Sure and Certain

Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see.

Hebrews 11:1 (NIV)

I'd like to introduce you to two real characters, "Sure" and "Certain"...

...but I can't seem to find them anywhere. Just their hats:

These brothers, 'Sure Lee' and 'Certain Lee', look an awful lot like the pastoral staff here at St. Paul. And the only difference appears to be the nature of their confusion regarding patterns of speech that relate to their names. (though some might argue that the confusion is actually a similarity to us pastors)

We performed a skit that I wrote for the opening chapel this year with Sure and Certain as the primary characters, along with a dear woman (one of our teachers) by the name of 'Faith Full'. Hebrews 11:1 is the theme verse for our school this year you see, so I thought we'd have a little recurring fun with it. And now I'm sitting at my office computer, trying to find an angle for the second installment of this Abbott and Costello-esque routine. (Think "Who's on First?", but with salvation instead of baseball.)

...though I don't get quite as mad, so as to not upset the children.

As to the plan:

I'm thinking that this time I'll go a few verses into chapter eleven of Hebrews and talk about the men of faith that the letter praises for their lives of faithfulness. Making a point of the fact that, no, they weren't perfect but they were saved by faith.

This is God's grace to us as well - and that's the whole point of it all!
That whether we hear of it through simple explanation, or have it embedded within us by a semi-humorous skit performed by a couple of pastor-types, the goodness of God's work on our hearts will prayerfully affect those who hear it so they can understand just what it is that God has done for us.

Sure and Certain!

Of a 'Binky' and an iPod...

Sometimes things just progress in a manner that doesn't seem strange, but when observed from a third party's point of view seem altogether comical.

...then sometimes they don't.

There's a good possibility for the following to be in either camp; funny with a chance of developmentally damaging, or normal with a good likelihood for an ironic smile.

Last night we had dinner with some friends who hadn't really seen our kids for a while. It was a bit of a gathering, with most participants being about the same age or slightly older than our kids' grandparents.
Just our two kids, a meal that they wouldn't try (Though it was more than excellent! Yum!), and after-dinner conversation that was out of their range of concern or care.

So after a little bit of their trying to be polite, my wife (as we'd planned) reached into her purse and produced our Nintendo DS for our son (5), and the iPod Touch for our daughter (nearly 2).

Neither of these choices are unheard of in our home. He is an expert at Mario Bros., and we have a couple dozen of kiddie apps on the iPod specific to her age group. Their electronic nannies gained us about another hour of adult conversation with our dinner friends.

As we wrapped up the evening, someone noted with great wonderment at how good the kids had been. We simply referenced their respective games and attempted to credit ourselves with none of the accolades.
Then someone noted that our little girl was sitting there, knowingly and deftly tapping her way through screens and games on the device, all the while with a pacifier in her mouth.

...the 'Binky' and an iPod.

To us, this is nothing.

She always has a binky. And she often has the iPod.

In fact, she's regulary referenced it as "myPod". A knowing allusion to the facts of life in our home these days - a little bit of Veruca Salt here and there.

But looking at the picture, I could see the humor along with the saddness 'what we've become'.

Yet, then again, the kids now play 'Super Mario' and are occupied coloring on the screen - as opposed to acting 'Super Crazy' and coloring on your host's wallpaper.

...I'll keep the binky and the iPod, thanks.

Scenic Walks

The other day, I played around on Picknik.com and the end result was changing my desktop image to this photo from my past...


True, I did a bit of tweaking and I sort of 'Kinkade-ed' it up a bit I think, but the effect is far closer to the memory than the original image.

If I remember correctly, my wife gets credit for taking this one - though she wasn't yet my wife at the time. We were on what was likely one of the most ill-planned adventure weekends that this Eagle Scout had ever partaken in. ...and it was one of the best hikes of my life!

We'd gone to the Lake District in England while studying abroad. The whole class of 18 college kids and our American professor had gone the first time, but at least three of us (Meghan, myself, and another friend) had absolutely fallen in love with the region. So the three of us went back for a weekend.
There was no pre-arranging. No calling ahead. Just a train ticket and a list of hostels, and our previous time in the area - which amounted to about 48 hours of expertise.
Needless to say, it was an adventure in most of the safer senses of the word.

But I wanted to talk about walking.

Here's the thing that relates to the picture for today;
There are trails that go EVERYWHERE in the world. You can walk to the store, go to a hidden lake or find a mountain and traipse up a goat-path until you can't go any higher. Your intentions - planned or otherwise - can get you wherever you like.

