Here O Is Real - Miracles In My Life by Archie Bryant

Once I was thinking about the above story when I then walked out to my back porch to smoke.

My lighter would not work. It was out of fluid.

KELLY'S

I was driving to town about 7:00 in the evening. I was near a restaurant named Kelly's. All of a sudden up ahead I see an automobile with no lights and two kids pushing it on the highway. I started to go around them, but then I thought, "No, I'll pull in behind them because if I could have almost hit them, someone else not as alert might hit and kill them." So I pulled in behind the car ten or fifteen feet behind. Just as I stopped I looked in my rear view mirror and saw a car careening down on me. I began to pump my brake lights to let him know that I was stopped. He saw them too late and slid into me. The police took an hour or so investigating the accident. One of the young kids that was pushing this car was taking it sort of lightly so the patrolman turned to her, pointed his finger at her and said, "Young lady, if that man -(and he pointed at me)- if that man had not stopped and did what he did you might be dead now."

The following night about the same time I was going into town again to eat. I had not passed that place where the accident had occurred since it had happened. I was thinking about what had happened the night before and I was looking for the tire marks of the guy that slid into me. I saw the skid marks ahead of me and I said, "Well, my car was just ahead of those skid marks." All of a sudden there was a pedestrian walking on the side of the road. I was by him before I had time to even react and whip my wheel. I had been looking down at the road in front of me at the skid marks. Then I got to thinking, "Lord," I said, "Why-why would I have tried to save a life the night before, and then I could have killed somebody in exactly the same spot about the same time the following night?" I said, "I want to find out who that man is and why he was there." I had driven a couple of blocks so I turned around and I pulled on back, turned back around at Kelly's and shined my lights up ahead. As I turned straight going south I started looking for the man. He would have been south of that point, but no further than a half a block. There were no houses for a couple of blocks, but there was no man - no one. He didn't have time to be picked up by someone and he wasn't hitchhiking. He just vanished.

THIS IS YOUR LIFE

I was leaving my hotel room and thinking about God and life. I said, “God, show me what life is all about - let me know something, etc..”

As I got in my truck and turned the key, the radio announcer said, “This is your life station, WLIF.”

TOP OF THE WORLD

Listening to the radio one day, I was thinking about having been to the Top of the World at Disney World with my fiancé, who is now my wife. When the music stopped, the announcer said, "Disney World wants to send you to the Top of the World!"

READING BACKWARD

After showing Joan how history, like every living thing is symmetrical if you turn the numbers backwards (like 1491 and 1941), she was very interested. “But”, I said, “people are not used to turning numbers backwards”.

That afternoon I went down to Scotty’s hardware store to buy a floor scrapper. As I walked up to the checkout counter, I noticed that I had the sticker on the handle containing the price upside down. I started to turn it around but the clerk stopped me and said “That’s OK, I’m used to reading numbers backwards”.

RADIO BACKWARDS

I wasn’t busy at work and I was talking with the Lord, talking to myself, and searching for answers. I was thinking of all the things that I had turned upside down or backwards. I said, "Lord, you communicate to me through things, and not backwards, but I'm always turning things upside down and backwards and it's confusing." I said, "You don't do things backwards while communicating to me. Lord, I'm going to reach over here and turn the radio on right now and just let you do the talking. I'll stop thinking, and I'll listen." I reached over and turned the radio on (the dial happened to be on WPIO, a local religious station) and the radio was playing a tape of music backwards. It was completely gibberish. That had never happened before.

SPILLED COFFEE

At lunch while working, I was sitting in my truck listening to a preacher. I had spilled my coffee two or three times that day - a little here and a little there. Anyway, I then spilled a whole cup of coffee accidentally in my lap while this preacher is talking. At the same moment that I spilled it, the preacher said, "Sometimes in life, chaos spills all over us."

P.S. I made the notes for this book on tapes. When the typist was typing the above, as she came to the word "lap," she turned to me and said, "I don't know why, but I just typed "life" instead of "lap." I thought a moment and replied, "You might if you listen further."

