16 people, 2 vans, a few slaps

Esther's clan arrived from San Francisco at 8:30 this morning in Baltimore-Washington International Airport. We were supposed to leave at 4 in the morning from Virginia Beach to pick them up but we left at 5AM so naturally we were an hour late. From there we continued on to New Jersey. The whole trip with stopovers took 11 1/2 hours. Since I only had an 1 1/2 sleep that night I was really getting tired at the end of the trip. I had Esther slap me a number of times to keep me awake. Everytime she did everyone else in the van volunteered to slap me as well.

Stone Passed

Praise the Lord! Last Thursday morning the stone finally passed. What a relief! And now I feel normal again. I took some pictures of the stone and I was thinking of posting it but I'm not sure if it that was something people would want to see. Maybe I will. I'll think about it.

I Sculpt Kidneys from Stone

Yesterday I attended a leaders retreat sponsored by our church. Everything was great 'cept for one thing. I had another kidney stone episode. While we were doing some group games the pain started to get worse in my lower left backside. And though the pain was dragging me down there were some moments that I couldn't help but laugh still. We were playing a game called "2 Truths & A Lie" where each of us give 3 statements and everyone has to guess which one is the lie. My statements were:
1. I am a kidney stone making factory. I constantly have kidney stones.
2. My birthday & my anniversary fall on the same day.
3. I have an electronic Japanese toilet seat at home.
Anyways the answer was number 2 but what's funny was when later on Janel wanted to pray for me, Ella started asking what for. When Janel told her, she looked shocked and said "Oh, I thought you sculpt kidneys out of stone." Janel & I burst out laughing. Why would someone who can sculpt, sculpt stones into the shape of kidneys?

Well, the pain prevented me from sleeping. I just kept moving around and getting up. But another funny moment was when Joey, sleeping across the room, blurted out, "Now this... is how ... you make a sandwich!" Hmmm, I wonder what he was dreaming about.

I stood up at about 8 this morning cuz I was hungry. Praise God the pain was very much decreased. I was able to start enjoying the fellowship. I took a nap after lunch and by late afternoon the pain was barely noticeable.

Well, after that experience, which would be about the 10th time I've had a stone, me thinks I better drink much, much more water than ever before. In fact, I'm going to have a drink right now.

Google Maps

I discovered Google Maps a few days ago and what a find it is. For anyone who's used web-based maps such as Mapblast, Mapquest, etc. you'll find that Google Maps far surpasses them all. Try zooming in or out and notice the speed. Try dragging the map in any direction and see how fluid the map pans. Click on the satellite view and see a satellite image of your map. And even in this view everything is just as quick and smooth. It can do much more - check out the tour. Hats off to the Google team. Super job!

Click here to go there.