Bring Me That Horizon

Welcome to jennyweber dot com

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Home of Jenny the Pirate

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Our four children

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Our eight grandchildren

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This will go better if you

check your expectations at the door.

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We're not big on logic

but there's no shortage of irony.

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 Nice is different than good.

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Oh and ...

I flunked charm school.

So what.

Can't write anything.

> Jennifer <

Causing considerable consternation
to many fine folk since 1957

Pepper and me ... Seattle 1962

  

Hoist The Colors

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Insist on yourself; never imitate.

Your own gift you can present

every moment

with the cumulative force

of a whole life’s cultivation;

but of the adopted talent of another

you have only an extemporaneous

half possession.

That which each can do best,

none but his Maker can teach him.

> Ralph Waldo Emerson <

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Represent:

The Black Velvet Coat

Belay That!

This blog does not contain and its author will not condone profanity, crude language, or verbal abuse. Commenters, you are welcome to speak your mind but do not cuss or I will delete either the word or your entire comment, depending on my mood. Continued use of bad words or inappropriate sentiments will result in the offending individual being banned, after which they'll be obliged to walk the plank. Thankee for your understanding and compliance.

> Jenny the Pirate <

In The Market, As It Were

 

 

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Contributor to

American Cemetery

published by Kates-Boylston

A Pistol With One Shot

Ecstatically shooting everything in sight using my beloved Nikon D3100 with AF-S DX Nikkor 18-55mm 1:3.5-5.6G VR kit lens and AF-S Nikkor 50mm f/1.8 G prime lens.

Also capturing outrageous beauty left and right with my Nikon D7000 blissfully married to my Nikkor 85mm f/1.4D AF prime glass. Don't be jeal.

And then there was the Nikon AF-S DX NIKKOR 18-200mm f:3.5-5.6G ED VR II zoom. We're done here.

Dying Is A Day Worth Living For

I am a taphophile

Word. Photo Jennifer Weber 2010

Great things are happening at

Find A Grave

If you don't believe me, click the pics.

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Dying is a wild night

and a new road.

Emily Dickinson

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REMEMBRANCE

When I am gone

Please remember me

 As a heartfelt laugh,

 As a tenderness.

 Hold fast to the image of me

When my soul was on fire,

The light of love shining

Through my eyes.

Remember me when I was singing

And seemed to know my way.

Remember always

When we were together

And time stood still.

Remember most not what I did,

Or who I was;

Oh please remember me

For what I always desired to be:

A smile on the face of God.

David Robert Brooks

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 Do not regret growing older. It is a privilege denied to many.

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Keep To The Code

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You Want To Find This
The Promise Of Redemption

Therefore seeing we have this ministry, as we have received mercy, we faint not;

But have renounced the hidden things of dishonesty, not walking in craftiness, nor handling the word of God deceitfully; but by manifestation of the truth commending ourselves to every man's conscience in the sight of God.

But if our gospel be hid, it is hid to them that are lost:

In whom the god of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine unto them.

For we preach not ourselves, but Christ Jesus the Lord; and ourselves your servants for Jesus' sake.

For God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.

But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellency of the power may be of God, and not of us.

We are troubled on every side, yet not distressed; we are perplexed, but not in despair;

Persecuted, but not forsaken; cast down, but not destroyed;

Always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our body.

For we which live are alway delivered unto death for Jesus' sake, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our mortal flesh.

So then death worketh in us, but life in you.

We having the same spirit of faith, according as it is written, I BELIEVED, AND THEREFORE HAVE I SPOKEN; we also believe, and therefore speak;

Knowing that he which raised up the Lord Jesus shall raise up us also by Jesus, and shall present us with you.

For all things are for your sakes, that the abundant grace might through the thanksgiving of many redound to the glory of God.

For which cause we faint not; but though our outward man perish, yet the inward man is renewed day by day.

For our light affliction, which is but for a moment, worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory;

While we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen: for the things which are seen are temporal; but the things which are not seen are eternal.

II Corinthians 4

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THE DREAMERS

In the dawn of the day of ages,
 In the youth of a wondrous race,
 'Twas the dreamer who saw the marvel,
 'Twas the dreamer who saw God's face.


On the mountains and in the valleys,
By the banks of the crystal stream,
He wandered whose eyes grew heavy
With the grandeur of his dream.

The seer whose grave none knoweth,
The leader who rent the sea,
The lover of men who, smiling,
Walked safe on Galilee --

All dreamed their dreams and whispered
To the weary and worn and sad
Of a vision that passeth knowledge.
They said to the world: "Be glad!

