TBT: Counting Blessings

In searching through some old blog posts recently, I stumbled upon one from April 2020 about being thankful for the blessings in our lives.  The day before I’d written what I thought at the time was a doom-and-gloom post, but reading it now, it wasn’t too bad.  I do seem to remember being in an exasperated mood when I wrote it, so that probably explains, in part, the sense of contrition I experienced after writing it.

Regardless, it yielded “Counting Blessings,” a post giving thanks for God’s many blessings in my life.  It’s rather serendipitous that I stumbled upon this post again the other day, because the theme of counting one’s blessings is one I’ve been contemplating quite a bit lately.

Life is going well enough for yours portly (I’d better not say that too loudly!).  Work is clipping along and I’m hustling big time with lessons.  I have a great (and godly) girlfriend, dog, and house, and a supportive family.  Things could be worse.

With that here is 29 April 2022’s “Counting Blessings“:

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SubscribeStar Saturday: Indianapolis and TPP Update

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I’m in Indianapolis this weekend for my older brother’s wedding, which I will likely report about in some detail next week.  As I lacked the time this week to craft a better SubscribeStar Saturday post, I figured I’d give subscribers an update on my various projects.

Blogging at Buca di Beppo

Blogging at Buca di Beppo, Indianapolis, Indiana

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TBT^2: Christmas Eve

Well, it’s not exactly Christmas Eve—more like Christmas Eve Eve, which probably has some liturgical significance that my Southern-fried Protestantism doesn’t know or appreciate—but given the way Christmas is falling this year, as well as my own laziness, I thought it’d be worth looking back at this classic Christmas Eve post, with my timeless “Christmas and Its Symbols” post for Flashback Friday tomorrow.

That scheduling also lets me do my beloved “^2” addendum with the titles, adding another layer of Talmudic-esque commentary onto my past scribblings:  the ultimate in authorial self-indulgence.

Of course, the season isn’t about my half-baked musings about Christmas, Christmas Eve, or the rest.  It’s about the Birth of Our Savior, Jesus Christ.  As I wrote last year, Christmas Eve seems to perfectly capture the spirit of mystery of that night, “a night full of magic, mysticism, and wonder.”  Christmas Day is a flurry of activity:  opening presents, yelling at parents to wake up, cleaning up piles of wrapping paper.  Christmas Eve, especially Christmas Eve night, has always seemed more mystical, more reflective—the true celebration of Christ’s Birth.

It was also the night my Aunt Cheryl—the best one-eyed piano player in Aiken County—used to throw her big, bodacious Christmas Eve bash, featuring her incredible lasagna.  So maybe that’s why it fills my heart with a warm, fuzzy feeling (these days, it’d be a welcome dose of heartburn—totally worth it for a thick section of her lasagna).

This year, I think I’ll be spending Christmas Eve with my niece and nephews, waking up at their house Christmas morning for the second year in a row.  That’s always a fun way to spend the season.  Here’s hoping there’s some Christmas Eve Chinese food thrown into the mix.  God Bless General Tso—he was a bloodthirsty dictator, but his chicken is delectable.

With that, here is “TBT: Christmas Eve“:

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Celebratory Saturday; SubscribeStar Saturday Delayed

This weekend I am celebrating some big family milestones, including my older brother’s birthday.  As such, this weekend’s installment of SubscribeStar Saturday will be delayed.  With all the fun this weekend, it’s hard to get the ire up to write “Decline, Part II” (read  the preview of “SubscribeStar Saturday: Decline, Part I: Afghanistan” and read the full post here).

It’s been a very long week at work—not bad, just long.  It was one of those weeks where I felt like I was working constantly, but never quite getting ahead on anything.  Finding time to write is getting harder, unfortunately—there’s not enough time in the morning, and by the time I get home in the evenings, I am wiped out.

That said, all is well.  I’m getting excited for the next Spooktacular, and should be placing an order for t-shirts soon.  I’ll have the designs for those shirts uploaded once I place the order.  I have two designs this year, so make sure to collect ’em all.

