Hertzler Outpost

Lots of little kids came to the door
this year. And this ghost.

Having two kids who don’t like chocolate usually means Halloween is a sweet deal for me. Until this year. Neither Andrew nor Audrey went out for candy, and Cathy and I stayed home and handed it out for the first time in a long time. Negative candy flow.

Testament to the incredible wife of 20 years of mine is that fact that I NEVER heard a word of complaint from her about our broken oven over the last two months of its demise. Granted, the “Food:EatOut” category in Quicken got a bit more of a workout in the mean time, but today we finally resolved the situation.

After pulling the oven out, cleaning up the nastiness that grew under it over the years, and locating what we thought was the most likely broken part we called an appliance repair service. With the price of what we would likely pay to have our old oven fixed we set out to see what “new” cost. Within an hour we had found a NEW unit within $25 of the repair cost. No brainer.

You won’t be seeing this oven in use anywhere on the Food Network, but it will cook Hertzler food just fine.

I’m learning how to use Jott to update my blog. listen

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My Grandpa Bill

Today I got some photos of my family from around 1947 or so, and I found this one of my grandfather, Bill.

I didn’t know him very well growing up, as he contracted Parkinson’s disease when I was young. This is from an era I never knew, but it makes me think I would have enjoyed knowing him and fishing with him when he was my age.

Pretty Boring in Orlando So Far

Tropical Storm Fay gave the kids a day off school today on what would have been their second day. So far the storm sent little more than rain and some gusty wind, but it was nothing that would have interfered with school. We like this kind of anti-climactic storm activity.

Audrey and Andrew Ready For School

We’re running out of “1st Day of Schools”, but today was one of the last few. Audrey started her freshman year of high school, and Andrew begins his junior year.

This year high school starts during daylight hours. Our county swapped the starting times between the high school and middle schools, so now the poor 6th graders have to be at the bus stop at 6:30 am while the high schoolers sleep in. Andrew said it was weird finishing first hour in daylight.

One interesting contrast between our experience sending Andrew off to high school and that of sending Audrey: On the Saturday before school begins there is an orientation and sign up where you get your locker, find your classes, etc. Both of us went with Andrew two years ago and helped him figure things out. He was happy to let us join him. Audrey, on the other hand, went with Andrew to the orientation day, and was happy to have the independence. She didn’t want a ride to school from Mom on the first day either; she took the bus.

Audrey talking to the kids

Andrew with one of his kids

Andrew and Audrey had a great week in NYC working with the Exodus program for kids. They had some pretty funny stories to tell, and they both came back with a new sense of how God can use them. We’re glad to have them back home!

Read the blog from their week for the rest of the story.

Cathy called me today just after Andrew and Audrey drove off by themselves. Andrew passed his driving test (“It was easy,” he said) and has his regular license now.

He was very happy to discover yesterday that the additional cost of our insurance (due to him being a licensed driver) will be half what we were expecting. Since we’re making him pay the difference in insurance, this meant he had six months of insurance saved up rather than just three.

After a week at camp without their small screens (all campers turned in their phones and iPods for the week), Andrew and Audrey returned home tonight. The first dilemna they each had to overcome upon arriving home related to their small screens. The screen on Audrey’s camera broke, her phone recharger didn’t work, and Andrew’s iPod recharger broke. This created some re-entry stress for the two of them. It reminded Cathy and me of our own re-entry stress last Sunday night as we walked into the problems that awaited us after getting back from vacation ourselves.

They had a good time at camp, though. And in just three weeks they leave for their missions trip to New York City, and they have a lot of work to do in the mean time.

If the last ten years saw huge advances in the information available on a computer screen, the next ten years should see advances in what you can see and do on a small screen. That is, the small screen of a cell phone or an iPod. Campus Crusade recently began using video iPod’s and short film to create spiritual conversation opportunities for our staff members and students, but one of the things we want to begin developing are ways to make our message available to spiritually interested students on their cell phones – when our staff members or students are not around. We have some ideas but no proven model that works. I’m thinking of taking this on as a project.

Andrew, Audrey, and Cousin Amanda
at the high water point of the Mississippi River
near the St. Louis Gateway Arch

Here in the St. Louis metro area rising waters are the big concern right now. Near where we stayed last week, a community soccer field became a community lake due to the flooding. Only the tops of the soccer goals and the top of the picnic pavilion were visible above the water. We even saw someone paddling their kayak around in it. But none of the places we’ve stayed have been low-lying, so it’s mostly something we’ve seen on TV rather than something we have been affected by. We drive to Wisconsin later this week, though, where some of the roads have been flooded along the way. We’ll see how that goes.

Downtown Paducah, Kentucky

Tonight we went to downtown Paducah and walked around the Lowertown Art District. For dinner we had a picnic in the park next to First Baptist, where our friends Grant and Elisabeth got married years ago. Then we went to the “Downtown After Dinner” area by the riverfront and walked around until we’d seen it all and heard it all. A fun evening with family.

We’re on the road today, heading toward Paducah, Kentucky where we’ll stop at Sister’s house and see cousins, see friends, and give an update at one of our partner churches, Heritage Bible Church.

This trip we have three drivers, so it’s been easier, too.