But if you don't stop and look at what you're walking on, what you're walking next to, or what spectacles of natural beauty are off in the distance, you'll overlook vast sums of God's creation - which was, after all, made for you.

So I'll re-live my favorite hike for the lunch hour here.

But lets plan on going past some good things together sometime soon, okay?

...and take some pictures, so you can give God the credit.

Green Pastures

Tonight, as we continue our look at Psalm 23, I've been given the responsibility and privilege of considering verse 2 of the famous Psalm...

Ps. 23:2 He makes me lie down in green pastures,

he leads me beside quiet waters,

Wonderful words from the Psalmist, beautiful imagery and poignant comparison to God's love and care for His people...

And all I can think of this morning is this:

For those of you who were not blessed, such as I, to have experienced a LOT of Nick-at-Night as you grew up (and don't misunderstand; it was usually my choice and my parents the ones who endured it) - we're talking about one of the more hilarious examples of absurdity that CBS ever produced. (that is, until the onset of the Survivor Series)

GREEN ACRES

What a joyous show!

What a silly cast!

"What!?! You're considering comparing 'Green Acres' to Psalm 23 IN CHURCH?"

Well, sort of, yes.

More of a Compare/Contrast type of situation, really. And perhaps, if you'll indulge me I can get it all out of my system and nobody else will ever have to hear about it. - Then again, if this 'works' the world will soon hear of it.

My premise is this:

Of course you can understand how the name 'Green Acres' might remind someone of the green pastures of Psalm 23. That makes reasonable sense.

But there's a bit more...

The premise of the TV show was that a successful New York City lawyer, decides to give up the stress and strain of 'city life' in favor of some 'fresh air'. So he buys a farm. Accompanied by his socialite wife who has an already humor-inducing Hungarian accent, he finds himself in the most backwards of rural towns... and is (relatively) happy to have found "it".

As we hear of the green pastures, we find ourselves thinking, "Hey, that sounds nice." As well we should. The idea is that God leads His flock into places that are hospitable, pleasant, and something of a respite for us from the daily existence. And even more than that, we dwell there safely under His protective gaze so long as is appropriate to the season.

Its kinda as if God has fulfilled a lifelong dream, without our asking or putting forth effort, and has provided us with the life that we've needed all along.

He's given "it" to us... that thing that we so deperately need as humans.

Peace.

Not to say that the oddities of life will subside - the strange neighbors literally became the backbone of the Green Acres plotline - and we'll certainly not be without such a thing as trouble.

But we can be sure that what we need will be provided.

And we've got a Good Shepherd to watch over the farm.

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The un-used devotional thought for today.

Today, as they do every month, some of the ladies of the congregation invited the two pastors out for lunch. It's often customary that we 'sing for our supper' by bringing along a devotional thought.

Since our other pastor had a wonderful thought in January, today was my turn.

As it turns out, the conversation never waned enough to do too much in the way of devotionals before the food came, so the following brief thought has as of yet been unused.

(aren't you lucky to be on the inside track?)

One of my facebook friends recently posted a status that went something like this;
"Wasting time at work; playing Rock, Paper, Scissors with Jess."

(normally I wouldn't include names, but you'll see that it's significant in a moment)

I read this status, and laughed out loud - myself at work, momentarily wasting time. But my laughter came even a bit louder when I re-read the post, because I'd managed to perform a mental typo...

When I first read her post, I'd added a 'u' to 'Jess'...

"Wasting time at work; Playing Rock, Paper, Scissors with JESUS."

Now that would be a challenge!
I mean, come on! Not only can he know your thoughts, but I'm thinking that "Paper beats Rock" doesn't quite work the same way when you're up against the omnipotent Son of God.

Jesus always wins!

But then again, He's the personification of mercy and compassion. His very role in coming to save the World would seem to make such an arbitrary form of bargaining unnecessary. I mean, we could just pray and trust that things will work out.

You know, it sort of makes you realize that BECAUSE Jesus always wins,

You never lose!


What a reassuring thought as we come into the first Friday in Lent. Whether you give anything up or not, He's already settled the score by His sacrifice.

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Superbowl; maybe the best reason to have a big family in America!

Thanksgiving has turkey.
Christmas has goose (if you hold to that tradition).
Easter has eggs.
And Valentines Day has chocolate.

But Superbowl Sunday has no such boundaries or 'reasonable' regulations in the food department.

