Good news..

My health is improving. I'm still not well, but I am able to get up and make a cup of coffee without feeling afterwards like I've expended the effort of climbing Mount Everest.

Yesterday, I preached twice here at Riverside, and there was amazing response as God seemed to be dealing with some very important issues in people's lives. Tomorrow, I plan to dive full force back into college work.

Due to having been sick, I'm behind on my studies so the next couple of weeks are going to be crazy with lots of late nights and early mornings. I'll be writing essay after essay and just hoping I can put enough time into each one of them to sound like I know what I'm talking about. Hopefully I'll crawl past the finish line called "end of term" on the 11th of December with my last essay in hand. Then I plan to take it slow for a few weeks. Until then, I'll be in the college library. Maybe I should take my pillow with me so I can take short naps between essays.

Don't be alarmed, but..

I'm on DRUGS!

OK.. Not drugs as in the illegal bad stuff, of course, but medication. However, the result right now is that I'm a little spaced out from the effect of it all. Ah well, I will try writing a brief journal entry anyhow and if I find once I'm well that I wrote about seeing pink elephants or flying pigs I can always delete it and try again.I've been unwell for about a week.

At first I thought it was just a common cold, but it got worse every day until on Friday I finally decided seeing a doctor might be in order. I went to a doctor, called Doctor Leach, who diagnosed me with a bronchial infection and told me to take penicillin, pain medication to get the fever down, regular puffs of a rather strong asthma inhaler, etc. I'm not sure how much it's all helping me so far, but due to the combined effects of the medications I'm not really sure of much of anything at the moment. What was my name again?

On Saturday, the church had an Alpha Day Away at Gartmore House in Aberfoyle. It's a beautiful place, and the weather was absolutely wonderful that day so I got to go on a couple of really nice walks during the breaks. The church has been taking people through what is called the Alpha Course, a course that explores the basics of the Christian faith, and it seems to have been very helpful so far for some people. On that day, two of the people made commitments to Christ, so we are all excited about that.As a result of pushing myself on Saturday when I was already unwell, however, I completely crashed that night. Early Sunday morning when I was shaking violently from the chills and crying out, "God, help me!" I finally got the idea that just maybe I should take a few days off to recover.

Though I was supposed to preach twice that day, I called one of the elders and told him my situation. He said he would preach in my place and that I should just stay in bed.While I was confined to my apartment all day, the people from the church were very supportive. Some called to tell me they were thinking of me and that they wanted me to call them if I needed anything. At noon, one of the deacons showed up with several bags of groceries, including a freshly cooked chicken and donuts.

Then later in the day, someone brought me dinner. I was very grateful for the way everyone was looking out for me.Today, a friend of mine brought me lunch and spent some time with me, which was encouraging, and I continue to get phone calls from concerned friends and church members. I also got an interesting email over the weekend. Even though I had not yet announced being unwell to anyone really, I got an email from a friend in Peru saying she was worried about me because she'd had a dream that I was sick. After the dream she had been unable to sleep, so she stayed up the rest of the night praying for me. Coincidence? Hmm.Well, today I think I really am finally on the upward mend and hope to be back to work within a few days. Until then, I'll just rest and try to recover. I'm not alone anyhow. I just saw a pink elephant come in and sit on my couch. Uh-oh. Anyhow, I'll write more in a few days when I'm no longer under the influence...

Smoky Robinson and the miracle

I tried to burn my apartment building down the other day. OK, I didn't actually TRY to burn it down, but I very nearly succeeded in doing it anyway. You see, it was one of those little accidents that could happen to anyone. I was trying to cook some rice, and it somehow caught on fire. The smoke alarm went off and made so much noise that the first thing I did was run around frantically trying to find something tall enough to stand on so that I could yank the thing off the ceiling.

BEEP! BEEP! BEEP! BEEP!BEEP!BEEP!BEEP!BEEP!BEEP!

I ran for one of the leather living room chairs and dragged it toward the doorway, intending to pull it into the hallway where the smoke detector was making its wretched noise (why DO those things make so much noise? They make you want to run right out of the house and leave all your possessions behind! ...oh yeah, guess that's why they are there, but anyhow...). I got the chair to the doorway and realized it was too big to pull through. I stood there for a second, wondering, "How did they get this in here in the first place? Up two flights of stairs and three doorways?

They could have hoisted it up to the window somehow, I guess, but the windows don't open all the way, so I'm not sure how you'd get anything through them. Hmm, I wonder how I'd get out of this place in case of fire. Oh yeah, FIRE!" Snapped out of my reverie, I continued my search for something to stand on.

BEEP!BEEP!BEEP!BEEP!BEEP!

I pulled out a little tea table and placed it under the smoke detector. Standing upon it I reached up toward that terrible sound, the pulsating sound beating upon my eardrums and smoke getting into my eyes. My hand almost reached, but not quite.

BEEP!BEEP!BEEP!BEEP!BEEP!BEEP!BEEP!

The search continued (OK, I know that by now any sane person would be wondering, "Why doesn't he do something about the fire?!?!?" But all I could think about was stopping that noise). I went into my bedroom and dragged the bed stand into the hallway. I stood upon it and reached up. After a twist of the wrist, the smoke detector was off the ceiling and in my hands. The only problem now was, it was unlike any smoke detector I had ever set off before (not that I make it a daily habit or anything). I didn't know how to turn it off. I tried pushing the button, twisting off the lid, and just about anything I could think of while the BEEP!BEEP!BEEP!BEEP!BEEP! continued to pound into my head. I ran back into my bedroom and held it under the bed for a moment.

Magically, the sound stopped. Whether it was the lack of smoke under the shelter of my bed or something else I did, I'll probably never know, but the terrible sound was gone and everything was right with the world.I breathed a sigh of relief. "Glad that one's over!" However, the fact that the visibility in my apartment was fast diminishing and the smell of smoke was now attempting to choke me suggested to me that there was still one more thing I needed to take care of.I ran into the kitchen and turned off the burner under the rice. I also opened the windows (yes, I know! Never cook with the window closed! That's British Cooking 101, everybody knows it.

I just forgot, but don't worry.. I'll never forget again!). The rice had completely burnt to a pile of blackness that resembled something like the remains of spent charcoal, but the fire stopped and the smoke gradually started to clear, though the smell of it would linger for several days afterwards. There had been a bit of excitement in my new apartment, but fortunately it wasn't too serious, though nobody would ever be able to use that cooking pot again. My place was finally quiet...but only for a moment, because as soon as all was calm...

BEEP!BEEP!BEEP!BEEP!BEEP!BEEP!BEEP!BEEP!BEEP!BEEP!BEEP!BEEP!BEEP!

There was another smoke alarm in the living room!!!

Oh well. You live and learn.Otherwise, everything around here is going about as could be expected. I've been doing some preaching at the church and a lot of study at the college. I'm about a week behind where I feel I should be on my studies, but it will all come out in the end. It always does. Probably the greatest challenge before me at the moment, as I am living in this lovely apartment all alone, is getting down the routine of housekeeping and cooking without burning the place down. That reminds me, maybe I should reconnect those smoke detectors.