One More Testing to Go

Quiet day today.  Maddie and the crew had some time at Edge Martial arts of course.  Each time they have a testing, there's a sheet of paper handed out - the same one each time - that lets everyone know about testing schedules and asks various questions about training.  Written on this one were the words "LAST ONE!"  Yes, this next testing will be the last testing before the final testing in December, when Maddie goes for her third-degree belt.  Wow, can you believe we're here already?  What is really wild is the timing on this - keep in mind it takes about four years to get to this point.  Anyway, this December, there will be four students testing that same night for third-degree belts.  Some missed tests along the way, others went to rank camps and advanced a bit faster, and others just took their time with the journey.  But amazingly it times out that four of this small group timed it in such a way that they all test for third-degree black belts that one night.  It'll be a big deal!

I had to do another emergency re-write on the skit, which seems to happen a lot, but here we are.  I wasn't sure where we were going with it, so I started to write about refueling spiritually and that made me think of gas stations, and of course that made me think of Buc-ee's.  And the funny thing is, I wanted to use a prop from Buc-ee's, a prop that you can only get at a Buc-ee's... so you probably know where I'm going with this:  we're likely going to Buc-ee's tomorrow.  How insanely random.  But it should be fun, and old-school road trip!

I'm still marching along on the treadmill.  I passed 60% today, moving along this Scooby Doo virtual adventure.  It's been fun.  The virtual runs are a neat idea, and I'm considering a shift to that, leaving iFit for a while, although still on the current treadmill of course.  Either way, I'm still keeping my half-hour per day (really slightly more than that) of exercise.  Healthwise, Mom and I are okay with the detox.  It's getting Mom a little more than me at the moment though.  But we're still at the beginning of all this, with dietary changes and supplements.  

This morning I cleaned out the sea monkey tank a bit so you can see the alien spaceship on the surface of Mars.  This is a feature of the tank, the theme being "Sea Monkeys on Mars."  There are a lot of little ones in there right now.  I keep the oxygen going in the morning, and feed them about once a week.  They're good pets!  The hummingbirds are still outside at our feeder, getting their tummies full and ready for the migration.  It's still nice to see them.  And we're still getting all our visitors outside on the back porch.  While the bluebirds seem to be elsewhere, right now cardinals are really dominating the back porch there.  Their cheeps are distinctive and loud, and there are two families of cardinals visiting us all the time.  We have all kinds of other visitors too, of course, like chickadees, titmouse, various woodpeckers, the mourning dove mafia and more.  Oh, and the juro spiders.  Ugh.  They're relentless!  Those webs are so strong and get stuck to you and ... ew!

Oh, here's a small update on my Psalms project:  I'm almost done.  I've converted Psalm 149 to a hammered dulcimer bluegrass song, and Psalm 150 is a vaudeville orchestral number with trumpet, strings and cymbals, because the lyrics demand that sort of thing.  All that's left is Psalm 119, the mother of all Psalms, the longest chapter in the Bible.  What to do with that one?  That's the question moving forward, but once I'm done with that, I'll have set all 150 Psalms to music, every line performed by some AI singing voice with a huge variety of genres.  It's been a long-time coming - I've been working on this on and off for a year and a half now, just as a little hobby.  It's been fun!

Tonight we watched "Hotel Transylvania," one of our favorite seasonal movies.  These characters are like old family members coming around to visit each year.  I love these movies.

We closed out tonight reading, and then prayers.  Our nation is hurting, and we are grief-stricken.  We went to sleep tonight, but we have not ceased in our prayers for healing for our land.