"Be glad for the words we utter,
Be glad for the dreams we dream;
Be glad, for the shadows fleeing
Shall let God's sunlight beam."

But the dreams and the dreamers vanish,
The world with its cares grows old;
The night, with the stars that gem it,
Is passing fair, but cold.

What light in the heavens shining
Shall the eye of the dreamer see?
Was the glory of old a phantom,
The wraith of a mockery?

Oh, man, with your soul that crieth
In gloom for a guiding gleam,
To you are the voices speaking
Of those who dream their dream.

If their vision be false and fleeting,
If its glory delude their sight --
Ah, well, 'tis a dream shall brighten
The long, dark hours of night.

> Edward Sims Van Zile <

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Freedom is a fragile thing and is never more than one generation away from extinction. It is not ours by inheritance; it must be fought for and defended constantly by each generation, for it comes only once to a people. Those who have known freedom and then lost it, have never known it again.

~ Ronald Reagan

Photo Jennifer Weber 2010

Not Without My Effects

My Compass Works Fine

The Courage Of Our Hearts

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Daft Like Jack

 "I can name fingers and point names ..."

And We'll Sing It All The Time
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Easy On The Goods
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    starring Geoffrey Canada, Michelle Rhee
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    starring Bette Davis, Ernest Borgnine, Debbie Reynolds, Barry Fitzgerald, Rod Taylor
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    starring Jack Black, Shirley MacLaine, Matthew McConaughey
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    starring Barbara Stanwyck, Fred MacMurray, Beulah Bondi, Elizabeth Patterson, Sterling Holloway
  • The Ox-Bow Incident
    The Ox-Bow Incident
    starring Henry Fonda, Dana Andrews, Mary Beth Hughes, Anthony Quinn, William Eythe
  • The Bad Seed
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    starring Nancy Kelly, Patty McCormack, Henry Jones, Eileen Heckart, Evelyn Varden
  • Shadow of a Doubt
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    starring Teresa Wright, Joseph Cotten, Macdonald Carey, Patricia Collinge, Henry Travers
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    starring Jean Arthur, Joel McCrea, Charles Coburn, Bruce Bennett, Ann Savage
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    starring Alex Veadov, Roselyn Sanchez, Nestor Serrano
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    starring Tilda Swinton, Donald Crowhurst, Jean Badin, Clare Crowhurst, Simon Crowhurst
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    starring William Holden, Gloria Swanson, Erich Von Stroheim, Nancy Olson, Fred Clark
  • Penny Serenade
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    starring Cary Grant, Irene Dunne, Edgar Buchanan, Beulah Bondi
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    starring Fred MacMurray, Barbara Stanwyck, Edward G. Robinson, Porter Hall, Jean Heather
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    starring Clark Gable, Claudette Colbert
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    starring Meryl Streep, Jim Broadbent, Harry Lloyd, Anthony Head, Alexandra Roach
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That Dog Is Never Going To Move

~ RIP JAVIER ~

1999 - 2016

Columbia's Finest Chihuahua

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~ RIP SHILOH ~

2017 - 2021

My Tar Heel Granddog

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~ RIP RAMBO ~

2008 - 2022

Andrew's Beloved Pet

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Wednesday
Dec102014

Christmas :: It is what it is

Last week I promised to share the results of the Audrey/Dagny photo shoot with you this Monday, and I did. You may see those photos here.

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I've got Christmas music blaring -- here in the family room through hidden speakers and outside on the deck, emanating from our speakers that look like rocks.

You're welcome, neighborhood.

My large main Christmas tree is sparkling a few feet away. A second Christmas tree twinkles in the kitchen.

Christmas presents are scattered beneath the Christmas trees.

The front of my house is decorated with Christmas lights, Christmas greenery, and a pointedly Christmasy door ornament.

There are Christmas cards waiting to be addressed.

There is Christmas wrapping paper and various related accoutrement sitting at the ready to be flung around Christmas gifts large and small.

In my email sit Christmas wish-lists that I requested from my children.

The Christmas menu is planned and although the Christmas food-foraging list has not yet been committed to paper, it soon will be.

And that reminds me: I still need to go Christmas shopping.

That's because it's Christmas.

Not merely a season. Not just another holiday. Not winter solstice. Not winter break. 

Christmas.

It is Christmastime.

Have you gone abroad -- at school, to work, to the marketplace both real and virtual, even to church, in some cases -- looking for Christmas and been offered, instead, all manner of lame, diluted euphemisms?

