July 2004 Rapids trip Kristina at front of boat on far side with yellow hat. 

Rapids Trip Kristina Moffitt on front of boat with yellow hat July 2004 

Three year aniversary tomorrow

For the first time in a LONG time we went to bed before 11 pm which means that I woke up at 5:30 am as well. I had my 7 hours of sleep and now I am wide eyed and bushy tailed. Katy got up to go to the restroom, stumbled into the kitchen and observed us for about 2 minutes and then stumbled back into the bed and is now circling Pluto or some other planet by now. Poor dear has been pretty tired lately with all of the work she has been doing at Wallyworld.... Speaking of Wallyworld it is amazing to me how many people living in Charleston SC who have never heard of Walmart being called Wallyworld. I guess that either makes me weird or they have been living under a rock. Maybe they just do not even go to Wallyworld and therefore would not have a clue... Either way, they are missing out on some great prices and are not going to meet great people like us.

Tomorrow, August 5, 2004 marks three years since our daughter Jessica graduated to her place in Heaven. Its very hard to believe that she has been gone that long. Just yesterday I was reading an article about a young girl who was 8 years old who had the same type of pediatric cancer who ran a lemonade stand called Alex's Lemonade Stand. Apparently she started it to raise money to donate to the childrens hospital where she was getting treatments. Alexandra was her name and she had a dream to raise 1 million dollars for the childrens hospital in hopes that they could use the money to care for other children just like her. This is the link to the website that talks more about Alexandra and the charity lemonade stand she started. Alex's Lemonade Stand As I was reading this story of course I started to think about our Jessica and that Jessica had something very similar to little Alexandria. It is so sad when little children get this sick and then ultimately lose their battle with cancer and die. These children bring so much life and cheer into our worlds even when they are sick.

Our lives will never be the same folks. Our Jessica is gone in body but she is still here in spirit and a part of our family. Jessica was only one part of our family but like our other children she was an important part of our family who brought who she was into the family environment. Jessica was the peace keeper of the four children. Jessica was always mending fences and being the referee or moderator between Justin and Kristina. More often than not she wound up protecting her younger more mild mannered brother from his older more agressive sister Kristina. Jessica was so full of life and was a very loving child.
Jessica loved riding her bycycle and coloring in her coloring book. Jessica loved visits to see Ed the apple eating and daddy biting horse down the street. One late evening 3 years ago Katy and I were feeding Ed his nightly snack when we ran out of goodies. I was apparently too close to the fence and Ed's ever powerful jaws when he became upset at the loss of goodies, reached across the fence and nibbled on my tummy. Gosh, that hurt.
LOL... Something to remember my Jessica by I suppose.

As of last Tuesday my tour with Goodwill ended. After 4 months of working there I decided that I could not work in that environment such as it was. I guess you could say the PC Recycle Center that I was working in was going through some major growing pains and undergoing some daily transitions that were sort of painful. I tried as I might to try and deal with the stresses that were associated with the job. Sadly enough I am sorry to say that it just did not work. Perhaps I was the wrong person for the job to begin with.
Well anyway, so much for that, the Goodwill chapter has closed. The important thing for me to say at this point is that Goodwill as an organization is an awesome organization in that they turn 92 cents of every donation back into programs that reach out into the community and help those who are struggling or less fortunate than I am. Atleast when I took this job I held on to my security job to see if this was going to work out. When I first took the position I felt that there would be some possible conflicts with my immediate supervisor. Knowing that going into this environment I made sure to have a safety net just in case things did not work out. I am so glad that I did not quit my security job because now I have been able to go back to a full time schedule with them.
There is no shortage of work when it comes to folks needing security in this day and age.