PREACHER - CAN'T LOVE 2

One day while eating lunch I was listening to the radio, (this was the same job site where I spilled the coffee on me). I was listening to a religious station and a preacher was raving, "It is a sin to love two people and God dislikes someone that loves two people or has two wives." He was going on and on about it. At the moment he was saying this, I was thinking of Solomon who had so many wives, Lamech with his two, Adah and Zellah (first and last) and of Abraham who had a wife and a handmaiden, Jacob's two wives, the mothers of the twelve tribes of Israel, etc. Tiring of this, I punched in another station. The song "Torn between Two Lovers" was playing.

IT’S A SMALL WORLD

Coming back form an Alaska cruise, Joan and I had several hours layover at the Seattle airport. I left Joan sleeping on a bench and went around a wall to a smoking area. While I was there, a young man bummed a cigarette. Also, I recognized a couple who had been on the boat with us. We started to talk and I found that a woman next to them was from Texarkana, my hometown. The couple from the boat showed us a Disney watch, bought on the cruise, which began to play “It’s A Small World.” When the watch stopped, I could hear “Cotton Fields” on the airport music system. “Cotton Fields” is a song about Texarkana. I sing it in our lounge.

When Joan awoke after I returned, I said, “I just saw a couple from the ship talking to a woman from Texarkana.” Joan said, “It’s a small world, isn’t it?”

After we talked a few minutes, I realized that the young man who bummed a cigarette had tried to take Joan’s carry- on bag earlier.

GET MIRACLE EAR

I thought, “God, the human ear is truly a creation of the mind of God. Although it’s designed like a musical drum to interact with air. The man-made one makes sound, and yours receives sound, turning it into electrical impulses to the brain. The tool to receive and measure air pressure is nothing like the air it measures. It’s like man designing both a wrench and a bolt, neither is like the other, but both are perfect and serve one purpose. Similar to the other five senses, the ear of man is a miracle.”

Just then, the announcer on my truck radio asked: “Having trouble hearing? Get Miracle Ear.”

HUM

One morning I pulled out of the driveway and I was feeling very good. In a frivolous tone or attitude, I said, "Good morning God, I am going to sing to you." I started singing. I don't remember what the song was, but as I was singing, I turned onto the highway and pulled up behind another car. I looked at the license plate and it said, "HUM."

HUM TWO

While driving in Miami after the hurricane with a co-worker as a passenger, I was thinking of all the unusual things that had happened in my life. As I looked up ahead, I saw a license plate that said, “HUM.”

I never said a word about it to my passenger. To him it would have made no sense and I didn’t want to try to explain it.

WELLS FARGO

One day on a job site in Orlando I was singing. Only one other person was there at the time - an electrician. From another room he yelled, "Archie, you should be on stage." I said, "What?" and he said again, "You should be on stage. There's one leaving right now." I turned around and glanced through a window. Out front, a Wells Fargo truck was sitting at the red light.

THAT’S MY CHAIR

My wife and I were enjoying Suzie Browings’ wedding reception until three young couples came in and innocently sat down at the table we briefly left, leaving our half filled glasses to return to. Joan was burning inside and wanted me to make a scene. I’m thinking, “God help me” as Joan goes off to the ladies room. Just then, the band started to play a country western song, “Pardon Me, But That’s My Chair.”

Every time my band plays that song at the lounge, I remember the wedding scene. Once when they started to play it, I glanced at the large TV across the room. A Crylon Paint commercial was being shown. The only thing displayed on the TV was a single chair.

RIGHT AS RAIN

As a laborer turned to me after painting a building white in Miami, he said, “I’m all wite (like ‘white’ without the H) right?” He was covered in white paint. “Do you think I should re-paint that one spot?”, he asked. “No”, I replied, “if it wains, it’ll be all wite.”

Driving back home to Titusville that night, I was listening to some nice music on the radio. One song I particularly noticed because it was different. I thought to myself, “I’ve never heard that instrumental before. I wonder what the name of it is?” When the song ended, the announcer said the song was a lesser known work of a famous writer, and he mentioned some of his famous songs. Then he said, “The title of the song I just played was ‘You’re As Right as Rain.’”

MARY ANN

Joan and I drove to a club south of Cocoa to hear a musician playing. We were looking for someone to hire for our lounge.

Joan whispered to me as we sat across the room from the band stand, “Do you suppose he knows ‘Mary Ann’?” Frank then began to play the song ‘Mary Ann’.

