24 AUG 25

Chatting with the new vicar about his background as a kid-missionary in Africa and his Korean wife that morning during Bible study while Oxbear tries to help Rev. Karg with more technical issues for the lesson on Daniel...

Yali and Patience walk back from Sunday School with paper bags of Bible lessons... Yali explaining how Peter began to sink in the sea when he tried to walk on it...

A box of Tony's Donuts on the drive home... Patience asks for a pack of crispy fries...

Meanwhile Puck is leaving for J's and lunch at Popeye's before his afternoon shift at work... but not before pausing to purchase a jumbo pack of his favorite chewing gum from Dublin and researching online prices for knife-resistant work gloves...

Oxbear and Yali also leave for Faust Park and the Back to Scouting fall kick-off with Yali's buddies...

...while I rinse dishes and chase the dog away from the cat on the other side of Puck's cat door... realize I'm talking to the pets like they're misbehaved children now... “Hey! What did I just tell you? Stop that!”... dog looks ashamed...

Then in the cool sunshine of the mid-afternoon Patience and I take a fast two-mile walk down the neighborhood while she details to me every name she would (or mostly would not) name her future children... Violet and Otto are still top picks...

Two of the boys are back... Yali gets busy adding cuts and “bloody” bandages to his face in the bathroom for extra battle damage effects...

...while Mama pauses folding laundry for a Lutheran podcast on NDEs...

Before bedtime Yali walks up to me with a piece of duct tape over his mouth requesting to remain duct-taped for 24 hours as a “challenge”... uhmmm... nope