One of my four children, Jeremy who lives in a suburb of Houston Texas is attending summer school in Wharton. Actually, he is taking college courses during the summer. Jeremy is studying music theory. I am trying to wrap my tiny little brain around what exactly music theory would be. I guess it is a good thing he is taking this course and not me. LOL.... I do know that I love music and sound and that I enjoy working with it at church. I handle all of the technology related tasks with regards to audio and video needs. I am the guy that sits in the sound booth and either makes you sound good on stage or if I chose to I can make you sound like a chipmunk on steroids. The digital effects module of the sound board can do some pretty funny things with your voice. So, with that said, be sure to be nice to the sound guy because he can either make you or break you when you are singing. LOL... I am very proud of Jeremy Moffitt. Jeremy is on a wonderful track and he is pursuing something that he loves very much which is music.

Well, it is time to get ready for our mens fellowship meeting and a day at the City Magistrate's office doing security. Have a great day!!

Be vewy vewy careful......

Just today I sent out an e-mail to my "technology" distribution list and they wrote me back that according to their Anti Virus vendor that they were safe. This was my response back to them in e-mail and I thought it would be good to post here as well.

Anti Virus protection is not "set it and forget it" anymore. Hackers and script kiddies are writing viruses faster than Mcafee and Symantec can write patches for them. Almost every computer that I get that comes into the pc repair shop that is infected with viruses are either running Norton Anti Virus or McAfee. Granted, most of the time the end user who got infected got lazy and did not do live update or schedule it to be done for them on a regular basis. A regular basis today is atleast twice per week. I remember a time when once every 30 days was good enough. Not anymore.

I use both Norton Anti Virus and AVG at the shop. I NEVER run one virus scan with one product and believe it. I always double check. So, with that fact in mind dont get too comfy with the idea that your Anti Virus vendor is covering all the basis. The time period between the time a virus is released into the wild and the time it takes your Anti Virus Vendor to cover its bases and send out an update to cover you could mean the difference between a virus infection and data loss not to mention lost time in putting your system back together after the damage is done.

Be vewy vewy careful....

NEW Virus to be aware of folks.....

Please be aware of this threat and take appropriate actions to protect your computer, your data and your friends. :)

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From: Symantec Store [mailto:symantec@reply.digitalriver.com]
Sent: Tuesday, July 20, 2004 11:34 AM
To: James
Subject: Alert! Virus W32.Beagle.AG@mm Moderate



Keep your computer safe from W32.Beagle.AG@mm

Threat level: Category 3 - Moderate
Outbreak Type: Worm
Protection Update

As of (July 19, 2004), protection updates are available via LiveUpdate™ or the Security Response Website. For more information on Symantec Products containing the LiveUpdate feature, click here.

Next Steps?

With the newly found mass-mailing worm, W32.Beagle.AG@mm, Symantec advises customers to protect the network by updating the definition file of all the Symantec AntiVirus solutions, via LiveUpdate or Intelligent Updater, and to detect and block from propagation by using multiple security solutions. Customers who have run LiveUpdate any time after July 19 were protected by this threat by default.
Home/home office customers who use Norton AntiVirus™ automatically detect this threat as it attempts to spread due to our advanced worm blocking technology.

Variant

W32.Beagle.AG@mm, a new variant of the W32.Beagle family of worms, is functionally similar to W32.Beagle.X@mm.

How does it affect me?

W32.Beagle.AG@mm is a mass-mailing worm that opens a backdoor on TCP port 1042 and uses its own SMTP engine to spread through email. The worm’s potential impact includes clogged mail servers or degraded network performance. W32.Beagle.AG@mm also spreads via file sharing / peer-to-peer. W32.Beagle.AG@mm, a new variant of the W32.Beagle family of worms, is functionally similar to W32.Beagle.X@mm.
The email message from address will be spoofed. The subject, body and file attachment of the message vary. Please see the W32.Beagle.AG@mm write-up for additional details.

This is where I would like to be going today. Across the wooden bridge to the Island on the other side. I would hope that no one else is there and that I could make the bridge disappear so I could enjoy a few moments of solitude and relaxation. Shhh, its my dream, dont awaken me... 

James & Katy, picture taken in Bluffton SC 

Tanya on the left and Jimmy (me) on the right. Sitting on the couch in the living room in Quinlan Texas.  