POOLING AROUND

Phil was standing at the pool table looking at the musician about to start a song. The musician asked, “Whatcha doin’ Phil?” I butted in, “He’s just poolin’ around.” I meant the pun as a remark because he was playing pool, but realized after I said it that his last name is ‘Poole’.

Phil is also a musician and has played in our lounge. A few months later, we were sitting at the bar discussing the difficulties of making a living playing music when I glanced at the TV. A musician was sitting on a sidewalk playing his guitar with a tin cup in front of him.

JOSE

I was with a group of friends in our home partying and telling jokes. I thought to myself, " I want to compare Jose with hose B in some kind of a joke. How can I turn Jose into hose B?" At that moment "Jose Quervo, You are a Friend of Mine" commenced on the radio.

Several years later, my wife and I were at a party when the entertainer told a joke.

She said, “This Spanish plumber had twin boys. He named one Hose and the other Hose B.”

FLAG

Last month my wife and I were out driving and she wanted to stop at a motel to look for Disney discount cards to give to someone who was visiting us. We pulled up to a motel at 528 & US 1 and while she went inside, I was sitting out front in the truck. I looked straight in front of me and on a column on the drive-thru, a rope was wrapped several times around a hook. I asked myself, "What in the world is that rope doing wrapped around that hook?" My wife comes back out of the motel, gets into the truck, and we back out. More of the building comes into view and I see that the rope is connected to a flagpole with an American flag flying up above it, which I could not see before. At that moment, just as the flag came into view, Lee Greenwood's song, "God Bless the USA " came on the radio.

CAROUSEL

One Sunday afternoon, my wife and I took a leisurely ride. As I was driving along, I started humming a song. I thought, "What is the name of this song I'm humming?" I couldn't think of the words or title to the song. I then looked up at a big sign on the side of the road. It said Carousel Club. Suddenly I realized I had been humming the song "Carousel."

March 17, 1991 I was watching Blood River on TV. My mind drifted to the humming of "Carousel." At that moment, one man turned to another and said, "Someone taught me a song I didn't know the name of."

TODAY LIKE YESTERDAY

I was sitting in the club discussing life and philosophy with Joanie. The subject came up about why life was interesting and unpredictable. I said, "You wouldn't want today to be just like yesterday. At that moment the juke box echoes, "Today, like yesterday."

DANCE (EUNICE)

One night I was sitting at the bar, thinking to myself. My philosophy is that God can be anyone. If God can do anything, God could be anyone. I thought of my former wife, and I said, "God, you could be Eunice (that was her name)." At that moment, a lady tapped me on the shoulder and said, "Would you dance with me?" We danced a song, and when we finished I asked her her name. She replied, "It's Eunice."

DANCE-STOPPED MUSIC

Which reminds me of a time I was on the dance floor with Joanie. Ronnie Coolie was playing the guitar, and I was quite tired from working that day. It crossed my mind that I was tired and I just wanted the song to end. At that moment, Ronnie stopped playing in the middle of the song and apologized for doing so; he wanted to re-tune his guitar.

"IT'S BEEN YEARS SINCE I HEARD THAT SONG"

Three years ago, I was in a bar and a song came on the jukebox or radio. I thought to myself, "It has been years since I heard that song." Immediately someone across the room said to some one else, "It's been years since I heard that song."

GEORGIA

Once, in my den, I was singing "Georgia On My Mind," when a radio announcer finished a commercial and began to play "Georgia On My Mind."

I FALL TO PIECES

In the Citrus Lounge one night Joan handed me some smoked mullet to eat. As I broke a piece to put in my mouth it crumbled apart and fell in my lap. I exclaimed, "This fish is falling to pieces." Just then a song started on the jukebox. Patsy Cline sang, "I FALL TO PIECES."

GATLIN

Two years ago, I was driving to West Palm (down Interstate 95) to work. The radio was playing a country-western song that mentioned Gatlinburg. I then thought about a Florida Lottery advertisement where the woman said, "If I win the lottery, I want to go to Gatlinburg." Just at that moment, I noticed a sign on the side of Interstate 95 which said Gatlin Boulevard. I was still thinking about this, five or ten minutes later, when the announcer on the radio said "Anyone by the name Gatlin or Gatling should call the radio station for information about college scholarships."

