Archive by Author

The Joy of Encouragement

21 Mar

From My Heart

Louise Gibson

author of Window Wonders

 

 

We can be encouraged by what we hear-
Words are powerful; of this we are aware.
But nobody cares how much you know,
until they know how much you care.

It’s wonderous what a hug can do-
A hug can cheer you when you’re blue.
A hug can say, “I love you so”,
or “I sure hate to see you go”.

A hug is, “Welcome back again”-
and “Great to see you, where’ve you been?”
A hug can smoothe a small child’s pain,
and bring a rainbow after rain.

The hug- there’s no doubt about it,
We scarcely could survive without it.
A hug delights, and warms and charms-
It must be why God gave us arms.

Hugs are great for fathers and mothers,
Sweet for sisters, swell for brothers.
Kittens crave them; puppies love them.
and politicians are not above them.

No need to fret about your store of them-
The more you give, the more there’s more of them.
So stretch those arms without delay,
and give someone a hug today!

The message of this poem is “encouragement”-
When we touch someone with the love of God,
It fills a void;
That is my intent.

We are to encourage one another.
I know that I am encouraged by what I sense,
by what I hear, by what I read.
Reach out and touch someone-
Sense the hunger, sense the need.

Footnote: Learn to build up, not beat up.
The command to encourage one another is found
five times in the New Testament. It’s addressed
to all believers. It is not conditional, it is not optional.
It is a command.

“He climbs highest who helps another up”
Zig Zagler

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Robots~Part 3

19 Mar

A Slice of Life

Bill Lites

Bill

  

I just read an article about a new micro engine that says scientists have built the “smallest petrol engine,” tiny enough to power a WATCH.  The mini-motor, which runs for two years on a single squirt of lighter fuel (they say), is set to revolutionize world power/energy technology.  It produces 700 times more energy than a conventional battery, despite being less than a centimeter long.  It is hard for me to imagine a motor small enough to run a laptop, much less a watch, being able to replace a battery, but that is what the article was saying could happen in the not too distant future.  Check it out on the Internet.

Inspired by colonies of insects such as ants and bees, researchers are modeling the behavior of “swarms” of thousands of tiny robots, which together perform a useful task, such as finding something hidden, cleaning, or spying (on who I wonder?).

                                               

While most robots today are installed in factories or homes, performing labor or life saving jobs, many new types of robots are being developed in laboratories around the world.  Much of the research in robotics now is not focusing on specific industrial tasks, but on investigations into new types of robots, alternative ways to think about or design robots, and new ways to manufacture them.  It is expected that these new types of robots will be able to solve real world problems when they are finally realized. 

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 Then there are the fears and concerns about robots that have been repeatedly expressed in a wide range of books and films.  A common theme in this genre is the development of a master race of conscious and highly intelligent robots, motivated to take over or destroy the human race.  Does any of that kind of paranoia sound familiar? 

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Now, you know, I just started out to go on the Internet to check out a few things about “Robots” for my friend Leon, and now I have written a three-part (1250 word) blog about just some of what I found.  Who says the Internet is not a distraction?  Well, it sure can be one for me, as you can see.

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—–The End—–

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The Music Makers~Part 1

17 Mar

My Take

DiVoran Lites

Author, Poet and ArtistSaturday I had the privilege of taking fifth grader, Clarisse, to sing at the King Center in Melbourne. As it turned out, it was a big deal. There were only eight students from her school chosen to go. She wore her uniform, which was a pair of black pants and a long sleeved white shirt. Her teacher had a satin cumberbund and bow-tie for her and the other children from their school. Rita, Clarisse’s 17-year-old cousin who lives with her family went along too. We had to be there at eight a. m. So we got up early and drove forty-five minutes down I-95 to get there on time.

Adults and children from all over Brevard County flooded the walkways into the center. Carrie told us we couldn’t go in with her and she didn’t want any hugging, kissing, or long goodbyes, so we walked twenty paces behind and she seemed happy with that. As she walked away, she looked tall and slender in her black pants and white shirt with her hair in cornrows. She had given firm instructions to her cousin not to call out her name in the auditorium.

Rita and I headed for the counties best retail center, The Avenues in Viera. On the way, we talked about high school and friends. Apparently, high school is not a bed of roses. It certainly wasn’t for me. My take is that people want Rita when they want her, but they don’t have any use for her when she needs them and they are sometimes cruelly critical. I could honestly reassure her that she is a good person, and a smart one and she was the one who brought up the fact that high school wasn’t going to last forever. I told her I’d had some of the same things happen to me, but I let them go on for too long. I tried to persuade her that each of us has great worth and that we are free to choose our own friends.

