Joy and I visited an auction up in Concord, NH, last Thursday. It has been over a year since we were there and I was as surprised as they were to see I was still in their computer database. They've gone a little bit more high tech on us, too. Now all the furniture stays put for viewing and when piece comes up for bid, it is displayed on a television screen. Pretty nifty idea, I thought. We came away empty-handed but I have learned that Thursday nights are primarily for antiques and now "general merchandise" is sold on Monday nights. We'll have to check out the Monday night crowd one of these days. Jessica went to winter retreat this weekend so we dropped her off at the church and had a bite out afterward before settling in for a rainy, drizzly weekend. I suppose all the rain we're getting has its good points, like almost erasing the snow from our lawn and rinsing off the caked-on road-salt from our vehicles. (Don't know how the pacific northwest hacks it, though.) Crocuses can't come soon enough. On Saturday morning, we attended the funeral of Rev. Russell Hood; a good, gentle man of our church. (I came down to the family room in my Sunday clothes and asked Andrew why he wasn't dressed to go to church, telling him it was Sunday. The long school vacation week had him confused for a moment because I had him almost thinking it was Sunday.) At the service, I saw several petals fall from a mum and it looked to me like the flower arrangement shed some white tears. We celebrate the life and mourn the loss. Meredith's poetry was in top form to eulogize our friend. We carved out Saturday afternoon for our friends, and enjoyed the company of the Gonzalez' for a short time. Relationships are the meaning of life. On Sunday, someone painted our pastor into a corner and coerced him to promise to shave off his mustache if we raised enough cash to send him to Guatemala on a work-n-witness trip (rather than pull it out of the budgets). Many of us with whiskers know how attached we can become to facial hair (as odd as that sounds), especially after years and years. As of Thursday, Pastor commented that he was unconcerned about the razor, but some creative financing was procured at the Sunday afternoon lunch and the money was raised in the nick of time. Speaking of nicks, it may be a good thing to have a nurse nearby because shaving under the nose after so many years may have some nasty repercussions. I told the pastor that I have an ample supply of brown paper bags that he can have. He'll have to raise the eye-holes from what I'm used to, though. From levity to Lent: Andrew came to me recently and offered that he was giving up breakfast cereal for the Lenten period. I was impressed because I hadn't spoken about Lent this year to the kids, and cereal to a 12-year old is about as important as Coke is to me. My other children are considering their own sacrifice. I confessed to Joy that I didn't feel much like observing Lent this year. She reacted with accommodation, "well, then don't." I replied that I think it is the time that I don't want to that I should the most. She agreed. Some people get puzzled: "do Nazarenes observe Lent?" "Isn't it a Catholic thing?" I would respond that "whatsoever is good... think on these things." My father-in-law once commented that he thought I drank too much Coke. I agreed with him, but then I told him that I gave more than a tithe of my Coke to God during the Lenten season. (No, I don't pour an ounce out of ten down the drain.) Going without for 40 days (46 if you count the Sundays) is more than 10 percent of 1 year. And if I drink too much Coke for my own good, I declare at this time of year that it does not have dominion in my life. Lent is late this year: beginning on Wednesday, March 8. Hmmm... maybe the pastor can give up his mustache for Lent. :-{) Mark Mark Metcalfe, Cadence Design Systems, Inc. \ 270 Billerica Road, MS04 \ O, Chelmsford, Massachusetts, 01824 (_______\/ )_______/ Phone: (978) 446-6451 Fax: (978) 262-6363 -----------\--------------