Trot on over and give Bill a hard time. It's his birthday and he needs to know he's loved. BTW, Bill happens to be one of my favorite writers (he specializes in mystery and is always engaging to read), and one of my fondest memories of Howard Payne University--I took two classes under his watchful eye. He is also blogerific just read EQMM.

So I'm reading my new copy of Christian Ethics Today Journal and find the box that shares this little tidbit of information

Eighty-seven percent of Americans believe in the concept of sin. what counts as sinful behavior? Here's the percentage of Americans who view certain activities as sinful:

• 81% Adultry (sic)
  
• 74% Racism
• 65% Use of hard drugs
• 56% Abortion
• 52% Homosexual activity
• 52% Underreporting income30% Gambling
• 29% Telling a "little white lie" (from Ellison Research/RNS - March 14)

Of course, we've gone to ranking sin and ordering how sinful sinful behavior is, but I wonder what percentage of us would mark such things as gluttony, legalism and arrogance as sin. I also wonder if Christ would have an entirely different list.

Today we said so long to the youngest/oldest of the Golden Girls. I was not a big fan of the show, but she was my favorite when I did catch an episode or two. Read an obit here.

So we took the time to use the trip to Six Flags that someone anonymously gave to us on our second anniversary in Mulberry Grove. The trip to the park wasn't too bad aside from a five-mile slowdown for overpass construction.

We arrived sometime after the park opened and were blessed with prepaid "preferred" parking. We found a nice spot in row 5!

There are plenty of kid-friendly rides at Six Flags, so we rode and we walked and we walked and we rode. The kiddos seemed to enjoy the water-themed rides the most. We even met some cartoon characters and super heroes. In the "Bugs Bunny" area we found rides that the children could enjoy while the Blushing Bride and I stood outside the fence and watched. This, btw, is as much fun as a roller coaster.

Our gift package included tickets for things called "Daffy's Delight" and "Tweety Tweets". Before departure we searched the website but found nothing to explain these items. So when we got to Six Flags we spent our first twenty minutes waiting at the Guest Relations window. The Host who took my question finally came back with the answers I needed to give me confidence to proceed: "Daffy's Delight" is a funnel cake and a medium soda, and "Tweety Tweets" is a giant pretzel and a medium soda.

Mid-afternoon we decided to indulge in our treasure and found the eating establishment in "Bugs Bunny" Land. "We don't have Tweety Tweets here," they said. "Try Calico's Chicken." So the Bride and little ones stayed at the Character Cafe to get the funnel cake, and Puddin' N Pie and I went to search for the pretzel and bring it back. "We don't even know what that is," was the response at Calico's, "try Colonel Cobb's right around the corner." At Colonel Cobb's we saw the pretzels, but they didn't know anything about "Tweety Tweets" either. Back at the Character Cafe, I asked again explaining that the front gate had told me it was a pretzel--"Oh, we don't have pretzels here, but just across the railroad tracks is the Treehouse. Just tell them what it is and they should serve you." I left the whole family this time to enjoy the already procured snack items and proceeded across the tracks to the Treehouse. Pretzels were there but the boy in the snack shack knew nothing about "Tweety Tweets". "Sorry," was the best he could do.

Back at the Character, I sat down with the fam and sipped a drink-ade while examining my coupon. It was labeled "Tweety Tweets" with a confirmation number and "Six Flags St. Louis" printed clearly on the front (along with the price paid plus tax). The reverse side of the ticket had all the small print which included "No Refunds - No Rainchecks" among other things. So the idea of just getting a refund was out. Our anonymous friends had paid the money though, so we didn't want to waste it. At the counter, I tried to see if we could apply the money spent to something they did have. "Wait," he said, "our food service supervisor is right there." I showed her the coupon and immediately we went back to the Treehouse where I was awarded a giant pretzel and medium Pibb (like Dr Pepper only not-so-much). The explanation as to why know one knew what Tweety Tweets meant: "We do have a coupon for 'Tweety Tweets' but it doesn't look like the plain gift ticket that you have."

But finding the elusive "Tweety Tweets" was not the best part of the day. That came when we were back at home having family devotional time. When Bubba prayed it was along this line, "Thank you for the Batman cape. Thank you that I met Green Lantern and Wonder Woman and Batman. Thank you that I saw Shaggy and Scooby." And then he proceeded to go on to thank God for the family. And this is from the one who usually says grace even at bedtime prayers.

My point--we should be like children thanking God for even the simplest of things: a day out with the family, searching for hidden treasure, meeting superheroes along the way.

Have a great day, my friends.

In recent months I heard the hue and cry of home schoolers around the Internet. Their complaint: Subway sandwich stores were discriminating against the home schooled children of our nation. The point of contention was an essay contest which could garner massive athletic and playground equipment prizes for the his or her school. The problem, home schooled students were explicitly excluded from the contest base.

I noted all kinds of suggestions as to why this exclusion was made in the contest rules, and also noted the responses by home school parents galore.

Subway has re-instituted the contest and included everyone who is a citizen of the USA and of school age. The only exclusions seem to be people who are part of the Subway franchise system, Scholastic (the other major sponsor) and the subsidiaries. Those kinds of exclusions that keep people from tampering with the results. You can read the rules disclaimer for the new version of the contest here.

Get your school aged children writing about the stories of their own sandwiches.

Sadly, one of my three stories didn't make the cut this time, but congratulations to the winners of the WordClay short story contest.

You can peruse the list of the winners of both the single short story contest and the short story collection contest by clicking here.

Just to let you know, in this day when commitment means nothing, that this lovely couple just celebrated 49 years. Next year we hope to celebrate big with them.