I mean one’s whole life doesn’t have to be long-suffering, does it? Isn’t it okay to find a real and dear friend once in a while? Really, I did have some dear friends, but I thought I ought to please everyone, and I didn’t want to be self-indulgent so I spent more time with the ones I felt uncomfortable with because I didn’t want to be too self-indulgent. Haven’t we all done that—at least sometimes?

Green and pink paintingpng

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The Archivist~Part 2

16 Mar

SUNDAY MEMORIES

 Judy Wills

Judy Wills

                                           

Recently I wrote about being the family “archivist.”  In keeping with that theme, I want to talk about one of my great-grandparents.  I had often heard her spoken of as “Grandma Mac.”  She was my mother’s grandmother.

I don’t know a lot about her – she was quite a lovely lady…she loved having flowers around the house…she had one son and three daughters (my grandmother being the oldest of those daughters), and that son died at about age two.

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Not only do I have a bunch of family pictures, but I have a few “keepsakes” of hers.  I have a “pressed glass” dish that was hers.

I also have a silver-plated flower arranger.  I really didn’t know what it was for a long time, until my mother told me that Grandma Mac always had some type of natural flowers “arranged” in that dish.  It made it quite easy for people to have a nice flower arrangement on their table, without having to have the knowledge or knack of arranging flowers.  The pedestal stand and “bowl” are one piece, and the removal top is lattice-shaped, with holes where the flower stems would be inserted.

After holding onto that piece for a while, I decided that I would like to have a more permanent silk flower arrangement for my solid teak dining room table, and thought that arranger would be just the thing.  So I took it to our local florist, and asked them what they could/would do with it.  The sales person began suggesting this flower, and then that flower, and nothing really appealed to me.  Then she said, “oh wait….what about gardenias?”  And just like that, it was decided.  Gardenias are absolutely my favorite flower!  Why didn’t I think of that?

What do you think?  I think it’s gorgeous, and it sits on my dining room table every day except for Thanksgiving and Christmas, when I have other special arrangements.  And every day I am reminded of my heritage, and the sweet lady that loved lovely things.

I am blest.

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So What’s Another Disaster?

15 Mar
With permission: wikimedia.org

With permission: wikimedia.org

 

Walking by Faith, Not by Sight

Janet Perez Eckles

 

 

When will I learn? You’d think by now, aware of the limitations of my blindness, I’d be careful, really careful with the experiments and projects my 6-year-old granddaughter and I do.

“It’s a disaster,” she groaned.

She was right. I had placed the hot iron on the paper covering the group of beads she creatively arranged on a pegboard. The iron was too hot? I pressed too hard? Or missed one step in the instructions?

Don’t know. But after I lifted the iron, part of the melted beads had spread on the carpet, burning a baseball-size spot. Gulp.

After we dried her tears of disappointment, I took a deep breath, and then wisdom trickled in.

I knelt on the carpet and once the rug had cooled, I gently rubbed the palm of her hand on the scorched spot. “Feel this? This will help us remember that when we mess up, it’s not a failure if the mess-ups teach us a lesson.”

“What lesson?

“To read instructions more carefully.”

How many disasters have you have in life? Broken relationships, financial troubles, bad decisions, failed careers.

And the mess is there. They formed a rough spot in our heart, difficult to clean up. Heartache and regret melted in areas where they shouldn’t.

What if we didn’t consider them failures? Instead, those very events can become God’s powerful reminder that He still restores. Because of Him, we may stumble, but will never fall. Relationships end, but His love still remains vibrant. Finances crumble, but He still provides. Careers end, but He gives new beginnings. Illness wants to shake away our peace, but His hand stops the fear.

When embracing the lesson, life smiles again as we repeat “I will praise the LORD, who counsels me; even at night my heart instructs me. I have set the LORD always before me. Because he is at my right hand, I will not be shaken” (Psalm 16:7-8).

Father, how often the failures, mistakes or calamities of life have threatened to shake me. But now, because you’re near me, peace still sings in my soul. And I know each broken area is the lesson that teaches me to wait in expectation for something new, something better, something richer and something worthy of your praise. In Jesus’s name, amen.

• What has failed in your life lately?
• Where do you find the lesson?
• How will you allow God to turn it to good?

Janet

Learn more about Janet, her books and her ministry as an Inspirational Speaker  at Janet Perez Eckles.

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Ordinary People Living in Extraordinary Circumstances

14 Mar

From the Heart

Louise Gibson

author of Window Wonders

 

 

I was a “Depression” baby
born in 1929-
Times were hard, jobs were scarce,
but I managed to grow up fine.

