January 31, 2009 - Living For Jesus Is Fun

Today is a silly thing. It's Steve, our SYSCO rep. I like Steve, and not just because he drove all the way to Florence to pick up 18 cases of shredded cheese 80/10/10 blend for us to compensate for an ordering error earlier this week. I think Steve is great because he was in charge of the kitchen/cooking for the assisted living facility my Grandma spent some time in - and she was not an easy one to please. Steve is the one who got her sausage patty, wrapped in a napkin, thrown onto his desk as she expressed her displeasure about the *insert blankety-blank elderly agitated rage here* sausage he was allowing them to serve.

When we got Steve as an order rep., he mentioned having seen me at that place in the past, and when I explained that I was there visiting Grandma Dorothy (she really wasn't awful, she was just opinionated and very vocal...and threw things), he said, "ahhhhhhh....I remember Dorothy..."

Well, who WOULDN'T?? She was one fun ol' lady! Most of the time ;o)

ANYHOW, Steve also happens to be Catholic and I had a question I wanted to ask about Lent - that I really could have Googled, but Steve was handy and Google wasn't - what I wanted to know was WHY Lent is celebrated - I mean I know it all kicks off with Mardi Gras (Fat Tuesday - more on that later) but WHY?? Well, it's celebrated sort of like - a commemoration? concecration? in rememberance of JESUS' 40 days in the wilderness, fasting, praying and being tempted by Satan. My family is Apostolic, so even though I should have already known this - I didn't. All I learned from Catholic Grandma Dorothy was that during Lent she would give up sugar in her coffee for that 40 days, try to sneak it (yeah, cuz' God can't see you...wink*wink*) and cuss the equal she used instead. She couldn't tell me why they did Lent, only that Mardi Gras was the last big party before it started, and that Ash Wednesday you went to church and got ash put on your head (so she wasn't a very good practicing Catholic). Well, now I know.

Hmmm...most of that has nothing to do with Steve - but here's Steve bringing us our 18 cases of cheese to Gino's!