To those of us who have children in our lives, whether they are our own, grandchildren, nieces, nephews, or students...here is something to make you chuckle. Whenever your children are out of control, you can take comfort from the thought that even God's omnipotence did not extend to His own children. After creating heaven and earth, God created Adam and Eve.

And the first thing He said was "DON'T!"

"Don't what?" Adam asked.

"Don't eat the forbidden fruit." God answered.

"Forbidden fruit? We have forbidden fruit?"

"Hey Eve...we have forbidden fruit!!!!"

"No Way!"

"Yes, way!"

"Do NOT eat the fruit!" said God.

"Why?"

"Because I am your Father and I said so!" God replied, wondering why He hadn't stopped creation after making elephants. A few minutes later, God saw His children having a fruit break and He was ticked!

"Didn't I tell you not to eat the fruit?" God asked.

"Uh huh," Adam replied.

"Then why did you?" asked the Father.

"I don't know," said Eve.

"She started it!" Adam said.

"Did not!"

"Did to!"

"DID NOT!"

Having had it with the two of them, God's punishment was that Adam and Eve should have children of their own. Thus the pattern was set and it has never changed.

BUT THERE IS REASSURANCE IN THE STORY!

If you have persistently and lovingly tried to give children wisdom and they haven't taken it, don't be hard on yourself.

If God had trouble raising children,

what makes you think it would be a piece of cake for you?

THINGS TO THINK ABOUT!

1. You spend the first two years of their life teaching them to walk and talk. Then you spend the next sixteen telling them to sit down and shut up.

2. Grandchildren are God's reward for not killing your own children.

3. Mothers of teens now know why some animals eat their young.

4. Children seldom misquote you. In fact, they usually repeat word for word what you shouldn't have said in the first place.

5. The main purpose of holding children's parties is to remind yourself that there are children more awful than your own.

6. We childproofed our homes, but they are still getting in.

7. Just when you redecorate their room into a nice TV room, they show up with boxes, suitcases and large dogs, to move back home.

It's the year 2001 and Noah lives in the United States.

The Lord speaks to Noah and says, "In one year, I am going to make it rain and cover the whole earth with water until all is destroyed. But I want you to save the righteous people and two of every kind of living thing on the earth. Therefore, I am commanding you to build an Ark."

In a flash of lightening, God delivered the specifications for an Ark.

Fear and trembling, Noah took the plans and agreed to build the Ark.

"Remember," said the Lord, "You must complete the Ark and bring everything on board in one year."

Exactly one year later, a fierce storm cloud covered the earth and all the seas of the earth went into a tumult. The Lord saw Noah sitting in his front yard weeping.

"Noah," He shouted, "where is the Ark?"

"Lord, please forgive me!" cried Noah. "I did my best, but there were big problems. First, I had to get a permit for construction and your plans did not comply with the codes. I had to hire an engineering firm and redraw the plans."

"Then I got into a fight with OSHA over whether or not the Ark needed a fire sprinkler system and floatation devices. Then my neighbor objected, claiming I was violating zoning ordinances by building the Ark in my front yard, so I had to get a variance from the city planning commission."

"I had problems getting enough wood for the Ark, because there was a ban on cutting trees to protect the Spotted Owl. I finally convinced the US Forest Service that I needed the wood to save the owls."

"However, the Fish and Wildlife Service won't let me catch any owls. So, no owls!"

The carpenters formed a union and went out on strike. I had to negotiate a settlement with the National Labor Union. Now I have 16 carpenters on the Ark, but still no owls."

"When I started rounding up the other animals, I got sued by an animal rights group. They objected to me only taking two of each kind aboard."

"Just when I got the suit dismissed, the EPA notified me that I could not complete the Ark without filing an environmental impact statement on your proposed flood. They didn't take very kindly to the idea that they had no jurisdiction over the conduct of the Creator of the universe."

Then the Army Corps of Engineers demanded a map of the proposed new flood plain. I sent them a globe."

"Right now, I am trying to resolve a complaint filed with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission that I am practicing discrimination by not taking godless, unbelieving people aboard!"

"The IRS has seized my assets, claiming that I'm building the Ark in preparation to flee the country to avoid paying taxes. I just got a notice from the state that I owe them some kind of user tax and failed to register the Ark as a 'recreational water craft'."

"Finally, the ACLU got the courts to issue an injunction against further construction of the Ark, saying that since God is flooding the earth, it is a religious event and therefore, unconstitutional."

"I really don't think I can finish the Ark for another 5 or 6 years!" Noah whined.

The sky began to clear, the sun began to shine and the seas began to calm. A rainbow arched across the sky. Noah looked up hopefully. "You mean you're not going to destroy the earth, Lord?"

"No," said the Lord sadly, "I don't have to. The government already has!"

The next escapade is not my own, but this one is so priceless, that I couldn't pass it up.

Go visit The Curmudgeon's Rant

WARNING--it is a coffee shooting out the nose type experience.

And as Paul McCartney sings....LET IT BEE, LET IT BEE!

Thanks to my dear friend at Mimi's Pixie Corner for the shout out on this one!

And a P.S. to all NaNoWriMo-ers....write on--we're almost half-way there!

Don't you feel like doing this to at least one person a day?