Hertzlers at Graduation

Tonight Audrey graduated from 8th grade and Trace Academy. On to high school for her now. Her class size will jump from 4 to over 1,000, but she is looking forward to the broader horizon.

Cathy graduated tonight, too. After seven years teaching at Trace Academy (with a three year stint at the International Christian School of Budapest), she has now completed her responsibility at this parent-led school. She’s looking forward to catching her breath this summer.

Today I upgraded the software that runs this website, and it reminded me how far my life has moved from about three years ago. At that time I was intrigued with figuring out how to produce this site, and I was making changes weekly. In my free time I would upgrade the software that runs this site within about a week or two of new updates being released. Now my life has different things in it, and it has been nine months since I last upgraded. For now that’s OK. I’m more interested in using my free time to figure out how to get a motorcycle into it than the latest upgrade to this website’s software.

Three years ago Tom and I were also just figuring out how to get students to respond to the gospel on a website. Now I’m wanting to help figure out how to get students to take the next steps of growing spiritually and reaching their world with the gospel on a website.

We sold our gray van today! It feels great to own one less vehicle, and it feels even better to have sold it to a young family that looked like they could really use an affordable family van.

This time I remembered to visit the tag agency with the buyer. A few years ago I simply gave the title to the buyer, and they failed to transfer the registration. They got in an accident and had an insurance dispute over it. Since my driver’s license was still tied to that vehicle the state of Florida suspended my license! They never notified me either. It wasn’t until six months later when I went to write a new auto insurance policy that my agent told me my license was suspended. It was not difficult to resolve, but it would have been easier to have done it right the first time.

This week was an experience. One that I would not want to repeat anytime soon. I certainly don’t feel anonymous at this point. After finishing my duty, I went and did some Internet research and decided it is best to move on and not discuss anything here. I’ll be spending more time with my family…

1997 Plymouth Grand Voyager

We’re selling our van. This affordable family vehicle is a great value! Now that we have a third working car we’re ready to find another owner for our second van. If you live in Orlando and want to take a look, send us an email and let us know.

More photos here.

• 153,000 miles
• Everything in good working condition
• V6 3.0 liter
• 7 Passenger
• Power Windows
• Power Steering
• Cruise Control
• Air Conditioning
• Power Mirrors
• Power Doors
• Tinted Windows
• $2300$2100 (less than kbb.com ‘private party’ value)

Last week Andrew’s friend invited him to a gymnastics class where Andrew discovered he could do both a back and front flip from the standing position. We were all impressed.

Restored Escort

Frame is straight. Bumper is attached and painted. Owner is happy! Almost as good as new.

Another Junkyard Escort

Our trip to the body shop last Friday for an estimate gave us hope that we can get Humpty back together again. But we needed another key piece of the front-end puzzle, a header panel. On Saturday we went to a nicer junkyard across town and had a much nicer experience. We got our header panel, and we’re now experts at taking apart the front end of Ford Escorts, having done this four times. Next Thursday we have an appointment to get the frame bent back into place and our replacement parts installed.

Junkyard Parts

Today was junkyard diving day. We got up fairly early and hit about 5 used auto parts yards in Bithlo. (Local impresson of Bithlo junkyards being redneck country didn’t prove true at all. There were more Americans-with-accents running them than Americans with Florida accents.)

Good news: Junkyards are a free tutorial on how to work on your car. You can disassemble a vehicle just like your own and walk away at no cost, leaving it unassembled.

Bad news: After returning home with a bumper assembly we discovered, upon trying to install it, that the frame of our car is bent and the new bumper won’t fit.

Not sure how to proceed at this point.

[Update on how to proceed: we'll take it to a body shop, put it on a frame machine, and hope they can straighten it out for cheap.]

Either way it’s been fun working with Andrew on it.

Audrey’s Incredible Chewing Fish

This one falls into the category of causing me to question the meaning of things in my life when things like fish are interesting. But actually there are too many other meaningful things going on in life, so small things provide comic relief.

Ok, so a few weeks ago Audrey got rid of her parakeets. Annie kept eating the parakeet poop and getting sick, so either the birds had to go or the dog. Annie had seniority and edged out the birds.

On Monday Cathy brought home a new pet for Audrey, a beta fish. (Cathy’s Kindergarten class took a field trip to the pet store and each got a fish, including Cathy.) A couple days later Audrey claimed she heard the fish chewing its food.

I didn’t believe it until today. The house was quiet, I’m working from home today, and I dropped one of the fish food pellets in. And I heard the fish crunching on the little pellet. I wouldn’t have believed if I hadn’t heard it myself.

Stuck in Ocala

It almost made it home. Just south of Chattanooga the alternator started to fail. I replaced the battery in Atlanta and limped along until it was dead. The alternator then failed completely just north of Ocala where I rolled into this repair station. The engine had begun cutting out, so I rolled down the nearest exit ramp, lurched around the corner and coasted to a stop in a vacant lot. I looked up and saw “Auto Repair” on the building next to me. Sort of like dying and finding yourself in heaven, but not so much.

I thanked my good fortune for landing at a repair place, and this repair place thanked their good fortune that some money rolled in off the highway right to their doorstep.

When I finally got home just before midnight everyone was excited to see the car. Best of all, Andrew surprised me by clearing out the other half of the garage, so we parked it inside for the night.