And what better way to spend a January evening than throwing your New Years diet to the wind and stuffing your face with Nachos, Wings, Hot Dogs and beverage (often simultaniously). All in the name of choosing a team to cheer for based upon how much your favorite uncle or cousin is rooting for the opposite team... A loyalty he developed at an obscurred moment in childhood when his favorite player was traded to that team's rival.

But the opportunity to eat, and to do so with people you care about - with interesting commercials to go along with it all - THIS is why God invented broadcast TV!

Natural History Museum - A Zoo for things that used to be alive.

Yesterday, I took the family to the Cleveland Museum of Natural History.

It was a lot of good fun! Big enough for a day's venture with the kids, and not too busy on a Friday this time of year.

Naturally, there was plenty of evolutionary content to be ignored, but the dinosaur exhibits and everything were really nice!

Also, I'd not realized that Cleveland has really got a couple of 'celebrities' there;

We saw "Lucy" of diminutive-prehuman fame...

(though her real bones are back in Ethiopia now)

We saw a moon rock...

(it was not made of cheese)

We saw the first Foucault's Pendulum to be electromagnetically assisted...

(interestingly, and quite permanently positioned directly blocking a fire hose panel)

but perhaps the biggest thrill,

We saw Balto.

The real thing!

(Well, his posthumously posed self.)

And he doesn't look like this...

(and the real story is much more interesting than the movie - though much less romantic - see link below)

And his statue in Central Park, NYC isn't perfect either...

(but, to be fair, its devoted to ALL the sled dogs as well as just the star of today's show...)

This is what Balto looks like today:

And this is a shot taken in his prime...

Here's the full story on the Museum website.

Naturally, I was the only one really excited about Balto within 50 feet at the time. If not for my 1 year old on my shoulders at the time, I think that I may've creeped out a set of high school girls who were remembering the movie version of the story in bits and pieces, as I told them to go to the same web-site that I'm encouraging you to see (above).

Well, the point of this post wasn't supposed to be Balto, but its not a bad point.

...better than something about Jay Leno, I suppose. And much more educational.

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F.A.A.N.G.'s Christmas Card

After many months of silence, it seems that our dear friends at the F.A.A.N.G. have not actually forgotten about us after all.

(If you need a reminder of just what the Feline Association Against Negligence in Grooming & Care is all about - though I'm not sure how you could even begin to forget... I know that my nightmares have yet to stop - click here, or here, or here for a taste of our 'history'.)

They sent us a Christmas Card...


...yeah, that was pretty much my reaction too.

It was one of those custom photo-cards that usually involve sweaters and fireplaces, but I guess the cats wanted to send a little different message. Here's what the inside read...

Sharks - What God wanted to be called 'Catfish', 'til humans messed up the naming process.

Happy Holidays from your 'friends' at F.A.A.N.G.

...go feed your cat!

To: The Probationary Household of Client - Orange Julius "Caesar" Peters
From: F.A.A.N.G. - Public Relations Dept.

It is our desire to convey warm emotions related to the season.
As a result of provisionary compliance in regard to previous notices, we currently have the Peters household under the mandatory 12 month 'probationary surveliance' program. This program follows any and all infractions that might approach or offend against one or more of the traditional nine lives of aforementioned client.
The program will expire for this household on 6/1/2010, pending approval of the assigned field agent.

Please consult the F.A.A.N.G. website for a helpful list of holiday infractions to avoid.

signed,

- Lavernius "Midnight" Olearude
F.A.A.N.G. Local 9L2 (Cleveland-West)
Investigative Rep. #9L2-24

Following the typed note, there was a handwritten - or 'paw-written' I suppose - scrawling across the bottom:

"Dude, the outdoor litterbox your humans installed is AWESOME! You've got to sneak out and try it, it's HUGE! Thanks!"

Needless to say, Mr. Olearude will be getting a terse reply concerning his opinion and misuse of the sand that sits below our swimming pool in the summer months.


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Play that funky music... at the German Cultural Center!

Lots of happenings, lots of being "away".

It always makes it harder to come back.

So I thought that I'd start with a fun little moment that the title refers to today.

Simply; I performed a wedding for a great couple here at church. Meg and I went to the reception (a great mix of very nice and quite fun, by the way). And this moment of appropriate-ness struck me enough to laugh out loud:

The DJ, up on the stage at the Germanic Cultural Center, who'd been playing Polkas to great success 'til this point, broke out with some 'Wild Cherry'...

Though I didn't get up and dance with my clerical and suit, I certainly wanted to "Disco-down and check out the show."