I thought this was hysterically funny. Talk about determination. These were sent to me via e-mail, so this bear isn't mine, but it reminded me of a bear story.

One evening, several years ago I was driving home from a Saturday night service. We live in the country and there are no light poles on the roads. (Hmm, imagine that. Someone once told me that she didn't like driving on my road because it was too dark. I told her to come up in the daytime or wait till the full moon, but then she might have to deal with wolves.

After I peeled her fingers out of the skin on my arm, I told her I was just kidding....yea, right! But I digress.....

Anyhow...driving home...dark....no moon....only headlights to illuminate the road in front of me and with high beams on, and no discernable difference, I remembered, only too late, that I had followed a car on a wet, muddy road (because of a tractor that had been in a muddy field). My headlights were giving off about as much light as the penlight in my glove compartment that I hadn't fed a new battery in about two years.

As I climbed the hill, up to the Fire Station (it's a landmark), the dark road seemed to disappear as the light that enters a black hole (like I've seen one and can describe the vision!) I slowed down (something I'm fairly unfamiliar with) and the road sat up. Well, not the road but the BIG bear that was crossing the road.

I stopped rolling, about four feet from it. Hey it didn't want to move and I wasn't going to get out and shoo it off the road! It stood up on it's hind legs and looked at me. Now I'm looking out the windshield, up a hill, and I can't quite see the top of this bear's head.

The only thing I could think to do, with my mouth hanging open, was lay on the horn (boy that has a habit of getting me in trouble) At that point in time I was asking myself if my brain was attached to my body. This bear could tear the hood of my car apart.

Luckily, the bear decided it had enough of the annoying little car and it wandered off into the park beside the Fire Station.

I proceeded home with my heart in my throat and after parking my car in the garage (it took four tries to get into a space that I've been parking in, for the last twenty years. I ran into the house and greeted my husband with arms raised and open wide, exclaiming, "Bear, BIG BEAR!!!"

He looked at me unconcerned and said, "Honey, we live in the country. Where do you expect them to live, down on Court Street?"

Well, I'm home from retreat.

Two of the ladies are new moms, so that's why you see babies!

A recap of the weekend....I lost my voice for two days. Ate a lot of great food, including white chocolate chip and macadamia nut cookies, and got crowned (We all did!) I'm behind in NaNoWriMo. I took my laptop with me, but only reached 8557 words. Lots of words to write this week.

Other than that, like the two silent days....words fail me! But then as a writer I've learned that a picture is worth a thousand words....

I'm leavin' on a jet plane....no not really, but my best friend Bonnie drives fast enough that if I close my eyes, I think we've lifted off. Really, that's her name! There are three Bonnie's in my church. Pastor says, at least when he says Bonnie SOMEONE answers him!

I'm leaving Friday after work to go on retreat with 40 women from Church! Yikes! :-) We're going to learn how to act like ladies and be feminine (fat chance) So we'll be getting facials, and our nails done, and learning how to wear scarves and jewelry...Please kill me now! Shhh...don't tell anyone but we're going to get tiaras to wear, 'cause we're to think of ourselves as princesses! I'll take the poke in the eye with a sharp stick, now...sigh!

Thankfully, I like all of our ladies and the Montrose Bible Conference in Pennsylvania is a fabulous place with exceptionally good food!

I'm taking my laptop, so I won't get behind on NaNoWriMo. See ya' in the funny papers! Back on Sunday!

How's everyone doing on their writing projects for the month? I have found that either you love NaNoWriMo or you don't.

I love being required to write each and every day. There really isn't any pressure because the gustapo are not going to come and carry me off to a Siberian gulag if I don't finish. It's just a race against ME! I've spent thiry years playing beat the clock, so this fits my personality. What I had to wrap my little brain around was the fact that this isn't expected to be a finished, ready to hand into a publisher, version.....it will be a first draft....Wheeee!!! The whole manuscript will wind up being about 80,000 to 90,000 words, but this will be a great start.

Brandilyn Collins has started a great three part blog over at Charis Connection on the art of plotting a novel. Drop in, she is phenomenal at it.

Also for those that are not Mork and Mindy directed (NaNo NaNo), Dee Stewart over at Christian Fiction has a similar event called Halo's Eve. Their exploring novel premises. Check it out!

To all those slaving away at the keyboards of the world....NaNu NaNu...Write On!

Hmmm...what to do? What to do? My days are being taken over by writing! Never mind that I'm a seamstress, by trade. Who needs to get married anyhow? I need to write! I've taken to carrying my laptop to the shop with me. That signaled trouble in the first place. Why sew when I can roam the Blogs?

Well, my dear pixie friend Mimi wants the poopie story next, as an Animal Escapade. It was funny when it happened while we were IMing. But I don't know....if skating across my kitchen floor with a bare foot imbedded in a present from my delinquent dog, ramming my head into the refrigerator (that's how I ended the brown slide) and then hurriedly wiping my foot with a paper towel and spraying it with Fabreeze (love that stuff) because Mimi was still on IM, holding while I was getting another glass of ice tea....is funny now.

That run-on sentence has seventy-two words in it. That must be a new record! Poop...this is one hundred and ninety nine words that I could have used for NaNoWriMo! I just love saying that word...It reminds me of something Mork from Ork would have said. NaNu..NaNu!

Let NaNoWriMo begin. God speed to you!