The Lost bayou Ramblers Is one of my favourite Cajun Bands. Here is a sample of their music:



Kenith

Yesterday, I put a couple of packages in the mail for our son who is in the Persian Gulf. The packages contain treats (homemade and store bought) and a few gifts and requested needs.

After I got that done, my younger sons and I went to my sister's house to pop fireworks. We left home a little after noon, stopped and picked up some boudin at Peto's Meat Market in Moss Bluff.

After we ate the boudin, we bought fireworks at one of the multitude of firework tents are, this time of year, set up, all around the area. After that we headed North to Sandy and Brian's. We visited with with Sandy and her dogs for a while, before going to the pond to shoot off the fireworks.


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Sandy has a new dog (given to her), the dog is a beautiful American Bulldog, less than a year old. As it was giving dark, The boys and I went out to the pond to shot off bottle rockets and the other fireworks.

When we finished a couple of hours of shooting off fire works (the boys had a good time) we went back to the house and visited with Brian and Sandy for a couple more hours and then came home.

We arrived home about 10:00 pm.

Coram Deo,
Kenith

This morning my alarm went off at 7:15 but I hit the snooze until 7:30. I then got up and woke the family. We got got ready and headed off to Bethel for Sunday School and and worship. MK is teaching through the Puritan, Jeremiah Burroughs' book, The Rare Jewel of Christian Contentment.

Our Pastor, Steven Wright and his family are out of town so Rev. Mark Duncan lead the service in his place. It was good to have pastor Mark here. He and I used to visit on my front porch when he and his family lived just around the corner from here. Now they live in Texarkana, TX. I miss those visits.

Worshipping the true and living God, in an assembly of His saints, is good.

After worship services Lisa, the boys and I went to Arby's for lunch and we were joined by Rhonda and Morgan and Danny. After lunch we came home and have had a quiet day.

Coram Deo,
Kenith

Ps. Pastor Steven's sermons are online HERE.

I'm getting ready to head off to bed, but before I do so I did want to add a little note to this blog. My friend MK came over today. He had been on call during Christmas and we were unable to get together for Christmas before today.

We exchanged wines for Christmas. While he was here we opened one of the wines he gave to me. It was a very good blended wine. The wine, from Ventana Vineyards, was a 2005 Due Amici. Which is a 50-50 blend of Sangiovese and Cabernet Sauvignon. It was wonderful.

MK and I sat on my porch, talked and enjoyed this very good wine. Lisa joined us for a little while, but she does not drink red wine. This of course left more of this excellent wine for MK and me.

Now, Its bed time. I have to get up for Sunday school in the morning.

Never forget that wine is a great gift that God has given to man, but like all gifts, it must be used wisely. (Read Kenneth Gentry's book God Gave Wine: What the Bible Says About Alcohol)

Coram Deo,
Kenith

Lisa's brother, Troy, drove in from Ohio for a Christmas visit. He and his son Sean (who is in the Air Force) came over to visit on Christmas day as did other family members. We had plenty of good food and wine to celebrate the birth of Christ.

Friday started by driving Jessica to the airport in Houston, I got back home a little after 7 that morning and I went back to bed and slept for about four hours. I hung around the house with the boys for much of the day, then the three of use went to the movies to see Bedtime Stories. It was cute (mostly) and the boys enjoyed it.

After we got home, I got cleaned up. Lisa had made arrangements so that she and I could go dancing. My wife looked beautiful, as usual. We then went to Caribbean Cove, which is at the Isle of Capri Casino. Lisa and I are always one of the younger couples when we go dancing there. My wife jokingly refers to it as the geriatrics lounge. The band playing last night was Zydacane. They played Cajun, Swamp Pop, Country music and some old time Rock and Roll as well. We danced a lot, had a great time and were home by midnight.

This morning we slept in and did not get up until 9:30. It was great.

Here is a video of a favourite slow dance (i.e. belly rubbing), Swamp Pop song -- Mathilda




Coram Deo,
Kenith

Jessica, my lovely daughter-in-law, had to catch a plane this morning to return to San Diego. Jessica, Morgan and I climbed into my truck and headed for G.H.W. Bush international at about 1:30 this morning. I listened to an audio book, the girls slept while I made the 2 hour drive to the Houston airport.

It was foggy and rained a little bit for the drive, but other than that the drive was uneventful. We arrived at terminal A about 3:30 this morning. Hugged Jessica and said our goodbyes at about 4:40 this morning drove back to Louisiana.