My father lost his job at Goodrich,
as the economy took a downward spin.
To put food on the table, he found
a job delivering milk.- much to his chagrin.

Times were hard for the working class,
but they learned to help each other out.
When dad could no longer make payments on our house,
the owner requested that we stay
’til the economy turned about.

Both of my parents had a “sweet tooth”
which they tried to satisfy
Mom would bake her chocolate cakes,
and candied orange slices dad would buy.

A lollipop was a rare treat-
a much appreciated event;
so, if dropped in the dirt,
you brushed it off,
and back in your mouth it went.

We kids found joy in simple pleasures,
like greeting the ‘Ice Man” on delivery day.
Everyone had “Ice boxes” to preserve their food
(no refrigerators on display).

While the Ice Man delivered the
large block of ice to the house.
we would scoop up the chips left behind.
It wasn’t exactly a “snow cone”,
but joy came in whatever form we could find.

No TV, cell phones, or I Pads,
Can you imagine such a catastrophe?
No computers to send e-mails,
and we never heard of a CD.

Letters were written by hand,
so communication was slow.
Mail was delivered direct to your door-
through rain, sleet, or snow.

Doing laundry was an all-day chore,
No automatics,- clothes were put through a ringer,
and you had better pay attention as you worked,
or you could damage a finger.

We had no clothes driers-
Clothes lines were strung in the basement ceiling.
Weather permitting, we hung our wash outside.
(No secrets then, it was all very revealing!)

Sunday afternoons were spent socializing.
Relatives and friends would drop by.
All of this stopped when television came along-
We said “Goodbye” with a sigh.

I thank God for His blessings.
‘though not rich monetarily-
We were rich in all the things that count;
Christ, friends and family!

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Robots~Part 2

12 Mar

A Slice of Life

Bill Lites
Bill

 

The military is developing unmanned combat air vehicles (UCAVs), which are an upgraded form of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), that can perform a wide variety of missions, including combat.  UCAVs are now being designed which will have the ability to fly themselves, pick their own course and target, and to make most decisions on their own.  How scary is that?

                                   

Almost every unmanned space probe ever launched could be considered a robot of one type or another.   Those launched in the early 1960s were very limited in their abilities, but more recently their ability to fly, land, survey and take samples on foreign planets is an indication of the advancement of robotic technology.

                                               

Another example of the use of robotics is in the dairy industry.  I just received an email about the dairy farm in Fair Oaks, Indiana that uses computer assisted robotics to process (feed &  milk) their approximately 32,000 cows per day, to produce enough milk for 8 million people.  As part of the daily processing, a transponder that is attached to each cow, reads and records the amount and quality of the milk from that cow, as it is automatically milked.  Also, a pedometer is attached to each cow that records the distance the cow travels in each 24-hour period.

 

                                                                       

Due to the hazardous nature of mining operations, in particular underground mining, the prevalence of autonomous, semi-autonomous, and tele-operated robots has greatly increased in recent years.  A number of vehicle manufacturers provide autonomous trains, trucks and loaders that will load material, transport it from the mine site to its destination, and unload it without requiring human intervention.

                                               

Robots in healthcare have two main functions. Those which assist an individual, such as a person with a disability or a sufferer of a disease, and those which aid in the overall operation  and processing of such industries as pharmaceutical companies and many hospitals systems.

                                               

 

                                                                        —–To Be Continued—–   

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The Archvivist

9 Mar

SUNDAY MEMORIES

 Judy Wills

Judy Wills

My Mother died in 1993.  After that time, my brother handed me all the family photos and documents he had, and informed me that I was the family archivist, so….here you go!  And there were hundreds of items!  It was quite a daunting prospect. However, a friend from church was a Creative Memories consultant, and I sought her out as to how to go about “organizing” all that stuff.  Her suggestion that I separate them into “families” sounded good.  So I set about it – putting my Mother’s family in one pile, and my Father’s family in another.

There were still hundreds of items to work through!

For whatever reason, I decided to start working through my Mother’s family first.  Perhaps because she died more recently than my Father.  So I began to gather the scrapbooks and paper and ideas to work on putting those photos in some chronological order, to put them on decorated pages.  I always had at the back of my mind, that this was a “legacy” for future generations to know their ancestors.

I was never very fast at that project.  It would take me quite a while to decide how I wanted to decorate the page, and what pictures I wanted on the page.  But as I went along, I realized that I was, indeed, getting quicker with the ideas.  I also realized that I was getting rather “immersed” in my family and it’s history.  I have pictures of my great-grandparents on my Mother’s side.  It really turned out to be quite a lot of fun.

