During my visit last Spring to New York, I observed one of my daughters asking her son if she could borrow his cell phone. Then, on another evening, she asked her daughter the same thing. Then, my daughter would proceed to do something on the phone. Finally, she told me that she was playing a game that she wasn't able to get on her own cell phone. So I watched this go on and on, night after night.
Then, as I moved to another New York daughter's house, I discovered she used a tablet to access the same game. I was curious so I asked her if I could try her game. Before I knew it, I was hooked and she was without her tablet. I would wear down her battery with this game. It was mesmerizing. Everyday, the same question.... "Can I please use your tablet?" My daughter all but lost her access to her own tablet....her own tablet. Imagine that. How do you tell your own mother "No" for such a simple request to use her tablet? After all, her mother's life was so small. Her mother needed the intellectual stimulation. When I finally left to return to San Diego, I'm sure she had a "Candy Crush" party. I always tell my sons-in-law that they probably have a "Lower the Heat" party in the winter after I've left to return to San Diego. They always respond, "No, no, there is no party." But, I don't know because I do know that they raise the heat regardless of the expense of more fuel just to make me more comfortable. They are so good to me.
Well, back to Candy Crush. I've been bitten. The day after I arrived home, I set myself up with this game. I saw how a number of my Facebook friends were entrenched in it as well. In playing the game, after 5 unsuccessful tries, there is a waiting period before playing the game again. However, sometimes the waiting period is 25 minutes, but other times it is 3 minutes. When it is as little as 3 minutes, I can do something else and then, in three minutes, get back to the game. Whoever designed this game was expert at keeping you engaged if you were so weak-willed, which I discovered I was. The only strength I've been able to muster was in determining that I would not pay for the tools that appeared for sale when you could not win that level in the game. I am now at level 80 waiting for some of my kind friends to help me across a bridge so I can proceed with the game.
Yesterday, though, I had an awakening. Every morning I have my coffee while checking my emails and friend's posts on Facebook. Then, I always break away to read my Bible. You see, in my estimation, it's okay to be half-awake reading my emails, etc. Don't get the wrong idea. My friends and what they have to share with me are very important. I just feel I am awake enough for incoming correspondence, just not my daily calling in relation to my Lord and Saviour. The Bible is a "mainstay" in my life. Then, later in the day, it's back on Facebook again to play the game.
Yesterday, I got so engrossed in Candy Crush that I had no time to read my Bible before I had to leave the house for an appointment. At that point, I decided I had to resist the lure of the game from now on. After all, is a game really all that important? Actually, at this point, "Yes." But I will endeavor to put first things first from now on, even though I still hear the music in my head.
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My neighbor recently created a garden on her side of our joint deck. Hummingbirds regularly visit. When I hear the bird's little "chip, chip, chip" I grab my camera. The photo to the right is about the best I could get so far. I think it is a female Anna's Hummingbird.