When I go to the GHWB airport, I prefer taking I-10 to Beaumont, than I get off the interstate and take Highways 90 and 1960 the rest of the way. The drive is a bit shorter following this route and there is a lot less traffic.

Coram Deo,
Kenith

It is Christmas Day. It has been a very nice day. We opened gifts this morning and family has been dropping by through out the day.

(NOTE: Our son Christian is in the Persian Gulf area serving with the U.S. Navy. He couldn't be here for Christmas, but as you can see in the pictures, he is with us in spirit.)

Morgan and Jessica (Christian's lovely wife) with Christian

Christian and his brother

Christian and his other brother


Christian and his Mom (My wife for 25+ years!!)

Christian with his dog, oakly and me

Merry Christ-mass,
Kenith

A Cajun Classic

The big news for yesterday is Jessica, my lovely daughter-in-law, arrived last night. She flew in from San Diego by way of Denver. There were several delays on the way. But when she arrived in Houston Lisa and Morgan were there to greet her.

I had stayed home with the boys instead of making the trip to Houston. Woody called an invited the boys and me over for Pizza. He and Elizabeth had been painting were finishing up. I grabbed a magnum of Merlot and the boys and I headed down the road for Pizza.

After Pizza, Woody pulled out his Risk board game. The boys, Woody and I played the game and Woody and I enjoyed wine as we played. When Lisa and the girls arrived back from Houston, we were still playing, though one of the boys had been eliminated.

We left the game set up, we will finish it today, and headed home to visit with the Jessica, Morgan and Lisa. After a good visit, The girls, worn out from traveling, headed off to bed.

Later,

Kenith

Wednesday, James G. and I spent the day in the New Orleans area visiting a sister refinery, looking at their VPP stuff. At the end of the day we headed back west. In order to avoid the traffic in Baton Rouge, we headed south to Houma and Morgan City via Highway 90. We still ran into some traffic in Lafayette. We stopped in Jennings at a local Mexican Restaurant for a bite to eat and headed out. I got home a little after 9PM.

Thursday and Friday were spent either on union/company related business or running errands and taking the boys Christmas shopping for their mom. The shopping wasn't to bad because I had asked Lisa what she wanted and where I could get it. Life would have been much more difficult if I had had to figure those things out for my self. :-)

Saturday, Lisa was supposed to got to Houston to pick up Jessica, our lovely daughter-in-law, but Jessica was not able to make it to Houston and Lisa became ill, so it worked out for the best.

I took the boys to Longville for a family Christmas party. My daughter Morgan meet us at my sisters place. Morgan's been wanting to do some shooting, so I bought 50 rounds of .22 long-rifle rounds and brought my .22 revolver with me. ( I was supposed to bring my 30-30 to my dad, but I forgot it at home).

Morgan, the boys and my grandniece all did a little target shooting. Then we went into Sandy's house for the party. There was tons of food and sweets (of which I at more than I should have). I feasted on chicken and sausage gumbo, potato salad and dessert.

As things were getting started, we learned that a nephew had just killed a dear down the road, so Paul went to help him skin and dress the deer. When they arrived (cleaned up) the party got going.

This morning, Lisa and Morgan headed to Bush International Airport to pick up Jessica, who's flight, I just learned, is delayed at Denver.

I went to worship services alone this morning, so I took I took the opportunity to visit the local Orthodox Church. Saint John the Divine is affiliated with the Antiochian Orthodox Church. It was very interesting. I did not know what to expect because I had never visited an Orthodox Church before this morning.

Coram Deo,

Kenith

Tonight, I'm on the West Bank of the Mississippi River, just across the river from New Orleans. James and I are here on refinery business. We are here to look a a sister refinery on health and safety issues. We are working on getting our work place up to be as safe as possible, part of that is getting the company, workers and OSHA working together in VPP.



We are the Holiday Inn Gretna. Tomorrow will be spent at a local refinery we will then head west and home. We just ate at De-No Seafood in Gretna. It is a small local restaurant. As an appetizer I had a cup of shrimp and corn bisque. It was very good. My Red Fish was good as well and it was a more than I could eat. With the meal I had a couple of Abita Ambers with my meal and a strong cup of black coffee after the meal. At this moment Lou Dobb is on the TV. After I post this I will open my book and read until I am ready to sleep.



