such small hands

Christmas

The Millingers are having a fine Christmas, thank you.

I finished wrapping presents the morning of Christmas Eve. Ken and I got in a golf practice session (we are SO hard-core!) and had a quick lunch at Panera. I had dialysis, which was mitigated by being able to watch the movie “Amazing Grace.”

Came home from dialysis and we had our family gift-opening. Then we went to the 11 p.m. Christmas Eve worship at St. Paul. Maybe because we were on time this year, but the church didn’t seem as crowded as it did last year. The service was beautiful with lots of carols, and of course the candlelighting and singing of “Silent Night.” I was whipped by the time we came home and just tumbled right into bed.

Christmas morning dawned cold and grey. Maybe because of the late night, I felt kind of low. I read John 1 and gave thanks for the Word made flesh, who dwelt among us and gave us the power to become children of God.

Ken and Amy woke late. We spent the day at home. I put out the Honey-Baked ham, veggies and dip, little sausages, cranberry relish, deviled eggs and a cherry pie. We had lunch and sort of nibbled and noshed throughout the day. Christmas brought a bonanza of DVDs, so we spent the day watching them — “Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets,” “The Family Stone” and the entire first season of “Sex and the City.”

I don’t remember ever having such a laid-back Christmas.

Let’s see if I can hit the highlights of my gift list: a 2008 calendar of beautiful golf courses around the world, 3 dozen golf balls, a monogrammed golf shirt in pink, an official Dunder Mifflin Paper Company golf shirt, a golf score keeper, a ball marker and divot repair tool set (do you see a theme here?), Sensual Amber cologne, matching pepper and salt grinders, the entire set of “Jeeves and Wooster” DVDs, several Harry Potter movies from Amy — “Chamber of Secrets,” “Prisoner of Azkaban” and “Order of the Phoenix.” She also gave me “The Family Stone” and “Sideways.” That should keep me entertained at dialysis for quite some time!

Books Read in 2007

“Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows” by J.K. Rowling
“How to Stop Time: Heroin from A to Z” by Ann Marlowe
“The Case for Christ” by Lee Strobel
“Christ Plays in Ten Thousand Places” by Eugene Peterson
“The Case of Lucy Bending” by Lawrence Sanders
“Brideshead Revisited” by Evelyn Waugh (second read)
“Ishmael” by Daniel Quinn
“It Takes a Church to Raise a Christian” by Tod Bolsinger (second read)
“The Case for the Real Jesus” by Lee Strobel
“Lucky You” by Carl Hiaasen
Unfinished — “Wonderlust” by Vickie Kuyper. My bad. I received a copy to review and never finished reading it. It just didn’t grab me at the time, and the writer’s overwrought style left me cold. I think she never met an adjective or an adverb that she didn’t use.

Ohio Transplant Re-Evaluation

The Thursday before Christmas, Ken and I left early for my annual transplant re-evaluation appointment at the Medical University of Ohio in Toledo. An experience that is more tedious than painful.

We met with four different people, answering basically the same medical history questions with all of them. There is the transplant coordinator, the doctor, a social worker and the financial person. When they finished with me, I had some blood drawn and a chest X-ray.

I also have orders to get a TB skin test and fax to them the reports from the various tests I’ve had done: the colonoscopy in 1995, the cardio stress test from earlier this year, plus the EKG, carotid ultrasound and 24-hour heart monitor from November. These things are more a paperwork hassle than anything else. I wish there were some easy way for different medical facilities to share a patient’s information.

During our down time between meeting with people, I snooped through my file. Answered a question that had been nagging at me for a while. I wanted to know what my antibody level is, since that is why I had a positive crossmatch with Amy. Well, my PRA (Panel Reactive Antibody) is 93%. Here is an informative page explaining what a high PRA means. Basically, I would have a positive crossmatch with 93% of the population. Which is why finding a matching kidney donor is difficult. I assumed it would be high, since I have all of the typical factors that increase antibody levels: previous transplant, blood transfusions and pregnancy.

Please Pray

For my brother-in-law's brother, Bob Newton, who was admitted to hospice this week. He's been battling liver cancer.

Good Evening Ahead

Tonight is the children's program at church, which always promises great music from the smallest preschoolers to the eighth-graders. We'll have to leave early just to get a parking place.

Then there's the Pistons vs. Celtics. That promises to be quite a game. The two best teams in the East meet for the first time this season.

Update: The Pistons did not disappoint, as they defeated the Celtics 87-85 in the last seconds of the fourth quarter. With about 5 seconds left, Chauncey Billups drew a foul with a slick pump fake. He coolly sank his two free throws. Boston tossed one from the far court with about a second remaining, but it missed. And the Pistons gave Boston its third loss of the season. What a great game!

O Christmas Lolcat!