Here I am again at age 9 (I think) holding our family dog Geronimo on the back patio to our home in Quinlan Texas 

How about a trip down memory lane. This picture is of me , James standing on the left next to my sister Tanya in her blue dress on right. I believe I was around 9 years old in this picture. This is the suit that I wore when I got my naturalization papers to become an American Citizen.  

more water fall pictures 

more water fall pictures 

Picture of water running down a brook on the side of the mountain north of Greenville SC 

Lake Logan  

Different angle of boat house on Lake Logan  

Another shot of Lake Logan 

On trip up into the mountains North of Greenville SC we ran across Lake Logan Episcopal Center. Here are some very nice shots. 

Moffitt family on mountain top north of Greenville SC. I am holding a snow ball in my right hand for some reason...  

Danger Will Robinson Danger

Oops , wrong movie... That was lost in space. The "Will" I am thinking about is Will Smith who plays in iRobot which is showing in theatres EVERYWHERE..... No, I wont spoil it for you by telling you all about the robot called NS5. I will say that Will Smith does a bang up job acting in this movie and you will find some surprises you will not expect. The plot is fast moving, lots of mystery and intrigue and the special affects were pretty cool too. In the year 2035 is when this movie is staged. I wonder if technology will be that far advanced in 2035 and if so will I be alive to see it AND appreciate it. If I live that long I will be 74 years old. Justin, if you happen to be reading this do me a favor and get one of the cool cars that Will Smith was driving and give me a ride in it, will ya? LOL...

On a scale of 1 to 10 I give this movie a 9.5

:)

In loving memory of Glenna Hickson

I found out that "Aunt Mickey" passed away at 5pm yesterday at the Methodist Hospital in Dallas Texas due to the complications of a massive stroke. I am not sure how my aunt got named Aunt Mickey but it stuck and that is what most people called her. Aunt Mickey was 71 years old and her death comes as a sudden suprise and blow to all that knew her.
Apparently my aunt had a smaller stroke about a week ago and was put on blood thinners. For some reason she missed a doctors appointment and then a day or two ago she started having some problems with falling etc. My first cousin Larry found her on the floor of her home on Saturday and my first cousin Debbie found her yesterday. An ambulance was called and she was transported to a hospital in Terrell Texas. Doctors there had her life flighted by air ambulance to the Methodist Hospital where they discovered that she was hemorraghing in the brain. Life support measures had to be implemented to keep Aunt Mickey alive and I guess around 5pm yesterday her husband "Uncle Carl" gave permission to remove life support.

Aunt Mickey, Uncle Carl and Aunt Beth were three of my favorite relatives. I remember several summers as I was growing up where I would stay with my Aunt Mickey and Uncle Carl in Terrel Texas. My aunts and uncles were always very gracious, kind and loving towards me and my sister Tanya. I have many fond memories of my aunts and uncle.
Aunt Mickey loved to laugh and when she did you could hear her through the entire house.
Aunt Mickey had a huge heart with tons of love to give everyone. I remember how I used to get up at 4:30 am with my Uncle Carl during the summer and would have coffee and biscuits with butter and honey. Then we would pile into his Chevy Silverado pick up truck and go off to one of the job sites. Uncle Carl was a home builder in Terrell Texas. Uncle Carl liked to go play golf too. One of my fond memories of Uncle Carl was that he taught me how to drive. My dad just did not have the patience to teach me how to drive so Uncle Carl would take me to the school parking lot and put me behind the wheel of his truck and let me drive. Uncle Carl had the patience of Job and tirelessly taught me this and that when he had the time to do so.

I will never forget the day that my grandmother died. Aunt Mickey could be heard crying through the entire house that day. My grandmother passed away back in 1980 when I graduated from High School. I remember helping Aunt Mickey take care of my grandmother when I was staying there during the summer vacations from school in Quinlan Texas. I can remember how my grandmother loved the Lord and how she saved my sister and I from many a whuppin from my dad. My grandmother would stand between my sister and I and my dad and tell him to back off. If it had not been for her I would have gotten more whuppins than I did. LOL...

