Closing The Year

For Auld Lang Syne - BBC Symphony

Closing The Year

This is the day on which another year closes.  It is a good time for a quiet, honest look at our personal progress.  Has it been a good year, better than those which came before?  Has following your day-by-day spiritual program brought you more serenity and acceptance of yourself, the unique individual you are?

If you have regrets for errors or omissions, review them quickly and dismiss them.  In the new year, which lies ahead, there will be no time for futile regrets.

Resolve to live the coming year, one day at a time.  Whatever comes, meet it with a serene mind.

"And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God."  (Romans)
(after One Day At A Time In Al-Anon, 31 December)

Serenity Prayer

God grant me the serenity 

to accept the things I cannot change; 

courage to change the things I can;

and wisdom to know the difference.

Living one day at a time; 

Enjoying one moment at a time; 

Accepting hardships as the pathway to peace; 

Taking, as He did, this sinful world

as it is, not as I would have it; 

Trusting that He will make all things right 

if I surrender to His Will; 

That I may be reasonably happy in this life 

and supremely happy with Him 

Forever in the next. 

Amen.

Reinhold Niebuhr

2011 Reading Program

This morning I finished reading twelve books which were part of my 2011 daily reading program.  In all I read twenty-five books this year. There were four other books on my reading list that I set aside and didn't complete. I also skimmed a number of books on computer subjects, Windows 7 in particular, that I checked out of the county library.

I maintained two lists of the books I was reading.  I used the weRead application which I set up to work with Facebook.  On my own computer I created a file with the CSVed program.  Last night I extracted the following list of books read from the CSV file.  I also set the "Read It" switch for all twenty-five books on weRead and "tagged" each one with the tag "2011."  This was the first time I'd used tags with weRead.  I was pleased that it allowed me to easily find the books read in 2011.  I'm going to use LibraryThing to track the books I'm reading in 2012.  I've already selected the books and done some of the work to set up the two files I'll use to track my reading program.

1. Andrews, Andy - The Noticer
2. Anonymous - In God's Care
3. Anonymous - One Day At A Time In Al-Anon
4. Anonymous (Casey and Vanceburg) - The Promise of a New Day
5. Barclay, William - The Letters to the Galatians and Ephesians
6. Barclay, William - The Letters to Timothy, Titus and Philemon
7. Barclay, William - The Letter to the Hebrews
8. Case, Steve - Everything Counts
9. Copage, Eric V. - Black Pearls
10. Dyer, Wayne W. - Wisdom of the Ages
11. Franken, Al - Lies And The Lying Liars Who Tell Them
12. Graham, Billy - Hope For Each Day
13. Hughes, Selwyn  and Thomas Kinkade - Every Day Light
14. Kushner, Harold - To Life!
15. Larsen, Earnie and Carol Hegarty - Believing In Myself
16. Magee, Mike - A Book of Choices
17. Martin, Iain C. - Worthy of Their Esteem
18. O'Toole, Ph.D., Mary Ellen - Dangerous Instincts
19. Rice, Helen Steiner - A Collection of Blessings
20. Rice, Helen Steiner - From The Heart
21. Thoreau, Henry David - Walden
22. Tolle, Eckhart - A New Earth
23. Tolstoy, Leo - The Gospel In Brief
24. Various Authors - Daily Guideposts - 2009
25. Wiersbe, Warren W- Chapter-By-Chapter Bible Commentary

Mr. Dickie's Blog

Thanks to everyone who took an interest in Mr. Dickie's Blog in 2011 on NetworkedBlogs, Facebook or Google.  I hope that once in a while I posted something that caused you: 

• to think, 
• to smile, 
• to laugh.
• to learn.

It's my intention to continue posting to this blog and my Arrow Prayers blog on a daily basis in 2012.  I hope you'll find my efforts worthy of taking some of your time to see what's on my mind.

