2009/08/18 Lunch with Amy and Dinner with SS Class

I saw Amy at church a few weeks back. We took several Disciple classes together and she is one of my favorite people from small groups at church. Anyway, she asked me to lunch and today is the big day. She arrived to get me in a convertible Mini with the top down. What fun!!! I am glad I have my short curly hair right now as there is no way to "mess it up." It just is what it is. We started toward the South Park area toward a restaurant I mentioned. As she started to turn in, I realized I had given her the name Mangionni and meant Manzettis. She said she could not possibly go to Manzettis as her daughter was eating lunch there with a group of her teenage friends. Her daughter would for sure think she had come out to spy on her if she went there. She suggested another near-by restaurant as one of her favorites. She also told me her favorite dish there, a Palm Salad which was crabmeat and egg and vegtables mixed together on a bed of baby greens. I said it sounded good except I didn't really eat eggs. She asked the waitress to leave the eggs out of mine and was told "no trouble." Wow. They must make it up per order and not a big batch for the day. Mine and hers came and mine was full of egg. Amy took one look and said she was going to "get this fixed." And she did. And the wait staff did it joyfully, not crabbily. And graciously apologized which I said, No problem to. But if you knew me, you would know it was a problem as I mean I don't eat eggs unless they are cooked into a cake or something. Anyway lunch was a scoop of lump crabmeat mixed with stuff other than eggs and it was absolutely delicious. Amy picked up the tab and I said something to her about paying for mine. She said "so you will get it next time." Of course. I saw the bill $49.99 for this meal and tea for each of us. Of course, this paid for service as well as the food and it was also a very pleasant place to be.

I told her about Don's twin granddaughters going to School of the Arts in Dance this summer and she said one of her twin daughters is going to go to School of the Arts in Drama for her Senior year of High School. I think she has to move in this coming up week or maybe the next week. Amy and I were both excited that we could talk about this wonderful school together. What a fun coincidence.

We also talked about taking another Disciple together - she really wants to take Disciple 4 which neither of us has had. We both stopped after Disciple 3 as we were tired but now I would be willing to tackle 4 and she really wants to take it. But neither of us is available this time around on Wednesday nights when it is offered. So we will be on the lookout for another 4 next spring or fall and hopefully we will be able to get both our schedules on track to do it. It would be good to have all 4 of the long classes under our belt as it is a shame to have completed all but one class. I hope we can work it out even if it is not together. We just should do it. Maybe we should mention to Barbara that if another night comes up for this one to let us know. Someone really did tell me they might be willing to schedule more classes for the long courses if the Wednesday didn't work for enough people. But I think I am into enough stuff for right now and I am willing to let sleeping dogs lie for a while.

Then we went back to my place in her convertible Mini (of the James Bond variety) and I took two pictures of her in the car. We are to go out again after Labor Day to give her time to get her children situated in various schools. Looking forward to it really and truly.

Then Don and I went to dinner with our Sunday School class. I had Sweet Potato Bisque soup (yum) and a salad with shrimp (yum again). Wonderful good food and we talked and talked with our Sunday School class memebers. Don did a wonderful prayer before our meal and everyone was impressed with it, especially me. He must have spent a long time coming up with it as he quoted Wesley in it and told me it was hard to come up with a thankfulness quote from Wesley. I think a lot of people we admire so much in religion have done prayers about other of life's aspects but not about thankfulness per se so it hard if you go after a quote about being thankful.

One of our young ministers was also there. Kevin Wright does lots of missionary trips and tries to work with good causes in Charlotte. He was great to hear talk about Haiti and its problems. I am interested in these Latin America trips since that was a big part of my college studies back when. It is good to hear first hand information about these countries. He said there aren't even animals or insects there because there are so few natural resources that haven't been entirely depleted. They have even cut down all their trees. He said you really know a country is poor when not even an animal or an insect will be around due to lack of food. Wow, the things he has seen and the knowledge he has of the history of the island is impressive. I had a great time just listening and felt that I was being taught something interesting and maybe valuable to my own ability to be grateful. I would love to spend more time being taught by him. I think he should do classes on his missionary trips to show what he found and how our church has maybe helped people there. He did one class for our Sunday School group but there is so much more he talked about at dinner this night. I would like to get with him in a little informal group and let us ask questions and listen to answers. What a blessing to be around someone like him for a couple of hours.