Glenna Hickson is survived by her husband (my uncle) Carl Hickson and her daughter Debbie English and son Larry Hickson. Debbie English lives in Kaufman Texas and Larry Hickson lives in Terrell Texas. Glenna Hickson is also survived by my Aunt Beth aka Beth Aldridge who lives in Quinlan Texas. Beth Aldridge is 81 years old and I have many fond memories of visiting her during my childhood. Beth Aldridge is the last remaining sibling on my dads side of the family. I know that I know that I know that I have forgotten lots of neices and nephews and other relatives that I have long since forgotten about. When I get a copy of the obituary I will post it here so that you can read it.

I am hopeful that I can find a way to go to the funeral this week. Arrangements are being made as I write this and I am thinking that they are planning to have it on Wed which means I have a LONG drive ahead of me. I figured out it is 1100 miles or 17 hours one way. Whew, that is a LOT of driving folks.

My Aunt Mickey was a believer in Jesus Christ so that means that she is in a much better place now than she was a week ago. That also means that she will have an opportunity to see other family members who have gone on before her. I love you Aunt Mickey, you will always be in my mind and heart. Give our Jessica and your Doug and Randy a hug for me.

Love always, your nephew Jimmy Moffitt.....

Sleep the final frontier

It is hard to believe it is already Tuesday morning at 2:18 am. I seem to remember that I just went to church and then went out to lunch and went to work 3 pm to 11 pm Sunday evening. Then I went back to work at 7 am until 3pm on Monday morning. That was yesterday and here it is after 2 am in the morning on Tuesday. It is a good thing that I dont have to go to work until 3 pm today. Maybe Sammy the mutt will let us sleep past 4:30 am today. Yesterday morning after going to bed at 1:30 am he went out to leave his mark on the neighborhood and when he came back inside he decided he would start barking at Angel to see if she would wake up and play with him. That plan backfired on him because he wound up waking up the Boggy Creek Monster who came into Kristina's room and descended upon him in an attempt to change his mind with regards to barking at 4:30 am. Apparently the Boggy Creek Monster likes to sleep undisturbed during that time of the day. Sammy the mutt was unable to dodge the first two blows that bounced off his body but he did dive for cover next to Kristina who awakened and came to his defense in the nick of time. The Boggy Creek Monster having made his point clear enough to Sammy the mutt retreated back to the creek and attempted to go back to sleep.

As we fast forward to around 8 pm last night you will note that I decided to make a run to Wallyworld to locate a TV antennae for our television. We have not had cable TV now for about 2 months which also means that we were not getting local TV channels either. That means that I have been several quarts low on Jay Leno monologue. My trip to Wallyworld was productive in that I found an antennae and a DVD movie of interest and came back home to install said antennae. I am not sure IF Jeff Foxworthy has a line in his book called "You must be a redneck if" with regards to TV antennas. If not, I can happily add this one to his ever growing list. You must be a redneck if you spend 20.00 on a TV antenna and the only way you can get it to work in your double wide trailer is to throw it outside on the porch. LOL... That is right. This high powered antenna would get a signal but not much of one. I figure that while the metal in the double wide trailer is not much with regards to keeping in the cool or keeping out the cold it certainly can keep out all matter of TV signals. I guess that means that I dont have to worry about people sitting outside with parabolic mics listening in to our conversations.

In the past I tried this same manuver in an attempt to find a signal. In my desperation the next step became the mother of my newest brain child which was to toss the stupid antenna outside. That required a couple of extension cords and a 20 foot piece of cable and a splitter that allowed me to throw it out on the porch. Lets not forget the special enhancement that I added when I wrapped a couple of pieces of aluminum foil to each rabbit ear. That seemed to REALLY do the trick.

Pressing forward towards the Prize....

I utilized my Ipaq to take notes this morning and I was touched by this morning's message by Doug Dickerson who filled in for our pastor Tom Glisson. Doug Dickerson has preached at our church on several occasions and were happy to hear what God said through him this morning.

