Praying

Please pray with me.

Dear Lord of Mercy and Father of Comfort,

You are the One I turn to for help in moments of weakness and times of need. I ask you to be with two men very close to my heart (my father and my son) in their illnesses. Psalm 107:20 says that You send out Your Word and heal. So then, please send Your healing Word to Your servants. In the name of Jesus, drive out all infirmity and sickness from their bodies.

Dear Lord, I ask You to turn their weaknesses into strength, their suffering into compassion, their sorrow into joy, and their pain into comfort for others. May Your servants trust in Your goodness and hope in Your faithfulness, even in the middle of this suffering. Let them be filled with patience and joy in Your presence as they wait for Your healing touch.

Please restore Your servants to full health, dear Father. Remove all fear and doubt from their hearts by the power of Your Holy Spirit, and may You, Lord, be glorified through their lives.

As You heal and renew Your servants, Lord, may they bless and praise You.

All of this I pray in the name of Jesus Christ.

Amen.

Psalm 131

[the psalm from mass this weekend]

In You, Lord, I have found my peace.

PTO

Today I got an email from HR. They want me to project how much PTO (personal time off) I will use in November and December. Things have been pretty (FREAKIN') busy this entire calendar year. And I know that isn't expected to change in the next couple/few months. So, my first thought was, PTO?! Are you kidding me?!

I ran a report of all of my time cards since the beginning of the calendar year. I've taken PTO five times for a total of 47 hours since January 1st. I earn 120 hours a year and I only took 47 of them in the last ten months. And most of those were for medical reasons.

Apparently there were three days in March where I was sick. So, that was 27 hours (because of my 9 hour day). I charged 3.5 hours to PTO for my colonoscopy late in March. I know I had the whole day off, but apparently I had already worked enough hours that I only needed 3.5 hours in order to hit 80 for that pay period. I charged 5 hours to PTO on a Monday in April. My calendar shows 'out tired'. I charged 2.5 hours to PTO in June for Relay for life. And I charged 9 hours to PTO in August...depressed.

I even took a whole day off earlier this month for my dad's surgery. But I'd put in so many hours already, I didn't need to charge any PTO.

So I'm thinking, the chances of me actually taking a whole week off is somewhere between unlikely and 'what the heck are you thinking?'

I projected 40 hours...just in case. Then I checked out my calendar.

I normally work a 9 hour day and get every other Friday off. So I could potentially be off every other Friday for that. Plus, Veterans' Day is a Friday. I'll have Thanksgiving and the Friday after that off. Short weeks throughout November!  I love the thought of that!

So, if I take a vacation, it'll be in December. Again, I should have every other Friday off. Christmas is on a Sunday, so it'll be observed on a Monday. I'm thinking about taking off the week between Christmas and New Years. Then I'll be off work from Saturday the 24th until Tuesday the 3rd!
Now, let's see if I can get that approved.

Work of Art

"Joy Vibrations" by Rassouli

Matthew 22:34-40

[from the Gospel reading at mass this weekend]

When the Pharisees heard that Jesus had silenced the Sadducees,
they gathered together, and one of them,
a scholar of the law, tested him by asking,
"Teacher, which commandment in the law is the greatest?"
He said to him, "...

...The whole law and the prophets depend on these two commandments."

Seven Word Status

Two miles.  Two wins.  Still too blue.






(I chose that over "This damn depression is killing my diet.")

24 weeks...

...and I'm back to 15% of the way to my goal!  I had a 1.8 lb loss this week.  I'd love to average that every week for the next year.  But hey, one week at a time.