Worse yet, have you been indirectly shamed into not mentioning it by name? Have you bought into that particularly vile tentacle of political correctness?

Like most people, I've loved this time of year ever since I was a little kid with more nonsense in me than actual awareness of the significance attached to such events.

We didn't go to church so I was dumb as a box of hair when it came to what lots of things really meant.

So what was special about that early spring Sunday? Dressing up (maybe) and a basketful of jellybeans and chocolate bunnies. The thirty-first of October? Dressing up (certainly) and begging enough candy to rot both my own teeth and our dog's.

The fourth of July? Beach time. Mosquito bites and sparklers. The fourth Thursday in November? All manner of edible treats particular to that day, especially when we went over the bayou and through the woods to my grandmother's house in Baton Rouge.

Christmas? Getting stuff. Presents. Some Sanny Claus thrown in for effect.

Wait. Is there more?

As I learned when I was a young teenager, there is more: The purpose of Christmas is to celebrate the birth of Christ. It's a day on which we celebrate not what we can get, but what He freely gave.

Yet as years pile upon years, it seems the world is more determined than ever to mark the month of December with observance of anything and everything but the Baby born in a manger.

On Sunday morning I was getting ready for church, which I do upstairs, in a bedroom across the hall from our guest room. One of my offices, as it were.

There's a TV in the guest room so I flicked it on and turned to the DirecTV channel that purports to play music of the season. My ears were eager for O Come All Ye Faithful, O Holy Night, Hark! The Herald Angels Sing, and Away in a Manger.

An hour elapsed in which I gradually became bathed, perfumed, hosieried, robed, powdered, mascaraed, coiffed, bejeweled, shod, and gloved. And I accomplished same all by me onesie, my lady-in-waiting having weekends off.

It was while reaching for a lightweight shawl and turning off the TV, preparing to join my TG and go to church, that I realized: In an entire hour of "seasonal" music, the only mention of anything non-secular had been when Alvin and the Chipmunks enjoined us to give thanks to the Lord above because Santa Claus comes tonight.

Shopping was mentioned, and being home for Christmas, and seasonal depression, and chestnuts roasting on an open fire, and it being cold outside, and letting it snow, and rocking around the Christmas tree, and walking in a winter wonderland, and dashing through the snow, and long winters' naps and road trips to visit relatives, and Santa Baby, and Mommy kissing Santa Claus, and jingling bells and mistletoe.

Baby Jesus never made the playlist. No room for Him there.

Later I complained to Erica about it. She replied that she was having a hard time getting any clerk in a retail setting to say Merry Christmas back to her when she first said it to them.

Forget them ever saying it first. If that happens to you, I hope you'll tell me about it, because I'm pretty sure it's forbidden by most if not all store managers, for an employee to offer that greeting to a customer.

But that is not all. Now, someone saying it back when the customer says it -- which I do each and every time I shop during December -- becomes a notable event.

Now, I haven't been Christmas shopping yet (except online) so the opportunity hasn't presented itself.

But that very night TG and I swung by a major retailer so that I could pick up, among other items, Christmas cards and Christmas boxes (in which I plan to put Christmas presents to arrange under the Christmas trees).

And when we checked out, I said Merry Christmas! to our very efficient and pleasant cashier. It was latish; I'm sure she was tired and ready to go home.

But I got the biggest smile. Merry Christmas to you! she said. And it made my heart glad.

I'll stop soon -- you have that to look forward to -- but not before I make a solemn promise, both to myself and to you and to whomever else may be remotely interested:

I won't spend money on Christmas presents, swelling the coffers of retailers who aggressively promote the spending of Christmas dollars at their outlets, if said retailer refuses to acknowledge that what this spending and celebrating is all about, is Christmas.

All they have to do is use the word! In print in their advertisements and throughout their store. And verbally: Say it! Say the word Christmas. Say Merry Christmas, not Happy Holidays. Because the word Christmas contains the name of Christ, without Whom there is no reason to say it at all.

Let's be honest: If His name sticks in their throats, my debit card sticks in my wallet.

Because although the season definitely does have to do with the start of winter, with invocations of Santa Claus, with spending money you don't have to buy stuff people don't need, with ice skating and hot chocolate and mittens and jingle bells and twinkly lights and sappy movies, with gingerbread houses and greenery, with snowmen and reindeer and bulging sleighs, with sugarplums and nutcrackers and traveling home for pumpkin pie, and with folks being simultaneously happier and sadder than usual, none of those things are the main message.

Certainly the parties and eating too much and drinking too much, the use of the sacred holiday of Christmas as (another) excuse to imbibe and indulge, is not the point.