JINGLE BELLS

When my deceased son was three or four years old, he loved the song “Jingle Bells”, so I would sing it to him every night as I put him to bed. As I was attending a musical concert in Orlando, my mind drifted to that bedside scene as the music played. Just then, the orchestra began a movement of a classical piece from which “Jingle Bells” must have been taken.

NOSE JOB

Often while singing at the Citrus Lounge I would hold my nose to produce a nasal sound mimicking Willy Nelson. One night we had a new entertainer performing and during one song he had his wife come to the stage and hold her finger on his left nostril for the same reason. (He played the guitar as he sang so his hands were not free.) A minute or so after he finished, I glanced at the TV across the bar. A model in a commercial was holding her finger against her left nostril.

"MOVIN' ON"

One morning as I was driving to work, I was singing. I started to sing a song that Willie Nelson does, and I was trying to imitate his voice with a nasal sound. As I was singing I got into so much nasal sound that I thought to myself, "I sound somewhat like Hank Snow" and started singing the song, "Movin' On" that Hank Snow did. I sang this several times and thought to myself, "This is so silly." I was really putting a lot of nasal into "Movin' On." Tiring of this, I thought, "I'll listen to the radio for a while," and I reached over and turned the radio on. Hank Snow was singing "Movin' On."

"MOVIN' ON' AFTER SNEEZE

A few days later I was going to work again - a little further down the same road. The radio was on and I was listening to the music when suddenly I sneezed, I said, "Lord, don't have Hank Snow singing "Movin' On." Just then, a commercial ended and the announcer named a woman singer and said, "Here she is singing 'Movin' On'."

SEVEN SNEEZES

One day I was at the Ranch House Restaurant having coffee. As I was sitting there, doodling, I thought, "I'm going to think about the Bible. I'll think about the sevens in the Bible, . . . Oh yes, the seven sneezes." Just as I thought about that, I started sneezing. I sneezed seven times.

NOTHING TO SNEEZE AT

August 18, 1996 I asked Tom Gebert to come to my home to help me set up a web page. I gave him a copy of my book, Miracles In My Life, as part of the material to use. As he opened the book and read something, he began to laugh. I asked him what story he was reading and he told me.

The next day I was sitting with my wife and I told her about Tom laughing at something in the book, but I couldn’t remember which story it was. I noticed neither of our glasses on the table had napkins under them, so I reached over to a stack, got two, and placed them under our glasses. Joan said, “When you reached for napkins, I thought you were going to sneeze.” That’s when I remembered the story Tom was laughing about - “The Seven Sneezes.”

GOD BLESS YOU

Last month, August 1996, I needed to load my truck with supplies to repair a rental unit in Cocoa. I knew I needed some shoring for the floors, so I picked up some large pieces of plywood from my storeroom. As I started to exit the door, I saw a small piece of plywood, about 1 ½’ x 2’, and threw it on the truck.

After making several trips, squeezed between other priorities, a final day found me hurrying to finish my project. It was getting late and I’d completed all on my list but the flooring. I thought of getting out my extension cord and skill saw from the truck but changed my mind. “Maybe the small piece I had thrown in the truck will fit and I won’t need a saw,” I thought.

Sure enough, I crawled under the trailer and measured the opening. I needed a piece of plywood 18 ¼” wide and the length could vary. I went to the truck, found and measured the scrap piece. It was 18 ¼” wide - perfect for the job.

As I loaded my truck and pulled out for home, I said, “Thank you God, that was a miracle.” Just then the radio began to play the song “GOD BLESS YOU.” I said, “Thank you for that too.” A few blocks down the road, I’m still thinking about the plywood and the song playing, when I glanced to my right and saw on Kay’s Pit Bar-B-Q sign: “GOD BLESS YOU, RAY AND SCOTTY.”

COUNTRY BOY

Once, I was in Andy's Restaurant, and the jukebox was playing the song "God Must be a Cowboy at Heart." I said, "Yes, Lord you might be a cowboy at heart." I looked across the room through a window that faced the highway. A cowboy on a horse rode by. I said, "See Lord, that's a miracle. You're confirming this." A moment later another cowboy went by, and then another. I thought, "What is this!" I walked to the front door and looked out. A whole wagon train of cowboys and covered wagons was coming down the highway.