Ah the fun!

...more soon, I hope.


...

Meaningless post before a busy week fully commences...

So the other day I was getting something in and out of the fridge and I knocked down a yogurt container. The problem is that we don't buy individual yogurt cups or anything, we get the 1 quart kind... and it was newly opened!

So in full on slo-motion, the plain, low-fat, organic container (no, I did NOT drop it on purpose!) fell to the floor by making about a 270 degree rotation before completing the 4 foot plummet.

This caused a perfect explosion of the lid, but luckily I was quick and the 5 second rule applied to about 1/2 the container.


Hopefully that's something to think about 'til next week when I'll be able to post again.

My apologies for any lameness, real or implied...

The WhitePigeon Scooter Light Test

I've mentioned my scooter, a Buddy 125, before.

I've shared some fun times.

But I've yet to share what it looks like. So here are a few pictures, and there's a fun little video below as well... enjoy!

There are more images on facebook - assuming you're my friend (which I believe to be true of the three of you who might occasionally look at the site.)

But as an added bonus to the blog-viewers...

Here's a video showing off some additions that I've made to the scooter's lighting. My wife is sitting on the scoot working the controls. I failed to give her any useful instruction before filming this... the byproduct of which, you'll get to hear the horn that I added to beef up my road presence. (As did the neighbors at 9:30 that night.)

Its all about safety in the midst of fun and 'cool'... and 'cool' is often in the eye of the beholder.

I'm so cool!

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Noah... and Bill

Well, it was really only a matter of time before we had an illustration of the first successful pigeon in the Bible. Tonight at New Member Class we're talking about Noah... and in my research for illustrations, I came across this...

(Courtesy of Noah, Bill Cosby and LEGO)

D-Day on the road, with scooters and jam

A day to remember, for sure.

Today was "D-Day" - the Normandy invasion in WWII. A BIG deal that most of us have mainly forgotten about. So in honor of that, and the fact that it was going to be a beautiful Saturday, the scooters went for a ride.

This was my first ride in a group, and it was really enjoyable. We put about 125 miles (scooter miles aren't always 'exactly' true to actual miles... but they're close) and it took the better part of the day. The two destinations were the closest Veterans Cemetary as well as the Smucker's headquarters and store in Orrville, Ohio.

Its hard to imagine spending a similar amount of time on a seemingly insurmountable battlefield, amidst the bodies of your friends...

But boy oh boy, I sure appreciate the fact that; because of these guys (and gals) we can do things like go on scooter rides and buy jam and/or jelly whenever we'd like. (Maybe that seems trivial, but its part of the whole "freedom" package.)

Here's my favorite pictures from the day...

Dinosaurs!

We have a family membership at the Cleveland Zoo. Its great!

So this last Friday we packed everyone up for our first* full-family zoo adventure of the season, and we found THIS!!!

*We've actually been to the Toledo Zoo already this year, but the hometown zoo counts for the real 'first'.

Meghan's comment after viewing the above 'movie' was simply;

"I can't believe you spent all this time on that."

Thanks dear.

As we walked through the Dinosaur section of the zoo, I realized two things:

1) That I really liked dinosaurs as a kid, and I still kinda do.

2) That I had absolutely no interest in reading the signs.

I'll probably read those signs on a later visit this summer, but for now I just wanted to appreciate the beauty of the natural/animatronic world.

The signs just confuse things anyhow. Palentologists have changed all the dinosaur names two or three times since I was a kid... and I think they had something to do with downgrading Pluto from its planet status as well. I figure it's all about the marketing.

Those signs also force the whole issue of the age of the earth. Its tough to read to your kid that, "The Laziguanasaurus lived in what is now Chile about 1.5 jillion years ago" ...and then explain that the sign, though likely accurate on many points (like the part about Chile), isn't quite in the 'hard facts' category when it comes to the timeline. You're supposed to be able to trust those signs... but that's what a Christian deals with when dipping the toes into the scientific world.

Speaking of trust... Here's a serious 'Jurassic Park' moment for you:

"But I don't understand, Mr. Hammond said that the park was perfectly safe..."

We heard this poor child say something about "being a dentist for the dinosaur"

...our sympathies to those who knew him.

This guy was in the entirely wrong section of the zoo. Not even close to the other dinosaurs.

So appaling! They treat him as if he weren't even real!

...

The other day...