Christmas celebrates the birth of the Savior of the world (even if He was not born on December 25th).

No matter what anyone says (or doesn't say), no matter how thoroughly the purpose for celebrating Christmas -- and even the word itself, offensive as it is to some -- is suppressed and ignored and covered with glitter that's not even close to being gold, they'll never succeed in changing what it really means.

And no matter how much red you wear or how blue you feel or how silver the bells or how much white you dream of, those things won't get you to the heart of Christmas.

But even that is okay. Do you want to know why? Because in the end (as at the beginning), it is what it is.

No amount of turning a deliberately deaf ear and a stubbornly blind eye, of making a point to ignore the reality of Christmas, or the Christ of Christmas, will alter the eventual outcome, which He has planned and for which He was born.

Behold, a virgin shall be with child, and shall bring forth a son, and they shall call his name Emmanuel, which being interpreted is, God with us.

= Matthew 1:23 =

I pray this Christmas we will listen for that beautiful word, and say it both reverently and with joy, and savor it both on our tongues and in our innermost selves.

I plan to pursue and promote both its lovely timelessness and its eternal relevance, practicing forgiveness for those who don't understand and gratitude for those who do.

That is all for now.

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Merry Christmas

Thursday
Dec042014

Don't say cheese. Say honey.

As you know I meant to take a bunch of cute candids of the grandkids over Thanksgiving.

I envisioned a perfectly sharp and heartrendingly adorable photo of the four of them smiling into the camera, all faces wreathed in joyful abandon, nobody frowning or looking at the ground.

I'd planned to caption it Merry Christmas! For you.

That didn't actually happen. I cooked for two days, and then we ate -- sort of, if you don't count the throwing up at the table incident (no; not me) -- what I'd cooked, and then it was too dark to take pictures.

And I was too tired anyway. Instead, to relax I went outside and installed multicolored lights on the porch railing. I love the seamless segue from Thanksgiving to Christmas.

But on the next day -- Friday -- we all embarked on a planned photo shoot to take the annual Christmas card picture of my daughter Stephanie's family.

This is something TG and I did each year when the kids were much younger: around Thanksgiving we'd go somewhere local and pose up and someone would be pressganged into snapping our picture and I'd pick the one most flattering to me, and we'd go with that one for our card.

I insisted on said arrangement for lots of years -- favoring many eager recipients with an updated picture of our branch of the Weber clan just in time for Christmas -- before, around 1995, finally giving up.

That's because whenever I would suggest it was time to capture the annual family photo, TG would begin acting as though he'd rather be kicking a radioactive can on Pluto.

Miserable. He doesn't like posing for picutres. And it shows.

Consequently it has been awhile since all of us -- if you don't count a couple of casual snaps taken over the last decade or so -- appeared all together in any sort of posed portrait.

So I packed up the tripod and the Nikon D7000 and the remote control so that I could operate said camera without being behind it, and we set out for downtown Columbia.

It was a very cold day, highs only in the mid forties, but there was considerable sun so naturally we scheduled the shoot for late afternoon.

The light, don't you know. There's love in the air at that time of day.

My grandchildren -- all except Dagny -- served as standard-bearers for the time-honored tradition of wearing classic argyle, which I thought was all kinds of cute.

Melanie and Allissa got new pale-pink tights and new black dressy shoes for the occasion.

I am prejudiced but I think the Bixlers are the cutest little family. They love being together and it shows. My son-in-law has never balked at posing for the Christmas photo.

But it's no pose when I tell you that everybody had a good time. It was cold and we worked fast, but there was merriment in the air. (I don't do Black Friday; I only do the First Day of Christmas.)

We'll pose up again in a few weeks when we all gather in North Carolina to celebrate our Melanie's tenth birthday.

I'll make sure to get plenty of sweet pictures of double-digit girl, our precious Melly Belle.

Meanwhile be patient until Monday, when I share with you the results of my Christmas card shoot with Audrey and Dagny. To tide you over, there's a sneak peek on my Instagram if you care to look.

And that is all for now.

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Happy Thursday ~ Merry Christmas

Tuesday
Dec022014

Guest poster: Dagny a/k/a Daggybug

Wot? Wait a second. December second?

It's not November no more? That means it's Christmas!

Yay my first Christmas! Outside the womb, that is. Wow guys. What a concept.

I wonder if my presents will bring as much joy to me this year as my presence has brought to others this year.

I seriously doubt it.

And that is all for now.

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Happy Tuesday ~ Merry Christmas Everybody

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