COWBOY BOOTS

About this same time I was singing with a country western band at the lounge. I had some western clothing, but I didn't have any boots. I thought, "This is silly, wearing western clothes with street shoes." I said, "Lord, I need a pair of boots, but I can't pay $40-50 for a pair." I said, "Maybe I could just find some in a flea market, Salvation Army or something." So, one day I said, "Lord, I need a pair of boots and I'm going down to the flea market." As I pulled up to the flea market, I pulled up to the southeast corner. There was a booth at the southeast corner, and at the southeast corner of the southeast booth, was a pair of cowboy boots. I went over and picked up the boots, tried them on and they fit perfectly. The lady wanted $1.00 for these cowboy boots. I said, "Thank you, Lord."

1,000 MONKEYS

I was sitting with a friend discussing my belief that things were ordered - that there was no chance, things just didn't happen - and I gave an example that I'd heard (the expression that if you had a thousand monkeys and a thousand typewriters, given enough time, one of them could come up with the Bible.) I said "That's man's logical thinking." She said, "Well, I never have heard that expression". In the meantime, I'd asked the barmaid if she could find a particular song on the jukebox. It was a waltz, and I couldn't remember the number, but I asked her to find it. (She had been down on the other end of the bar, when I was discussing the thousand monkeys thing.) After about five minutes, I hollered to her, "Oh, you've found the song!" She answered, "Yes, if you had a thousand monkeys, and a thousand typewriters, given enough time they'd write Webster's Dictionary." My friend almost fell off the barstool.

TYPEWRITER

While compiling this manuscript, I decided to look for a typewriter. I first went to a pawnshop hoping to find a full size manual model. They only had an electric for $100.00. The second shop I checked had an electric for $150.00. I said, "Lord, I need a typewriter and I'm going to the Salvation Army to look for one." As I pulled up, a full size manual Royal was setting in view next to the front door. The clerk wanted $2.00 for it.

EXHAUSTED

About three or four weeks ago, I was in the lounge talking with my wife and Lawana Parsons. We were in casual conversation, when I thought of a joke. I started to relate it, but then, I thought, "This is not in line with the conversation we were talking about, so I'll not bring it up.” Just then, Lawana said, "I could hardly sleep last night." I said, "I dreamed about mufflers all night. When I awoke I was exhausted."

METAMORPHOSIS

The following day I was in the same place. And as I was observing nature a butterfly flew by the hood of my car. When I see a butterfly, I think of it being the symbol of eternal life and metamorphosis being one of the most miraculous things in nature, which a worm can turn into a butterfly. I was thinking on that when I looked out my left window in a bush about six feet away. I saw something fluttering there that I thought was a piece of dead leaf or something blowing in the wind and I just stared at it. I finally realized that it was some kind of living thing. As I took a closer look, I saw that it was a locust that had just come out of his shell. It was still wet. I thought to myself, "That is the first time I have seen something just out of its shell since I was a little child. It had not happened again since I was eight or ten years old. Just in the few moments before, I had been thinking about the miracle of metamorphosis.

IT’S FROGGY OUT

“It’s really froggy out,” I said to my wife as we were driving down I-95 returning home from a trip. Froggy was a term I used anytime it was foggy because my son, who passed away, had used the same expression innocently when he was four or five years old.

Then the soft music on my radio from a station around Washington or Norfolk was interrupted by a disc jockey who said, “This is W_ _ _, Radio Frog.”

FROGS

June 17, 1992, I bumped a frog out of the doorway as I entered the house. I then went to the TV and turned it on. A mass of frogs appeared on the screen.

GRASSHOPPER

Standing in a storeroom full of plywood paneling, I picked out a stack that had enough sheets to do the job I was working on. The pattern I picked out was called ‘Grasshopper’, and it looked the part.

I hauled some sheets to some sawhorses and began measuring to cut the paneling. As I returned, a grasshopper was sitting on the stack of ‘Grasshopper’ paneling.

