Gosh! It's been over a week since my last update! That's because there wasn't a whole lot going on. The week passed by pretty quietly until Thursday. 'Til then I'd been planning on a nice quiet weekend, starting off by going to the 8th Men's Morning of Spirituality where I was to serve at the Mass with our Archbishop. No problem.

Monday I was blessed with KenEllie coming over to watch a movie. We watched Nanny McPhee with Emma Thompson. It was actually quite good and I think KenEllie enjoyed it. I'm hoping to get them to watch Heaven Can Wait, with Warren Beatty, the next time we get together.

Wednesday I got together with H2 and his friends as usual. After a sojourn to the Pit Stop, we went to Carretta's for some good Mexican food and music. The place was PACKED, and the wait for a table was about 45 minutes. But, it was worth it.

Thursday I get a call from the Diaconate office. They want to know if I am able to prepare a short reflection on each of 3 sets of daily readings for Mass that will be taped for the US Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) website (see my links) and oh, by the way, the taping will be Saturday. Being the simple fool that I am, I say "OK, I can do that". So Thursday and Friday evenings are now dedicated to preparing the three reflection pieces.

Friday evening I also got together with Patti and Jerrod and the kids for dinner at Carretta's. This time there's no music and they were already seated when I got there, so no wait. Again the food was great. BB is SO cute in her school uniform, and Ian couldn't wait to find out if I'd seen his picture in the T-P. That's him in the light blue shirt.

Saturday I went to the Men's Spirituality get together, served at the Mass, then headed off to WLAE-TV to do the taping. I had prepared one page for each reflection to read. When I got there, the video people told me that they didn't have a teleprompter and that they wanted me to deliver the reflections in a conversational manner, without notes. Oh, no! I was definitely NOT prepared for that, and told them so. Finally we worked out a process where I would begin the reflection without notes, then occasionally glance at the notes to keep my thoughts going, then deliver the closing without the notes. If you are interested, the dates that I prepared reflections for are September 27th and 30th, and January 30th. They should be posted to the USCCB website. It would probably be helpful to take a look at the readings for those days to understand what I'm talking about.

It was great seeing so many of my deacon brothers at the spirituality session. Many of my diaconate class who I see infrequently were there. The speakers were very good and one gave an especially inspiring talk which I enjoyed thoroughly.

Saturday evening we learned that a friend of H2 who lives just a few blocks from us had been shot, IN HIS HOUSE, by a gunman carrying an automatic weapon. The details are sketchy, but apparently he and a friend were returning from a beer run and were going into the house when the gunman approached them. They ran into the house and he followed, showering them with a hail of bullets. H2's friend is in pretty good condition in the hospital, but his friend suffered damage to his spleen and kidney (I think) and is in pretty bad shape. To top it off, the police identified the shell casings as coming from the same gun that had been used in a murder earlier that day! Our neighborhood had been so quiet before the storm. Lately it's been turned into a war zone!

On the lighter side, Linda learned this week that Reese Witherspoon owns a house in the same neighborhood that she (Linda) is staying. We have no idea, and no interest in where the members of 3 Six Mafia might be living. Just for the record.

H2 and I joined KenEllie for a late evening supper at Serrano's (another Mexican restaurant) in Clearview Mall. After a very nice dinner we went to KenEllie's new apartment for a quick tour and some coffee. It's a very nice apartment, first floor, and the complex is right across the road from one of our major shopping malls, so they have great location. Hopefully while Linda is here we'll have the opportunity to go over and bless the apartment for them.

Molly Grace is only 5 days away, and that means that Linda will be here for an extended stay in only 4 more days! HOOOO-Ray!!! I can hardly wait.

The pictures of little Logan are adorable! He looks like such an angel! We want some more pics of his cousin, Kylee!

Please pray for the young men who were shot today, and for their parents. Please pray for the newest members of the extended Herrick clan, and for a safe and healthy arrival of Molly Grace. We wish you God's blessings in abundance.