Best Christmas lolcat ever. Click on the picture to check out the comments for some very creative kitty carols. The cheezfriends at ICHC are some of the most creative.

moar funny pictures

Digging Out

The big snowstorm over the weekend dumped 8-9 inches on our little house. Did that stop us? Not at all. With the snow still coming down hard Sunday morning, we got into the trusty Rendezvous and drove to church. Ken had a big grin on his face as he plowed through the piles. A lot like the big smile he had on his face as he got to finally use his super-duper snow blower to clear the driveway, sidewalks and the neighbors' sidewalks. Boys and their toys. I'll never understand it. But I do enjoy the benefits.

I'm taking some time off this week, so it will be only a two-day workweek for me. Today, Thursday and Friday. I expect Amy home from Kalamazoo today. I'm hoping she'll help me decorate the Christmas tree and house. Ken and I assembled the tree Friday night, and I managed to get one string of lights hung during halftime of yesterday's Pistons game. But Amy enjoys the decorating, and I could use an extra hand with the lights. Besides, I don't like to put the tree up early. I want to consciously give Advent its own space and really use the time to prepare spiritually for the feast of Christmas. This way, I can leave the tree up until Twelfth Night.

Thursday morning, Ken and I are going to the Medical University of Toledo for my annual checkup with the transplant people there. That's necessary if I am going to stay on the waiting list in Ohio. The new kidney will come when it comes, meanwhile, "My grace is sufficient for you, because power is perfected in weakness."

How's the Golf?

I have been enjoying my GolfTec lessons. Even though I had a rather discouraging practice this afternoon. My instructor, Thomas, is still very encouraging. I'm experimenting today to see whether I can post a video from my last lesson. (Nope, can't insert mpeg files. Too bad. You'll have to use your imagination.) At the moment, I am concentrating on my backswing. Getting it to slow down and making that weight shift to the right as my shoulders and hips turn. Anyway, this is what it's looking like now.

Stuff I'm Reading

My postings have been few and far between, I know. And what is posted, well, it’s been rather insubstantial. It’s not that I haven’t got a thought in my head, it’s that I just can’t seem to pin it all down and write it out.

Besides, when there is just so much good writing out there, I find that I just … have nothing to say. I’d rather read.

Mr. Henry gives advice on buying kitchen appliances for Christmas.

The London Times advises us on the 30 things every woman simply must have in her wardrobe. The comments are amusing. Oh-so-serious women can't get over themselves enough to enjoy a lightweight little piece of fun. Why should you look like something the cat hocked up while you're working for peace and justice? I'm just sayin'. As someone who sometimes DOES look like something the cat hocked up ...

Catholic blogger Amy Welborn gives in to the clamor of her readers and writes eloquently and discerningly about “The Golden Compass.” Never read Pullman’s trilogy, probably never will. But I find the controversy fascinating.

Preaching that is Christ-centered. Because all of Scripture, Old and New Testaments, point us to Christ. “And beginning with Moses and the Prophets, He explained to them what was said in all the Scriptures concerning Himself.”

I confess I love lolcats. One of my favorite sites is I Can Has Cheezburger. I'm hard-pressed to think of a friendlier online community. And I am becoming fairly fluent in the lolcat language. So I was fascinated to find the lolcat Bible translation project. (via Mark Shea)

Here’s an example, the first 11 verses of Job:

In teh land of Uz wuz a man calded Job. Teh man wuz goodz, afraid of teh Ceiling Cat and evilz.2 Teh man hadz seven sunz and tree doters,3 And lots of sheepz and camlez and rinoceruseses and servnts, srsly.4 His sunz tok turns mading cookies, and they all eated them.5 And Job wuz liek "Oh noes! Wut if cookies were sin? Gota prey, just in cased."
Furst Tess
5 Teh ayngles wented to seez Ceiling Cat, and Saitin wented 2.6 Ceiling Cat axt Saitin, "Wher u wuz?" Saitin saied "Oh, hai. I'z wuz in ur earth, woking up and down uponz it."7 Teh Ceiling Cat sayd "Has u seen mai servnt Job? He can has cheezburger cuz he laiks me."
8 "No wai!" sed Saitin.9 "U just plyin favrits.10 If u take his cheezburgers, he no laiks u no moar."
11 Then teh Ceiling Cat sed "Okai, u can take his bukkit, but no hurtzing Job hissef." And then Saitin went awai.

James Lileks is often wonderful, so it’s almost cliché to link him, but he really got me this morning with this:

If, at age 50, you could recall the specific elements of being five, with the warm radiator smell and the snow on the eaves and your toys all around, Dad down the hall and Mom downstairs and Christmas coming and Rudolph on TV tomorrow and your favorite song playing for the sixth time – ah, it would be too much. Forgetting is a blessing. No one can reassemble the particulars, but you can recapture the generalities.

I do remember that time. Maybe it wasn’t so happy that it’s painful to recall, but there is something about the innocence of childhood that showers Christmas and everything about it with a sort of magic.