OH GOD

I remember when the movie 'Oh God' came on, it was five or six months ago. I watched that movie and I believe that anything is possible with God. I have for a long while felt from what has happened in my life, God can use anyone or anything for any purpose. The following night after that movie 'Oh God' I was sitting at Sambo's thinking - I said, "Lord, what I see is reality that you created and it's the way it is because you want it to be like this right now. I accept it. You can reach me in any way." Just at that moment the telephone rang, and I pictured in my mind the last scene in the movie 'Oh God' where the man driving down the street hears the phone ringing in the phone booth. He backs up and answers the phone and God was in the adjacent phone booth calling him. So, I said, "See, that could be you on the phone." The waitress picked up the telephone, talked for a minute, and hollered out among the few people there. She said, "Is there a Mr. Godeo or Godero here?" I didn't turn around, but somebody behind me in a booth mumbled something. Then she said, "No, not God" and talked a minute and hung up.

The next four incidents happened in one day at a hospital in Texarkana, Texas:

MONEY ON FLOOR

My mother was ill and had been hospitalized so I traveled from Florida to Texarkana to see her. I was having breakfast at the hospital one morning and, as I went to the cashier with my tray, I broke a twenty-dollar bill. Rather than put the change in my billfold, which I always do, I just shoved it down in my pocket and thought to myself, "I want to shove this far enough down that it doesn't fall out." As I was eating, a janitor in the dining room turned to me and asked, "Did you drop some money on the floor?" He had found twenty or thirty dollars lying near me.

DATES-READERS DIGEST

I went back to the waiting room near my mother, and I'm thinking about numbers that have significance. I would think of a number, and ask, "Could that be a date in history?" I converted many numbers to time, wondering if that were true . Later, I picked up a Reader's Digest and flipped it open. An article about someone comparing register prices to dates in history was staring me in the face.

DIOR - DRESS

In the same waiting room, later on that day, I was reading a People magazine. I'm looking at a picture of the Princess Diana dressed in a Dior gown. The TV announcer said, "Here's Diana in her Dior gown."

"IT'S THE DEVIL HIMSELF"

So many miracles or coincidences had happened that day, that when the phone rang on TV, I said to myself, "God, that might be you on the telephone." Just then, the announcer on TV said, "Who's on the telephone? Why, it's the devil himself." I had not made that comment since the "O God" incident years before.

“BRUNIE”

After writing Miracles In My Life, I let Brunie, who was the waitress who answered the phone and said, “no, not God”, read my book. As I picked up the book weeks later, and left the smoke house, where she now works, she was still on my mind. As I passed the Miracle City Mall marquee, for a thousandth of a second, I thought I had seen just one big word, “Brunie” displayed on the sign. I wasn’t sure, so I turned my car around, sat beside the road facing the sign until it went through a full cycle. Sure enough, the word “Brunie” came up again.

$1,000 BOOK

I said to my wife, “Because these experiences are so personal, reveal my thoughts, and should not be taken lightly, I think I will set a price for this book at $1,000 a copy.” She was startled by my remark and replied, “ You should be realistic if you want to sell books.”

The next week, my wife showed me an item in the Today paper.... A pricing record had been set by a forthcoming book......exactly $1,ooo a copy.

Lottery

I said, “Lord, this book is finished and I’ll not publish it if you’ll only let me win a lottery. I know the odds of my winning a lottery are much smaller than the odds of most of these things happening in my life. Why not let me win two lotteries so that I wouldn’t have to sell this book? These experiences would remain hidden, known only to me and you.”

I opened the newspaper the following day to find that someone had won two major lotteries.

1001

I put an ad in the newspaper, offering my book Miracles In My Life, for $1001.00 a copy, since I thought it was worth it. Two thirds of the Trinity of God are 54 and 704. A few days after placing the ad, I scribbled two numbers down at lunchtime at Harris, 153 and 351. (God is 351 and there were 153 great fish counted in John 21:11). Multiplying them together I came up with 53, 703, 1001 short of 54, 704.

RAINBOW

While working on a church in Orlando, I glanced over at some water that was running from a broken hose. It was spraying water up into the air causing a rainbow. As I looked at this rainbow, I thought, "Wouldn't that be pretty to take a picture of? I wish I had a camera," at that moment the pastor of the church stepped out with a camera, and said he "wanted to take some pictures of how the job was progressing." I thought to myself "if I ever write a book, I want to put this incident in that book." At that moment this workman said to the preacher with the camera, "if you ever write a book put us in it."

THE RAINBOW ABBIS

My first book Miracles In My Life, which contains 185 of these stories, has a rainbow on the cover.

