An Interesting Way to Spend a Vacation

So I have just about two weeks off now.  I'm on vacation.  But we haven't gone anywhere .... yet.

That's right, we're right here in town.  We're leaving town on Monday.

99.9% of the time, when we go on vacation, we go somewhere else.  Though our family did not travel much on vacation, I was told in seminary that it's important for pastors too get away when they get time off, so I've pretty much done that.

But, so much doesn't get done.  During the last year, there have been a few times when my hours have not been pretty.  So I thought it might be fun to get a longer time away, but not actually go anywhere for part of it.  Just try to get some things done.

So, that's what we've been doing.  Especially yesterday, when my mom came over and helped us wash the venetian blinds, re-organize the pantry, and clean out the refrigerator (which has been dripping water again, so we took all of the food out and turned it off.) 

My mom is the most organized person I know.  I may have mentioned that when I lived in Japan, I always got my Christmas presents from home well before Christmas.  (This was not uniformly the case.)  She is also the best ever at packing a little car so that all the things you need to bring home from internship will fit into it.  (I still remember our checklist for weekend camping trips.)   We took her out to eat as well, which was fun.

We ran into members of my church there.  I said "hello."  As they left, they waved and said they liked this restaurant "because of the pop-overs."  I remembered that I had seen another member of my church the day before at our local Large-Chain Bookstore.  I just said "hello" again, but a few minutes later, the woman came running back to tell me how much she had enjoyed the service on Sunday.  That was nice.  (Especially that she liked the whole service -- not just the sermon.)

I understand why they say pastors should "get away" on vacation.  This is not a small town.  But I still run into people.

So, today we decided to "get out of Dodge," so to speak.  It was waaaay to hot to work outside, which had been our original plan.  We decided to go to a larger medium-sized town where there are some cute little shops and restaurants.  (More about that later, perhaps.)

But, before we left, we went swimming.  Where I bumped into someone from my church.

Really.  This is NOT a small town.