like your expiration date cannot be more than six months out from your arrival date in another country. After you've reached the 15th of a month it's like that month doesn't figure into the equation - round down. Despite the guvments website statement that you can find there today, the info that Can'tinental abides by says 6 months. They won't bend. Supposedly they could be fined and/or the traveler could be stranded at any other point along the trip. They asked us to show them this info (below) which we couldn't 'cause we got it when we phoned a friend. They brought us into the inner sanctum and showed us their statement from immigration but wouldn't look this one up:

• "ENTRY/EXIT REQUIREMENTS: A U.S. passport valid for at least three months from the date of entry is required to enter Honduras." [Confirmed current with U.S. Dept. of State by phone on 12/17/08 1-877-487-2778]

Let's hope Billary cleans this up when she comes into power.

Additionally, their recommendation is to camp out in L.A., go to the American Embassy and ask for a rush job on a new passport that costs an arm & a leg. Then, they want to send you off two days later if the rush job thingy works for an additional $400. Where's the love?? The buyer was given no caveat emptor - a term I learned when I had to bring the weight of the BBB and the CA State Attorney General's Dept. of Consumer Affairs to bear on Ticketmaster when they reneged on an agreement.

Our night in a nutshell.


Continental Airlines could not be reached Wednesday for comment.... well I got cut off after waiting in line on hold for 5 minutes. We'll see if they answer their e-mail.

Merry Christmas!!

Having grown up in Wisconsin I was used to having a white Christmas more often than not. It's still hard for me to get in the mood with the absence of snow in So. Cal. There are the universal elements leading up to the 25th - carols, food, trees, lights, traffic jams - but it still seems like something's missing. I remember my first December here. The season seemed so contrived to me. The snow and the cold does add something to it all. I kind of miss all it has to offer. I remember:

Sledding, innertubing, skiing, skating, getting in trouble for errant snowballs, trudging through it to deliver newspapers before anyone was awake to shovel the sidewalks, shoveling, blowing it with a snowblower & trying to prevent your eyelashes from freezing together, losing control of your car, the car getting stuck in the snow, doing doughnuts in the mall parking lot, giving your enemies a facewash, making snow people, snowmobiles, & the Klondike Derby with the Boy Scouts.

I hope to get a dose of snow in Colorado when I go home.

Merry Christmas!!

Ellis Island

Part of my evening was spent picking up more items for our annual hygiene kit project. I visited friend and former neighbor, Sebastão at the 99¢ store he staffs. Later, I parked near two drugstores to do some comparison shopping and stopped in between at *bucks for a pit stop. When, what to my wondering eyes should appear, Ellis sitting at a table alone. Life's been hard for Ellis and he recently lost a family member. We shared coffee and a Cranberry Bliss Bar. He preached to me - the Cotton Patch Version. I was happy to listen and get lost in his world for a moment forgetting about mine.

Ellis is a good egg. He rarely stays for the entire church service. You'll find him arriving late, crisscrossing the sanctuary obliviously right in front of the main speaker as he finds a seat. He is a survivor and is always restless. Philippians 4:11-12 is not a picture of Ellis. He has a hard time making his ends meet. That, and the love of Christ he finds at the church, keeps him coming back for more. He plays some kind of game hustling cell phones and pagers. He goes through them like dirty diapers. Though he tried to explain more of that to me tonight, I still don't get it. It keeps him busy and out of real trouble. It just makes it hard to get ahold of him as his phone number(s) change about once a week. That's our Ellis!

Random Thought of the Day: IMHO, the bassline in "It's My Life" (Talk Talk or No Doubt) is one of the best around.

In the Street Smarts Dept. - I was approached again tonight in a parking lot. My tendency in these cases is not to engage a stranger in conversation at night when alone. Call me new-fashioned. I get it often late at night near the church or in a parking lot when shopping. If someone does this and begins their petition or even before they begin it I'll utter a preemptive "Don't approach me!" If that's not enough, they won't be satisfied and I feel like it, when they say "why?" I'll just say something like, "It's too late at night." Yeah, I know "what would Jesus do?" I'm still asking myself that but also I am still here to tell you about it. All this keeps them guessing as to what surprise I might have for them if they do approach me. I guess I may be cold in this regard but for all I know they may be out to do me harm or in the case of a female approaching me, far-fetched as it may be, it could be an undercover police officer out for a night of entrapment.

CBS Evening News with Katie Couric

A local CBS news crew is here using the Church's food distribution as a backdrop for the national network CBS Evening News. May air tonight. Shout out to Katie Couric!