My Great-grandparents and their three daughters. My grandmother is second on the right.
My Grandfather (right) and his father

Of course, other “projects” came into play, and I had to set aside the archival project once in a while.  A driving trip we made with our daughter, son-in-law and grandchildren.  Those pictures just had to get into a book before I forgot what we did and when we did it.  Then back to the archives.  Then a cruise, and those pictures had to make their way into a book.  Then back to the archives.  You get the picture.

My Grandmother and Grandfather. Purported to be their "wedding" picture. They eloped.

My Grandmother and Grandfather. Purported to be their “wedding” picture. They eloped.

But I never lost the feeling of really “knowing” my family’s history – where they lived, and when they lived in that town and on that street.  It’s something that I’ve come to cherish.

My Great-grandparents and my Grandmother. She was about six months old.

My Great-grandparents and my Grandmother.
She was about six months old.

            

I’ve gotten away from it now, for a while.  I’ve been rather busy with scanning all the old 35mm slides Fred and I have taken over our 50+ years of marriage.  I hope our daughters and grands will someday want the pictures of their grands, and parents as small/growing children, but I’m sure they don’t want the slides.

My Grandmother at age 2 years 3 months. The "frame" around the picture is the back of the photo, blown up. I thought it needed to be seen - to show how photographs were done in the early 1900's.

My Grandmother at age 2 years 3 months. The “frame” around the picture is the back of the photo, blown up. I thought it needed to be seen – to show how photographs were done in the early 1900’s.

In any case, it’s been a wonderful journey, and one I don’t think I’ll ever finish.

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Slaying the Giants in Your Life~Destroying Discouragement

7 Mar

From My Heart

Louise Gibson

author of Window Wonders

Can you recognize the enemy?
There’s a battle to be won.
Know who you are fighting-
Your armor is the Son!

There are three ways to live,
Of this there is no doubt:
You can live out-
You can wear out, or
You can burn out!

It is erroneous to say
“working too hard is burnout”-
Working hard “at the right thing”
is what it is all about.

Bring everything out of that “anxiety closet”,
and expose it to the ” Light”-
When looked at as they truly are,
You can put them all to flight!

Emotions are treacherous advisors.
We need to be disciplined to stay on track.
Work can be wonderful therapy;
It will get your confidence back!

The Biblical story of David
can turn your life around.
Get your slingshot ready,
“Discouragement, you are going DOWN”.

Psalm 46:1-3
God is our refuge and strength. A very present help in trouble, Therefore, we will not fear. Though the earth be removed, and though the mountains be carried into the midst of the sea; Though its waters roar and be troubled, Though the mountains shake with its swelling.

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Robots Part 1

5 Mar

A Slice of Life

Bill Lites

Bill

In a letter I received from my friend Leon the other day, he mentioned that he had gotten interested in “Robots & Droids.”  I had no idea where he was getting his information, since I knew he didn’t have a computer.  So, I decided to check out the internet to see what I might find there that might interest him.  WOW, was I surprised!   We are surrounded by robots, whether you realize it or not.  Wikipedia started off by saying, “A robot is a mechanical or virtual agent, usually an electro-mechanical  machine that is guided by a computer program or electronic circuitry.”  Then it went on for pages to describe all kinds of Robotics, Soft Robotics and Virtual Software Agents (otherwise known as Bots).

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This immediately brought to mind the “Star Wars” movie series with all its robotics in action and living color.  Of course, there were the “Good” robots that were always there to help Luke Skywalker and his friends with whatever had to be done.  These robots were even lifesavers at times, giving up their vital parts for their owners.

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 Then there were the “Bad” robots, coming (as it seemed) out of the woodwork, lead by the evil Darth Vader.  This guy was determined to get rid of the good guys and take over everything they had, not to mention the whole Galactic Empire.  Boy, did we enjoy watching the good guys defeat the bad guys for a change, even when they were bigger and badder that anyone could imagine.

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Then I thought about the trip to Alabama I made last year to see another friend.  On the way back I stopped in Montgomery, at the Hyundai plant, for a tour and, saw how the automobile industry is using computer assisted processing and robotics.  It was amazing to see how most of the heavy and dangerous jobs have been replaced by robots. 

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Of course there is the military use of  Teleoperated robots, or telerobots,  which are  devices remotely operated from a distance by a human operator rather than following a predetermined sequence of movements.  These units are being used for such dangerous jobs as bomb locating and disposal.

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                                                                 —– To Be Continued—–

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