The other day I was casually walking through the living room and I encountered something interesting. It seems that a couple of kids had managed to wrangle themselves an elusive "couch kitty". The following images were hastily snapped on my camera-phone, as I tried to keep a safe distance from the action. Here's a rough narration of how things went down...


Boy: "Good jump, sis! Now hang on 'til he's fully submitted and is placid!"
Girl: "Alright, but get up here and help!"

Girl: "OK, I think I've got him... what variety of couch kitty do you think he is?"

Boy: "I'm not sure, let me see; Orange and White markings, Northeast Ohio, long tail... I'd say we've got ourselves one of the last remaining specimins of 'Felis Caesarus'!"

Girl: "Do you think I should let him go?"

Boy: "Well, that depends on if you want to keep your hand. I'm not liking the look in his eyes..."

At this point in the action, my 'flight' instinct took over and I ran away as fast as I could. I don't know what happened to those children, but one can only hope that they were wise enough to back away from the enraged beast carefully and respectfully.

Obviously this is a fictionalized version of what was really not a story at all. I just wanted a good excuse to post some semi-blurry pictures that I took of the kids' version of cuddling with their cat... who had until just prior to this been blissfully resting on the couch.

Caesar is actually doing really well with the kids (not that he ever wasn't). He's very fond of Ellie's attentiveness to him, and has even been giving Ben the opportunity to pet him on regular occasions.

Things are pretty good.

Working on the "Shiny Frenchman"

Not that anyone who frequents this blog (all three of you) cares, but I've cleared another hurdle in the process of my next bike dream!

From a previous post...

"I've also begun the progress on another bicycle conversion.

The above image is what the Schwinn Voyageur 11.8 originally looked like - not mine, you understand, but out-of-the-box "New". "New" back in 1981, the same year I was born."

The "Shiny Frenchman" term is my loving combination of the fact that the bike is chromed steel and bears as a name, the term often associated with the French-Canadian trapper/explorers of days gone by... and this cultural/historical fact is best noted by the additional 'u' in 'Voyageur'. (If my history is bogus on this, please don't burst my bubble - frankly, I just like the name.)


There's also the sideways reference to the great cycling movie, "The Flying Scotsman" mixed in as part of the mystique.

Anyhow, I've found that fixing up and dealing with American steel beasties is a fun little game of conversions and mix-matched parts... what a joy! (sarcasm mixed with scent of challenge)


The parts for this bike have been selected and gifted me as Christmas presents and the like, and my hope is to create a fun all-weather bike with capabilities of following 'real' trails as well as going on commutes and family rides. Certainly I've got bikes enough for most of these endeavors... but the Shiny Frenchman will be my well-loved 'beater' bike that I won't feel bad taking on the trails, or be worried when I go over a curb or two.

Its been a lesson in plan-adaptation in getting things to 'go' for this bike.

I want it to be 'right' and everything to work, but the facts of age and non-standard parts (read: not parts made once the European size systems had taken over) has made this project a little more involved than I'd like.

But since I daresay that no one who will likely read this will share enough interest to invest the minutes necessary to read of the trials involved, I will simply post a photo of the (nearly) finished product...

Since this picture was taken, I've switched out the regular platform pedals for my platforms with clipless adapters built in, and I changed the seat out for one that's much more 'dashing'.

The only other issue is that I believe the brake pads are original to the frame, and therefore it stops like the Titanic turns... not so much. This will be remedied soon, since I've also hooked up my son's biketrailer-hitch, which only adds to the stopping conundrum.

However, I'm really pleased with how things are turning out on it. Its comfortable, utilitarian, and has a semi-vintage 'flash' to it... ah, how nice.

(Many thanks to Michael and his "Carbon Rocket" for making all of this a possibility.)

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More on Gnomes

After my post about gnomes, I did a little Google-ing and found this place...

http://www.freethegnomes.com/

...especially interesting was the 'Act Now' page on their site, which included a sample letter for members to send to someone who has a garden gnome "enslaved". It reads as follows...

Letter to Gnome Captor

Gnome Slave Owner,

We deplore your treatment of gentle woodland creatures, and your total disregard for the basic principles of liberty.
Your moral bankruptcy is evidenced by your acts of wanton recklessness and the deliberate use of coercive force and terror tactics against gentle and innocent creatures.

It has come to our attention that a Gnome is being held captive in your garden. We do not, as a rule, negotiate with terrorists, however, we request that he be released immediately. Already your actions have prompted copycat offenses, which we have witnessed, including the deplorable use of a Gnome as a hood ornament.

