john stott said it all...

this post is dedicated to God and to his good and faithful servants. intrigued? then read on.

since our change in 'careers', mrs hope has kept a close eye on our household's finances. for my part, ignorance has been my shield. my usual practice on the occassions that i need pocket money is to approach my good wife, who provides me with whatever i need. this practice has carried on un-interrupted, but mrs hope has been fully aware of the state of our finances: in essence the need for slightly more of them.

thankfully, God has also kept himself fully appraised of our situation and for the last three months, we have been given, by three separate people (some known and some unknown to us) considerable sums of money. each month, it has been enough to meet those odd annual expenses like car insurance/house insurance/TV licence.

turning to stott:

"Towards the end of my time ... at Cambridge, the Rev. Paul Gibson retired as Principal [of Ridley Hall], and a portrait of him was unveiled. In expressing his thanks, he paid a well-deserved compliment to the artist. He said that in future he belived people looking at the picture would ask not 'Who is that man?' but rather 'Who painted that portrait?' Now in our case God has displayed more than skill. A patient after a major operation is a living testimony to his surgeon's skill, and a condemned man after a repreive to his sovereign's mercy. We are both - exhibits of God's skill and trophies of hs grace."

the latest gift was received this morning, in an appropriately non-descript brown envelope addressed (in an obviously disguised hand) to the 'Hope Family'. i'm putting it in our trophy cabinet.

just checking the way

so i downloaded and am trying a new web browser: camino. it's supposed to be mozilla's bespoke offering for mac's os X, and seems to work quite well. it certainly supports blogger better than safari. whether i start to use it as my default browser is another thing entirely though.

so our new car has a spot of rust on the rear off-side (left) wheel arch. if we leave it untended to it will mean, in due course, we need to replace the wheel arch. if we tend to it ourselves, it may well mean the same thing. unfortunately the garage we use recommended a body-work specialist who only does entire body panels - so for them to remedy a spot of rust the size of a 50p coin will mean they re-spray the entire panel (which even i will admit is OTT). but if we try and do it ourselves with a bit of sandpaper and touch-up spray we'll probably end up having to replace the entire panel too. perhaps i am being overly pessimistic about my wife's talents with sandpaper and spray paint, but surely there's another way...? i guess we'll be trawling the yellow pages for body-work shops for a more helpful solution.

did anyone else think phil and grant mitchell's re-appearance on eastenders last night was terrific? "hello mum" *smirk* - sheer brilliance. mrs hope and i had a tv binge last night, having had the two shows we watch (spooks and house) recorded for us last week (we'd plumped for spidey 2, which was only available on video, otherwise we'd have recorded it ourselves). spooks and house followed 'enders in merry fashion; dinner was eaten off laps on the couch - great stuff!

Due to an overwhelming response to the ticket pre-sale, some of Jack's shows have been moved to larger venues and additional shows have been added.



so in early march we'll be sitting in cardiff arena listening to jack's sunny hawaiian surf melodies. anyone else thinking what i'm thinking?