Doug picks up the sermon in Phillipians chapter 3 verses 12-14 as the apostle Paul is speaking....

Grace Fellowship Church
Sermon 7/11/04- Doug Dickerson

Phillipians 3:12-14

Phi 3:12 Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already been made perfect, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me.
Phi 3:13 Brothers, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead,
Phi 3:14 I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus.

Are we preserving or progressing in the Lord with our relationship?

Preserving is maintaining
Progressing is to move forward to the prize or pressing on

Are we content in living in what used to be?

Moving out of our comfort zone takes risk

God can not do anything new until we shake off the past and our comfort zone.

Do we place our comfort over commitment?

The tradition of the past hinders God from moving us into the future.

God does not change but we can be changed by God.

We can not be content in just our Godly heritage

We have not arrived.

There is always something new to experience and gain in our relationship with God.

Bad Attitude that hinders growth
Yesterdays experience was sufficient and can not be exceeded.

We are dependent upon God today.

Spiritual pride keeps us from experiencing God in a new way. We should not live in the past and our accomplishments with God.

Preserving is a defensive hold on the past.

Progressive is moving toward the future.

The 7 deadliest words for a church = We never did it this way before...


Paul was passionate abut knowing Christ. To move on with God we must become passionate about who God is and what He wants for us.

Fear of new things paralyzing us and keeping us from what God wants for us.

Fear paralyzes our dreams and hopes.

Lay down those (the) sin(s) that so easily entangles us

Three challenges for us today.


Believe that God wants to exceed our expectations

To keep our eyes on Jesus and not our circumstances

To keep pressing on towards the goal to win the prize

Picture of driveway between the county office building downtown Charleston and the Hibernian Society shown on the left.  

From the left, Kristina, Erin, Justin , Rossi and Cameron in background. Kids enjoying swimming pool at neighbors house on hot sunny afternoon.  

Rainbow Row on King Street seen from above the County Parking garage in the afternoon. This row of buildings is part of the historic downtown Charleston SC taken with the Pentax IQZoom 115 camera.  

The pool at the Mills House Hotel on Meeting Street in Downtown Charleston SC.  

Unknown Historic landmark on Meeting Street near County Office buildings and across from the Hibernian Society in downtown Charleston SC.  

Photo taken with my Pentax IQZoom 115 camera on top of the county parking garage looking towards I-26 going away from downtown Charleston 

All I want for Christmas is the 1932 Ford Tudor that you see in the picture below....

Hey, if I am going to dream, why not dream BIG. How about dreaming the impossible?? LOL... Well, who knows, if we figure out how to play the lottery on a regular basis we will have a 1 in 5 million chance of hitting it big just like everyone else that plays. Short of that happening this Christmas wish will probably remain a dream. LOL...

I downloaded this image as my desktop this morning from Webshots. If you are like me you do not like to stare at the same ole boring desktop day in and day out. As for me, I use Webshots to refresh my desktop image every single day.

As you can see mother nature dumped buckets of water on us yesterday evening. The storm was so bad Katy and I grabbed the dogs and headed for the center of our tin box. Yes, living in a double wide trailer is NO FUN when you are listening to the lightning cracking all around you and watching debris fly by the windows when the wind kicks up a notch or two. Living in the midst of a bunch of trees all around you also does not make things nice when the lightning starts to zing all around you. I guess the only plus about the trees is that hopefully the bouncing electricity will hit one of them before it hits the trailer. Then again, if it hits a tree close to us that tree will possibly land on top of our tin can causing a large dent. All you can do is hide , squint and pucker and hope the storm passes by without killing you or the neighbors...



Katy just advised me that Justin and Kristina's neo pets were starving and that she had to go online to feed them.
I said "say do what??". Katy is playing some sort of game on Neopets so that she can accumulate enough points to buy food for the neopets so they dont starve. Gosh, I wonder if we can do that for the REST of the zoo around here? LOL... I am thinking, "dont we have enough critters to feed around here without having to have NEOPETS to tend to?" @@ I guess it goes to show you that there are just not enough pets to go around....