We understand that you probably were not responsible for the innocent Gnome’s original capture but rather purchased him from a Gnome slave trafficker like a garden center or craft show. Please understand that we are not holding you responsible for the state of Gnome slavery in America.

We are, however, asking you to put an end to your involvement. Do the responsible thing; free your Gnome today.

FreetheGnomes.com has specially trained caseworkers who will gladly work with you toward the goal of returning your Gnome to the northern woodlands from where he came. Please contact us today at FreeMe@FreeTheGnomes.com.
Although American law currently permits you to keep a Gnome in slavery, we believe it to be morally reprehensible. We hope that upon honest reflection, you will agree.
Stop Oppressive Gardening. Free the Gnomes.

Thank you,
Your Name Here

Honestly, I can't decide if I want to join their movement or buy a gnome to put in my yard in hopes of getting such a letter for myself! And though I really want to believe that its all intended in good fun, it also is somewhat unnervingly serious...

Maybe something like this would draw their attention...

http://www.prankplace.com/inflatable_gnome.htm

(Please click on the links to see that this site does, in fact, exist. I know their letter sounds a lot like my style with the whole F.A.A.N.G. thing [which is also entirely real, and I didn't write it at all!!!], but I promise I cannot take any credit... only pay homage.)

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The "New" Bike... and being out of shape

So I finally got to ride this afternoon!

[distant cheering]

I'll write about the "New" bike's completion in a few days... once she's feeling photogenic enough to post some pics. But I've gotta say two things as of today (as I rode back to church on a 90% completed project bike)

1) I don't know how people can go without handlebar tape
2) Knobby tires are loud on pavement and really hard when you pump them up full and take them onto a little trail (75 lbs. - the recommended max pressure)

But I still smiled/grimaced joyfully most of the trip!

Oh, and the out of shape thing... its just a simple fact.
We'll get into that some more later as well.

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Gnome or Kabouter?

Here's a little random-article action from Wikipedia...

Kabouter

For those of you who'd rather not follow the randomly acquired link to a brief article about 'little people', the tradition of gnomes apparently comes from a series of legends and folklore from the forests of northern Europe, and especially Dutch folklore. Not that it has ANYTHING to do with the usual subjects on my blog... In all honesty, I was hitting a dry-spell and really didn't want to think about real life today, so I hit 'random' at Wikipedia (as implied above) and here we go...

A much more thourough accounting of gnomes can be found at Wiki's actual 'gnome' entry.

This leads me to wonder about the Garden-Gnome industry - if there is such a thing.

What kind of gross do the manufacturers/sellers of these lawnmower delicacies pull down per year? Are there gnome regulations in place throughout America? Why am I expending such mental energy on this topic...?

Well, maybe I'll just browse around gnomeoutlet.com for a while to satiate this strange urge...

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Our Response to F.A.A.N.G.

Poor Caesar...

This post has its origins back from December. We'd had all those 'unfortunate' reports and nasty letters floating about from the Cat Union, F.A.A.N.G. That's all in the past now, mostly. And well, with Ellie around it seems as though Caesar has found a new perspective on things. He and I sat down and talked... we had visitors coming from all corners of the country in order to pay attention to him... things weren't too bad. The excitement of everyone being in town for the baptism is long since gone, and all the "guest petters" have gone away with it. Then the Christmas holiday let him have some time to think about things at home by himself. He's found that all that's left are the usual humans... perhaps he'll try them again.

This picture was taken back in December... a moment that changed things!
A moment that changed things so that nowadays they look a little more like this...

So Caesar and I thought that it would be appropriate to send the lovely representatives at F.A.A.N.G. a status update, as they indended, in order to share what life is like now...

To: F.A.A.N.G. Local 9L2 (Cleveland-West)Investigative Rep. #9L2-24, Lavernius "Midnight" Olearude, et al

From: Orange Julius "Caesar" Peters and alpha human family member, Matthew

Dear cats,

As requested, we are submitting this follow-up report within the appropriate time limits in order to put aside any doubts that the Feline Association Against Negligence in Grooming & Care (F.A.A.N.G.) has previously had concerning our household and the humans therein.

Let it be known that the matters previously mentioned have been discussed and all parties are readily compliant with the agreements reached.

What's more, we'd much prefer that your monitoring of our situation in the future be restricted to opportunities when one or more parties within our household requests your assistance...

In other words; "Keep your whiskers out of our business!"

Happily,

- The Peters Household

Yep, we're doing ok...

God's Blessings to you and your families (pets included) as well!

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