Happy New Year 

2012

Mr. Dickie

31 December 2011

Enough is Enough

I will not allow myself to be troubled by anyone else; my one problem is to improve my own way of living and looking at life. (One Day At A Time in Al-Anon, 7 January)

I do not know what course of action is right for anyone else. I can offer only comfort and compassion ... (One Day At A Time in Al-Anon, 26 February)

******

The people of Miami, Florida recalled the Mayor and at least one commissioner. The process was financed by a rich individual who claims he isn't interested in becoming the Mayor. Could this be the beginning of a grassroots "Enough is Enough" movement?

I'm working on a project to create my own Verizon FIOS channel listing because I can't find a complete list of what's on all of the channels. It's not too difficult to create a file with my CSV editor that I can sort three ways: 1) channel name, 2) type of programming, 3) FIOS channel number. I pulled the information I used to create the file from several sources.

Yesterday I obtained a URL for a photo fo Blackwater Falls, WV from a photo album on my Google Picasa account. Then I installed this link on my Facebook wall. It worked. My Facebook friends were able to view the photo. Neat, if I do say so myself.

Mr. Dickie
17/Mar/2011 9:22

Tomorrow

(Photo: Mr. Dickie - Smithsonian Postal Museum, Washington, DC, 30 Dec 2010)

Therefore do not be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself. (Matthew 6:34 (RSV) in Daily Guideposts -1990, 29 December)

******

This morning I finished reading twelve books that I have been reading since the first of January. I read one page a day from each book. Three of the books were Daily Guidepost books. With the completion of these three I have read every Daily Guideposts book published except for the 2009 and 2010 volumes. I own a copy of the 2009 volume which I intend to read in 2011. I'll be on the lookout for a used copy of the 2010 volume. On my computer I maintained a little file (CSV format) of the books I was reading in 2010. I'll be posting the "date completed" to this file later on. I'll also be posting to my online weRead account that I finished these books. I already created a new reading list file on the computer for 2011 but I didn't post the titles to weRead yet.

Yesterday Cyndi and I took the Green and Red subway lines to Union Station. We went across the street to visit the Smithsonian Postal Museum for the first time. I purchased a sheet of twenty stamps, the Gulf Coast Lighthouses. I took quite a few photos. When I got home I used the camera to alter some of the pictures. I ended up with twenty-eight photos. Some are good and some not so good.

After we left the museum we walked up North Capitol Street for a block to the Government Printing Office. Cyndi went inside and asked them to contact our friend Keith O. who is on the police force. He came downstairs to meet us and then went with us to the food court at Union Station where we visited while Cyndi and I ate our lunch.

Mr. Dickie
31/Dec/2010 9:01

Preparing a Christmas Letter

Words of wisdom inspire us, but they have value only if we can take them into our hearts and use them in our daily lives. (One Day At A Time in Al-Anon, 6 December)

******

I used a number of different tools to create, print, and send our Christmas form letter this year. I typed the letter using my text editor, EditPad Lite; I formatted the letter (centering and bold facing) using Google Docs; I used my HP PhotoSmart camera to take the poinsettia photo and to add the oval vignette; I created a PDF version of the letter by telling Google Docs to download the letter to my computer in that format; I printed the two-sided letter on my HP LaserJet 1020 telling the print program to print on both sides of the paper; address labels were prepared by typing forty-five lines (for forty-five labels) with the EditPad Lite in the Comma Separated Value (CSV) format; the CSV file was uploaded to Labelmakr.com on the Internet where the file was converted into a PDF file suitable for printing on two sheets of Avery 5160 labels of thirty labels per sheet; the free PDF file was downloaded to my computer where Adobe Acrobat Reader was used to view and print the labels; I used stationery and envelopes that I had on hand; there was a picture of earth from outer space on the stationery and Christmas artwork on the business envelopes; stamps were purchased on Sunday from the bank ATM machine.

Mr. Dickie
20/Dec/2010 8:30