Coram Deo,

Kenith

I started working days Thursday and finished today. On good weekends at work operators, like me, are mostly babysitters. On such weekends the units we are over run good. The outside and console operators have fairly leisure days (or nights) at work. We have rounds to make and equipment and processes to keep our eyes on, but on good weekends supervisors, engineers and mechanical folk are home or at least somewhere else.

On not so good weekends, there are problems, operational or mechanical, and these make for busy, hard and tiresome weekends at work. This last weekend was on the problem side of the equation. I am glad it and my Monday (which is almost always brutal) is over.

I had hoped to be finished with everyting about work until after Christmas, but I may go to New Orleans on business and then I am going to have union work to do on Thursday and Friday. This should go quickly (I hope).

Lisa and the boys are ok, although one of them is a bit under the weather. Tonight when I got home, my cousine Chris and one of his sons, Brandon came over to visit. It was good to visit with them for a while.

Later,
Kenith

Today was the first time in about twenty years that we had snow that actually stayed on the ground for even a little while. I awoke at 4:40 AM at 5:am I saw on the news that it was snowing so I went outside to see. I saw that the snow was sticking in the yard so I came in and woke the boys. Before today, they had never seen snow and they were pretty excited by it.

I had to leave for work before light. Lisa got the boys dressed and when it got light they went outside to play. They played in the snow and threw snowballs at each other and our neighbours. Then they came in got their things and went to school.

I spent the day at the refinery. It was a typical hectic day.

Kenith

Sunday night I picked up MK in my truck and we went to Josh's house to watch football, drink a little wine and talk sports, politics and theology. We opened a few impressive bottles of wine, ate good food, watched the Baltimore/Washington game and visited. The three of us are all Reformed in theology so we had lots to talk about, especialy since Josh has spent much of the last year or so in Southern Alabama.

On Monday I took up painting the house again. As I painted the house I had my iPod and listened (for the second time) Garth Nix's Abhorsen trilogy. These books are a very interesting work of fantasy. I highly recommend them. My dauther talked me into listening to them. She thinks I don't read fiction so she loaded these books on my iPod. I am so glad she baggered e into checking them out.

I finished with the primer so the next clear day that I am off from work I will add the finish coat.

It's now passed my bed time.

Coram Deo,

Kenith

The other night I spent several hours talking with Christian via Windows Live Messenger. He is at an undisclosed spot in the Middle East. He is well and says the food is good.

While I wrote notes back and forth with him he was also speaking to his wife, Jessica, and to his sister, Morgan, I don't no how to speak with him over the web (yet).

I was ill much of yesterday, but fill much better today. Today it is Lisa who is not feeling good.

Morgan spent the night here last night and she, the boys and I went to Sunday school worship services at Bethel. MK will be teaching Sunday school for the next several months. He will be going through the Puritan pastor, Jeremiah Burrough's book Rare Jewel of Christian Contentment.

Today, the Second Sunday of Advent, Pastor Wright preached a second sermon on Ruth. The sermon was based on the Ruth chapter two. It was very good.

After Worship we came home at gumbo Danny and Morgan at dined with us. We had gumbo (I can never have too much gumbo). The boys and I tossed a football for a while as well.

Now I am sitting on the porch writing this blog enjoying a beautiful Sunday afternoon.

Coram Deo,
Kenith

Tim Tebow and Florida have defeated Alabama and Nick Satan in the SEC Championship!!!

Alabama 20 - Florida 31

Go Tebow!!!!

Looks like Saban and Bama are going to the Sugar Bowl. I've always pulled for SEC teams when playing non-SEC teams but I can't pull for Saban.

This is a first for me: Go Utah, beat Nick Satan and Bama.

Kenith

I worked last night. We had a little trouble because of cold weather. The temperature dropped to 30 degrees during the night. That is COLD for deep south Louisiana. I was out side from 2:30 am to almost 4:00 AM. I love this weather, when I am properly dressed for it.

Yesterday was a non-event. I had stayed up late Sunday so that I could sleep in on Monday, to get ready for the hoot (i.e. Night) shift. I woke early, but went back to bed after Lisa and the boys left for the day, and I slept to almost noon. Because I had plenty of sleep and the crisp cold air, I had no trouble staying awake last night.

Here is a picture of the type of aircraft that Christian flies in:

It is now time for bed.

Coram Deo,
Kenith