It's time to blog again.  I'm going to tell about some friends from church this time.  Ron and Monica moved here a few years ago from Michigan.  He does a lot of solos and groups with the choir.  She subs on the keyboards and teaches a Sunday School class.  His sister will bring his mother down here for the winter soon.  His mother is quite dependent but really loves to be here.  She has to have someone with her at all times and uses a wheel chair or walker.  She even has had to have help in the bathroom for the past couple years and uses oxygen all the time.  Monica is a dietician and I don't know what he does.  When they decided to move south he wanted to live close enough to go to Lake Gibson Church.    It's amazing how many people locate here because of the church. 

Roney and Jean  are retired and are here half the year and in North Carolina half the year.  I've been friends with them almost since I've been coming here.  He is retired from pastoring and prior to that he was an accountant with the North Carolina auditor's office, or he was the state auditor.  I'm not sure which.  They both are very short.  She is very neat and usually wears a suit of some sort on Sunday mornings.  She worked for an insurance company with the words Woodsmen of America in it.  I don't remember the rest of it's name.  It's the second marriage for both of them.  Their first spouses both died. 

The choir is so good here and they look good.  On Sunday mornings, all the men wear suits and the ladies are dressed up nicely.  This Saturday night is their Christmas musical at 5:00 Central Time.  It will be streamed live at www.lakegibsonchuch.com.    They will all be dressed in black concert attire and the platform will be very decorated.  The director reminds me of Bill Green.

Carl is an usher and has a bad limp caused by a stroke.  His wife is also an usher.  I don't know her name.  He is extremely outgoing and jokes a lot.  He always insists that I be first in line because I drive into the parking lot first.  I asked him what he is retired from and found out that he was a contractor and traveled all over the Unites States, Canada, Virgin Isles, etc.  putting fiber optics together.

Dorothy is also an usher and is always finely dressed.    She also is very friendly and has a little dog and lives by herself.  She has a daughter who lives somewhere in the north. 

Some of you who have been Nazarene's a long time will probably remember this man.  Saturday night I asked Jean if she knew his name and she said all she could remember right then was that his first name was Chuck.  He has always looked very familiar to me and I didn't know why.  All at once I figured it out and asked her if he is Chuck Milhuff, and I was right.  He came to Oskaloosa to speak for revival at least once when Pastor Bearden was there and it seems like he was there more than once.  This is his home church now. 

I think I better call it quits for now.  I just about lost the whole thing!  Tomorrow night we will be singing carols and eating a bunch of junk at the dining hall.  Our building has to take foods for the chocolate fountain.  But today we found out they don't have a fountain and they thought we could use a small fondue pot!  We found an appliance that has three "slow cookers" that we are going to use.  We have marshmallows, pineapple, strawberries, and pretzels to use with it.  People in other buildings will bring sandwiches, cookies, candy, and chips and dip. 

Last Tuesday evening our host and hostess got a call that their 13 year old grandson had been shot in the head.  They are in Huntsville, Alabama now.  He died and his funeral was Saturday.  Elmo's sister died in the Toronto area and he went there today for her funeral.  He'll come home frozen tomorrow!  He usually leads our singing at Monday night prayer and praise time so we had to punt tonight. 

Have a good day/evening.  I hope I'm not too boring!







    

Okay, I had two paragraphs written and it jumped to another page that I hadn't even seen before.  I'll try again.  I thought I had already written since I had arrived here, but I guess not.

I arrived here about 11:45 on November 12.  By 12:00 I was on my way with some others to Plant City to ABC Pizza.  They have AYCE spaghetti on Monday and Tuesdays.  I don't care for restaurant spaghetti usually, so I got a large pizza and ate one piece of it and put the rest in my freezer.  I didn't see anyone get seconds on spaghetti since the portions are so huge.

The apartment complex I live in has 40 units - 20 up and 20 down.  It's on the Florida Holiness Association campground.  There are also dormitories (some with heat and AC and some without) and a campground.  Most of the campers are permanent, but they can only live in them during the winter.  I can be here November 1 though March 31 and have to pay rent for all those months whether I'm here or not.  The rest of the year it is closed.  My complex has laundry facilities, a game room, and a puzzle room. 

Now I'll tell about some of the residents.  The man two doors down from me is 80 and has outlived 2 wives.  This morning I saw him out hanging up laundry!  He golfs almost everyday and goes to the game room at night.  He's from North Carolina and is Troy.

The couple next to me is new this year and they are from Ohio.  The man is just like a neighbor of ours when we farmed.  He has to be moving all the time.  This morning he was out pulling weeds.  I call him by the name of the man at home whose initials are SK.   You kids will know who that is.  They are Leroy and Marilyn.  She goes to the puzzle room a lot.  He roams looking for something to do or eat.  He evidentally burns it all off.  He also goes to the game room some.

The lady on the other side of me is from Pennsylvania and was here two years ago and is now back. 
Her name is Carol.  She goes to the game room most nights and has outlived two husbands.   She worked for a school district and was in charge of payroll.

Elmo lives upstairs and is from Ontario about 50 miles north of the Minnesota/North Dakota border.  He also golfs most days and goes to the game room most evenings.  He also plays guitar and helps with Monday evening prayer/praise time.  He's 82 and takes the stairs 2 at a time sometimes.  In Canada he golfs 5 days a week.  His wife has been gone 18 years.  He was in sales.

