Refreshing

Surprise! When Jo came to pick me up from work today she told me that we have a new shower.
After 3 or 4 goes at contacting our plumber, we finally agreed a time for him to come round and take a look. That was Saturday. Today, he just turned up and fitted it. So its back to showering tomorrow and I won't have to give up washing for Lent.

Meanwhile the exercises that I have been given do seem to be making some difference to the strength and reach of the right arm. I sat in the drivers seat of the car today and checked out the movement around the steering wheel. Driving looks a distinct possibility now, whereas on Saturday I definitely could not get my arm high enough under its own power.

The journey to work is about 90% by car, and the rest is a short walk. This is to ensure that I get at least some basic exercise, other than the recovery requirement. I was reminded on my walk in that a few years ago we did a map of our walk to work for Lent - as part of our training. The objective was to help us reflect on the different people and places we passed. Their significance for us and for others and whether there was anything we should do - like get involved with the people inside one of the buildings in some way. Tonight I read the Lent entry 'Coming up for Air', and thought how nice it would be to breath fresh air, instead of the exhaust fumes I get on my journey.

A shower is refreshing in the morning, so is my walk once I get past the worst of the traffic. They (and coffee) set me up for the mornings work on MS-SQL and VB 2005. Then at lunch time I go down for air, and take a short walk to set myself up for the afternoon.

Unsafe building

1) Today we had a fire alarm in the building. We duly left our desks and walked slowly down the stairs to the fire exit. No-one could open the door, we turned around went down another floor and out the main entrance. 40 minutes later we were back at our desks. The building is poorly managed. If there is a serious fire people will die in this building - more than need to. There is lots of building work going on, as the alarm started the man with the radio turned to one of the workers and asked if he had a permit for the work he was doing - thought he should have checked that first.
A tragedy waiting to happen.

2) As I went out for a sandwich I walked past one of the buildings that is clad in scaffoldings. A crane was hauling a large structure to the top of the building. The structure was pre-welded I-beams, and I estimate it was about three storeys tall. It was resting on the scaffolding. There were men at various levels trying to push it away. I would not have wanted to be up there for anything.
An accident waiting to happen.

Which just goes to prove that human beings are often careless, incompetent, or negligent. We all are at some point in our lives. Mostly there will not be serious consequences, sometimes there will be. We live in that sort of world, it the sort of world that we should all be used to, but to some of us it never quite makes sense - especially when its me making the mistakes.

By God's grace we can be forgiven for all time for our 'mistakes', even if we can never forgive ourselves fully.