The Servant's Quarters

Back Online and Catching Up

You've got to give me credit for making a go of it. I ALMOST made it through my entire vacation with an entry a day. But not quite. A couple of things ultimately led to my drop off. Of course, going on vacation with six kids is never peaceful and relaxing. I would have enjoyed spending my days lazing around the house reading and resting. That would have provided many opportunities to update my blog. But the kids needed things to keep them amused, and that kept Rita and me pretty busy.

Now that I'm back, I'll be writing here more often. I have some things left over from vacation that I want to blog about over the next few days. In the meantime, here's some quick catch up on the important stuff -

1) Vacation Wrap Up - After my last entry, things wound down appropriately. We did make a return visit to Mackinac (where I managed to foil an Al-Qaida plot - more on that later), ate more ice cream, and spent a fun albeit very expensive afternoon at Avalanche Bay water park at Boyne Mountain. We finished up with a delicious and very enjoyable dinner at Zehnder's in Frankenmuth. Another reason that I'll be able to blog every day next vacation is that it's only going to last one week. I made up my mind that with a big family, two weeks is just too long to be in northern Michigan. The first week is great, with lots of fun activities and closeknit family time. The second week is filled with complaints about missing friends and homesickness. We usually peter out about mid-week (which we did this year) and head home early.

2) Mom's Health - Please stay in prayer for Mom. I think she is doing very well with the chemo, but it is still discouraging how much it is taking out of her. Nausea is not a major problem, thank God. Exhaustion is. And we are very concerned about the progression of the effects that the chemo is having. After Round 1, she had about 3 shaky days, 3 really bad days, and two weeks of good days. After Round 2, she about 1.5 weeks of really bad days. She's just coming out of that now. The doctor says that her reaction to the chemo will continue to deteriorate over time, along with her overall condition. (Right now, the only thing that you'd notice about her is that she is bald. Other than that, she looks normal.) Also, my Dad is continuing to struggle with his own health issues.

The next 6 months are going to be very rough indeed.

3) The Way Ford-Ward - As most of you doubtless know, the condition of my employer, the Ford Motor Company, has deteriorated alarmingly over the past couple of years. The latest and to date the largest blow came last Friday when Mark Fields, president of The Americas division of Fords, announced the third version of the Way Forward Plan, which is designed to restore the company to prominence and profitability. The updated plan calls for the offering of buyouts to our entire hourly workforce and the elimination of 10,000 salaried positions by the end of the first quarter 2007. What does this mean to me? I have absolutely no idea at this point. My job is in danger. Everyone's is. Very few people around feel that there's no way they are are the chopping block. If I am going to be offered a buyout, I won't know about it until mid-December. If I'm going to be "involuntarily separated," I won't know about that until next year. I give the company a lot of credit for firing people as a last resort. But it is still very frustrating and stressful.

In the meantime, we're told to stay focused and put everything we have into our jobs. That's hard to do when morale is so low that you have to be careful not to step in it.