Howard and Joyce live downstairs and are from Ohio, I think.  They are the assistant host and hostess so sometimes they help out with miscellaneous things.  They both go to the game room in the evening and she goes to the puzzle room in the daytime.  I think he is 74.  Joyce also helps with Prayer an Praise on Monday evenings.

Tom and Lois live upstairs and are from Pennsylvania.  He's a retired trooper.  She goes to the puzzle room and game room.  He goes to the game room and is an avid reader.  You seldom see him without his Kindle. 

Ella just arrived for the first time yesterday and is from Michigan, I think.  Her husband has been gone 17 years.  I can't imagine that.  Seven years is way too long for me!

There's another new couple this year whose names I can't remember.  I also can't remember where they're from.  They live upstairs and she goes to the puzzle room.  He had heart surgery in July and is still doing therapy from it. 

Wayne is from Canada and lives upstairs.  He's divorced and goes to the game room most evenings and golfs some days. 

Harlan and his wife have been coming here for many years and at one time lived in Lakeland.  I don't remember where they're from.  She goes to the puzzle room a lot.  He is very large and she is small.  He was a trucker and she did office work. 

Carolyn is on the ground floor and I don't remember where she's from.  Her husband died late this past summer.  He was in charge of Prayer and Praise time and was a retired pastor. 

I don't know where Jane is from, but she lives on the ground floor also.  I think her husband has been gone quite a while.  She goes to the game room a lot and also is trying to be helpful to Carolyn.

There are a few others here, but I don't really know them because they don't go to the game room.  When everyone is here the building will be about 40% Canadian.  They are mostly from Ontario.  In fact a high percent of non Florida license plates are from either Ontario or Michigan here in Lakeland.

Tonight is the first of the season at Lake Gibson church.  It is the Talley's and will be streamed live.  The web address is www.lakegibsonchurch.com.  It starts at 6 EST and will probably come on line 15 minutes or so early.  Check it out. 

It's been in the 70's and 80's since I got here, but tomorrow and Monday it's supposed to only be in the 60's and rainy.  Now, let's see if I can get this to post.








  

I'm in Lake City, Florida tonight.  It's 10 miles south of where I-10 and I-75 intersect.  It is very nice outside.  I got here a little late because I had a problem to take care of today.  Yesterday as I was driving along I heard a big noise in the back.  When I looked in the mirror I saw that my clothes bar had fallen.  This morning I had to buy some wire and fix it and then get everything hung up again. 

The concerts in Fort Worth were very good.  They were held at Southwest Baptist Seminary and it is a very nice campus in a very bad part of Fort Worth.  A friend of the president of the seminary said he had told him that about 1/2 the people on campus are armed.  I don't know if that was employees or employees and students. 

I had a nice visit with Diane Altes.  Her daughter is a friend of Jodi's and her brother is the pastor of the church I go to in Florida.  The church's web address is lakegibsonchurch.com.  If you look at it, you will find a listing of the concerts on Saturday and Sunday nights in the winter.  They are all streamed live.  They are all nationally known Southern Gospel groups.  Keep in mind that they are in the eastern time zone.  If you get snowed in, you could watch the Sunday morning and evening services live too. 

I'm about 2 1/2 hours from Lakeland, so I should be there sometime in the late morning tomorrow. 

Have a nice day!

I'll be leaving on November 5 and spending a couple days with Jodi's family.  Then I'll be heading to Fort Worth to attend the Cathedral Family Reunion on Friday and Saturday.  From there, I'll be heading to Lakeland, Florida for the winter.  See you then!

Saturday we had a ladies tea and it was nice for a tea. There was left-over chicken salad, so last night they had some sort of little things that looked like a cross between flatbread and buns with the chicken salad on it with chips downstairs in the game room. I sat and listened to a man telling about immigrating here in 1922 from Persia. He was 3 and they arrived in New England. They were informed that the quota for Persia was already full and they'd have to return to Persia. But since his dad was a minister, he could stay but his mom and the kids had to return. His dad contacted a brother of his in Gary (Indiana, I assume) and he too was a minister. He somehow worked it out for the entire family to go there. Their plan was to go to California, but that never happened. It was a very interesting story.

Phyllis and Ila were here most of the day yesterday and I'm going to meet them at Parksdale tomorrow morning. I need more strawberries and oranges and some celery.

I got a shot of cortisone in my hip joint on Friday and it is improving slowly.

Triumphant was very good Saturday night. A group called Old Paths was here Sunday night and they were okay.

Have a good day/night.

Hello! Is anyone reading this, or am I just doing this to keep myself busy? Let me know if you are reading it!

Karen Peck was in a movie with Dolly Pardon and someone else who's name I didn't recognize. The movie is out now and has a two word title, but I can't remember the name of it. Karen is the director of a choir that won the competition last year, so they are the host in the movie. She even has a speaking part besides doing a song for it.

This was part of the conversation tonight:

Karen Peck: "I'm different than Dolly Parton."

Charles Kirby: "Yeah."

Open mouth. Insert foot. Dr. Kirby's complexion changed colors.

I'm really having trouble walking now, so Wednesday can't get here soon enough. I may have to start using the walker again.

Have a good day/evening and let me know if you are reading this.