My 18 year old son in Houston Texas (actually Richmond/Rosenburg Tx outside of Houston) started his first year of community college at Wharton University. Wharton University is a community college close to where Jeremy lives with is mother and step father. Mark, Jeremy's step father, has been working hard at making sure Jeremy got registered in college so now Jeremy can make the educational leap from High School into community college. Way to GO Jeremy !! Study hard son, you will reap the benefits of the hard work later on in life. I was chatting with Jeremy just the other day on Hello telling him that I was hoping that he would NOT make the same mistake I did. When I was his age I had the opportunity to get my RN degree at El Centro in Dallas Texas and because I THOUGHT I was smarter than my parents I decided that I would drop out (idiot) and be a real man and just make it on my own. After all, my parents were incredibly short sighted and stupid and what did they know about real life? Well anyway, there is more to that story than meets the casual observer here but the important lesson to be learned is to get that degree while you can.


I changed my imood this morning from blessed to SICK. Yuck and double yuck. My blood pressure spiked yesterday at work so I wound up coming home at 2pm to rest. This morning I felt better in that regard but I spent most of the morning talking to mother nature. I have been speaking with her so much this morning I feel as if I have a special relationship that will NEVER end. I am hopeful that this ongoing conversation will eventually end. I called my boss at Goodwill and told him of my predicament and that I would try to be at work by noon today but if not I will be there in the morning to greet all of our eager beaver retail shoppers as they rush through the door looking for used computer junk to carry home. (Cough)....

I am happy to announce that my friend John Searcy in Houston Texas wrote me an e-mail telling me that he has started a new blog. John told me that something I said to him when we were all together for a JC reunion caused his creative juices to get flowing. You can read his blog at John Searcy Bloghttp://iamnotgod.blogspot.com/ You can read Jeremy's blog at Jeremy Moffitt Bloghttp://germ_e.blogspot.com/ as well. You can read my friend Bill Berry's Blog at Bill Berry Bloghttp://elderberry.blogspot.com

Now I know what I want for Christmas this year.... 

another shot of the rising water 

another shot of the rising water 

Response to fellow Blogger

A fellow blogger that I found through an index called Blogs4God wrote the following.

"I'm convinced that my blog readership would increase greatly if I
worked in a bar or a pornography establishment. Or, perhaps, if I
were gay. It seems that sex and alcohol are the primo subjects to
blog."


I tried to post my response to his comments section but I was too long winded to fit it all in there. So I told him to come here , to my blog , to read my comments in their entirety.


You are correct. If you were posting comments from the viewpoint of the world then your readership would increase ten fold. Then again we as Christians are not of this world. We are different. Atleast that is what my bible tells me. We have been redeemed and restored. We are to be the salt of the earth and light of the world.
We are not supposed to be like everyone else. We are supposed to bring flavor to those around us and we are to intrigue others because of our lifestyle choices. Sometimes that intrigue turns out to be something that repels people instead of attracting them. Nevertheless God uses who He is in us to reach out to the community that HE has placed us in. We might think that we are just a common Joe with common lives that no one is interested in. Take heart and know that people are watching and see the real you even when you are not watching. When we gave our hearts to God and said "I will follow you" we rejected the things of this world and embraced the kingdom of God. That means that the things of this world really do not have an appeal to us anymore. Amen? Do we really want to be a part of the worlds social scene any longer? Of course not, those things are temporal and unfullfilling. The reason for that is because there is very little value. Gosh, I feel as if I am preaching here and that is not my intent. I just want to encourage you to know that your life makes a huge difference in the grand scheme of things. You may not be in lights per say and your blog readership may be minimal. Its not who we are or what we can accomplish or who can notice us but rather what God can do through us. When we are weak and inadequate that is when HE can do his perfect work through us. Keep on Keeping on for Christ my brother.







James Moffitt
http://www.jesus-connect.net/jcmoffitt
moffittj@bellsouth.net

Fourth of July 2004 Audio Blog

Another Fourth of July 2004 Audio Blog