Another concert

Went to see ZZ Top last night in Manchester.  A fifth row seat grabbed a week ago.  So, here are some photos.  Opening was Gretchen Wilson.  I knew of her and had seen her perform on TV once, so I expected her to be good and she did not disappoint.  Next was 3 Doors Down.  Good performers, but not my type of music.  Then the headliner, and it seemed that they went chronologically through their music.  A good show.  It was no Van Halen, but being in the 5th row, and jumping into the 4th row for ZZ Top made it quite enjoyable.

Enjoy the photos and don't forget to click on them to enlarge to full size:

Oh, and one last photo of my concert companion, my sis-in-law.  Did I mention it was also my 21st wedding anniversary last night?  I may have overlooked that in scheduling the concert, so will have to make up for that the rest of the weekend.

Frustration

Having a frustrating afternoon with work.  Then I came across this.  The USPS is bleeding cash and here is a company I do business with, explaining why they are switching to FedEx.  And the USPS answer is to cancel Saturday delivery as a solution.  Perhaps this 'business' should listen to their customers:

we tried the US Postal service Priority Mail, but we got too many complaints from our customers about many issues.  The main issues were: it took too long to be delivered (in some cases more than a month!) or NEVER delivered, packages arrived damaged (probably because in many countries, the package is passed on to a third party service) and the biggest issue that customers had was there was no real time tracking, so you never knew where your box was.  Then from our standpoint, when the product is lost, it is almost impossible to collect on the insurance that we purchased. This causes significant problems for us since we make limited edition product and most of items are sold out, so we do not have any “extras.” Also, the cost of items are very expensive when they lose the package. 

Marriage Enrichment

Last weekend, we had our last Formation Weekend of the year before we take the Rite of Lector.  Once again this year, I hope to have my son Chris (who turned 19 yesterday) as the Bishop's server during the Rite.  It takes place June 9 at 11:30 at St Theresa Church in Henniker, NH.  Took some photos with our presenters last weekend to add to my 'clergy collection'  I have a new goal - to photograph all the presenters at our Formation Weekends over the next two years so that I have a photo record of our Formation after Ordination.

Kathy and I with Msgr Paul Bouchard

Pastor, Our Lady of Mercy Parish in Merrimack, NH

Kathy and I with Deacon Jim and Christine Patterson

Deacon Jim is assigned to Our Lady of Mercy Parish 

Christine is Pastoral Associate at Our Lady of Mercy Parish

Christine joins us for many of our Formation Weekends.  Her experience as a Pastoral Associate and Deacon's wife has been a welcome addition to our weekends as we grow and further understand what it will be like once ordained and assigned to a parish.

Kathy was a Lector for our weekend liturgy.  She has never done it before.  She practiced quite a bit and the first time she practiced in front of me, I thought she was perfect.  Good pace and good pronunciation.  She was really REALLY nervous.  As was I my first time, but now I am very comfortable.  In fact I am Lector at St Mark the Evangelist this weekend.  Kathy is not comfortable with public speaking.  I tried to tell her this was public READING and a bit easier, but it did not calm her down.  She did terrific.

We had our third class in Moral Theology.  I wish this class continued for a while - it has been the most enlightening class so far, mostly because of our instructor, Prof Dan Daly from St Anselm's Theology Department.

Tonight I have Nocturnal Adoration at Midnight, then up at 6 AM for Men of St Joseph with my brothers in Litchfield at St Francis.