Thanks for reading, and thanks for your support!  If you’d like to subscribe to or view my SubscribeStar page, you can do so here.

Happy Saturday!

—TPP

TBT: Nintendo Labo Piano

My Spring Jam is approaching very quickly, and I’m dedicating more time to preparing for it.  I’ve dusted off the piano and have been putting in some practice time to make sure I’m sharp.

With that in mind, I thought it would be fun to look back to a post from last May, in which I detailed the construction of the Nintendo Labo Piano.  It was a fun but lengthy project, and I’m not even sure if my niece and nephews have played it since then, but it’s really cool seeing the imagination Nintendo is putting into their products.  Nintendo is to video games what LEGO is to toys.  If you get that analogy, then you understand.

Here is 19 May 2020’s “Nintendo Labo Piano“:

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SubscribeStar Saturday: Easter Weekend 2021

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It’s Easter Weekend 2021!  Unlike last Easter, which was “decidedly un-Eastery” in The Age of The Virus, this Easter is starting to go back to normal.  By the time you read this post, I will have had my second shot of the Pfizer vaccine, so I’m either fully medically acceptable to our cosmopolitan elites—or dead.  Gulp!  I’m not sure which is worse.

Regardless, more and more folks are vaccinated, and churches have been reopened for many months now here in the South (they never should have been shuttered in the first place).  I fully expect that tomorrow will see a return, albeit a perhaps socially-distanced, diminished return, to the jam-packed Easter services of The Before Times, in the Long, Long Ago.

Easter is the most important holiday in the Christian calendar, probably in a dead-heat with Christmas.  Just as Christmas celebrates Christ’s Birth, Easter commemorates His Resurrection—the ultimate testament to Christ’s Victory over Death, the Devil, and the Grave.

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SubscribeStar Saturday: Myrtle Beach

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This weekend I’m down in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, with my family.  With the exception of last year, we visit Myrtle Beach every March because it coincides with the Myrtle Beach Marathon, which my older brother flies down to run (after running the full marathon one year and starving while we waited for lunch at Sea Captain’s House, he has since decided that the half-marathon is a more reasonable distance).

Even before my brother’s career as an amateur long-distance masochist, we have been visiting Myrtle Beach as a family.  We used to come every summer for a big South Carolina Public Works convention, so Myrtle Beach’s tacky neon charm holds a certain nostalgia for me. These annual visits are not just a wonderful opportunity to spend time with family, but to relive the glow of childhood nostalgia.

The rest of this post may be delayed, as I am—as the preview noted—in Myrtle Beach with family.  Don’t worry, subscribers, I should have it finished soon.  —TPP

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Lazy Sunday C: Valentine’s Day

It’s Valentine’s Day—and the one-hundredth installment of Lazy Sunday!  Because I did the “Best of Lazy Sunday” prematurely due to The Great Misnumbering, I decided to take a look back at Valentine’s Day posts.

Unfortunately, I only have two posts for Valentine’s Day, which I don’t celebrate with the same gusto as Halloween or Christmas.  So I’m also going to toss in a sales pitch for one of my albums, which you’re welcome to ignore.

That’s it for this very special Valentine’s Day edition of Lazy Sunday.  Snuggle your sweetie today—even if she is a robot.

Love,

TPP

Other Lazy Sunday Installments:

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Romney Gets One Right

Okay, okay—before you start pelting me with the citrus fruit of your choice, let me make it clear:  I have no love for Mitt Romney.  I think he’s a traitorous, chimerical liar whose positions bend and twist with the ever-changing fashions of the Left.  He strikes me as a coward and opportunist, who will gladly slit his own party’s throat for a farthing of accolades from Democrats and the progressive press.

All that said, I’m intellectually honest enough to give credit where it is due, and even a stopped Mormon is right twice a day.  Mitt Romney has proposed a bill (forgive me for linking to the Never Trumpers at The Dispatch) that he argues is intended to alleviate childhood poverty, but is really a pro-natalist plan:  direct payments of $350 for children five and under, and $250 a month for children six through seventeen, with a maximum annual benefit of $15,000 annually, and payments beginning four months before a child’s birth.

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