On August 20, 1991, as I drove to Walden Books in Miracle City Mall to ask them if they would stock mine, I envisioned a rack at the entrance with Miracles In My Life prominently displayed.

As I approached the store, a rack outside the front door proudly displayed copies of a book titled The Rainbow Abbis.

I could not convince them to sell mine, even on consignment, though I had lived in this small town for over 20 years.

JIM SPEEGLE

I had worked for Jim Speegle and some of the things in my book happened on his jobs. I thought one day, that since I was going right by his office on my way to St. Cloud, I would drop him off a copy.

As I approached the turn off to his business with a book for him beside me, I changed my mind and drove on to St. Cloud and worked all day.

Coming home, as I turned on the SR 520, heading east, I noticed a Speegle Co. pick-up truck on the shoulder of the road heading west. I turned around, pulled up to it and found Jim Speegle alone. He said, “I ran out of gas and I have called someone to bring me some.”

I signed the book and handed it to him.

SPRING

One day while watering some new sod on Speegle’s job site, I discovered that the sprinkler head would not rotate. Upon examination, I found a tiny spring had broken. When I arrived home that afternoon, my wife asked me to repair a sprinkler head. Not only was ours the same make as the one at work, the same spring was broken.

KOMATSU

While driving home from a job with a co-worker, our conversation got around to ‘heavy equipment’. I mentioned a particular machine I had used on a Speegle job at the Cape, but I couldn’t recall the name of it. I could only remember that it was made by a Japanese company.

We pulled into a truck stop on highway 50, where my rider had parked. A Komatsu backhoe exactly like the one I was trying to name, was setting next to his car.

LOST DIAMOND

Years ago my wife was washing our old ’38 Chevy when she noticed something sparkly on the running board. She picked it up and realized her diamond had fallen out of its setting. She had found it before she realized it was missing.

November 26, 1993 Kathy Tu lost her diamond out of its setting. Since she had been to the Citrus Lounge, she called my bartender to ask her to look for it. Michelle came back into my office and informed me of what had happened. I was about to tell her that Joan had lost hers and found it on the running board, but Michelle quickly remarked, “I told Kathy a friend of mine came home from grocery shopping, realized she had lost her diamond, and went and looked in her car. She found it in the middle of her car seat. So I told her to go and look in her car. She found it laying in the middle of the seat.”

EARRINGS

While cleaning a house trailer we rent out, I was wiping the medicine cabinet in the bathroom. Behind the corner of a shelf, I found a silver earring. I thought to myself, "one earring is not worth keeping." I started to throw it away, but then, changed my mind, and stuck it in my pocket. Later, I began pulling drawers out and emptying them of trash. As I pulled the last drawer out, I saw something right in the center of that drawer. It was the matching earring to the one I had in my pocket.

ST. JUDE

My wife lost some jewelry and she asked a friend to get her a St. Jude medal to help her find it. A month or so later she found the piece of jewelry in the swimming pool. Later that day I went to the mailbox and brought in the mail. There in one envelope was a little St. Jude medal with a solicitation for money.

WOOD BLOCK

While working up north about three years ago, I was doing some carpentry work and needed a little wedge of wood. Rather than climb down off the ladder, go to the saw and saw exactly what I needed, I said to myself "I'll take a chance and just split this block I have and maybe it will come out the size I need for a wedge.". I took my hammer and struck the block, splitting it in a very unusual pattern. There was a knot in the board and the knot remained in one half of the board, It was so perfectly round that is looked like a dowel that had been glued into the wood. It left a perfectly round hole in the other half. I thought this so significant that I saved the two pieces of wood. I was living in a camper I had pulled up north. This wood was put in a drawer with a number of other unusual things, sort of like souvenirs, things to remember. Unfortunately, the trailer caught fire as I was pulling it home on the highway. I still remember the wood as a very unusual thing. It was like the 16 penny nail that I split with a saw. Something that I felt was not an accident.

COLUMBUS DAY

From the hunks of melted gold I had salvaged from the fire and kept for years, my wife had a jeweler make something for me for my birthday in 1992. She decided to give it to me the day it was finished, even though it was a week before my birthday. On October 12, 1992, she handed me a sailing ship on a necklace. She did not know that day was the 500th anniversary of Christopher Columbus.

The following six things happened one night and during the following day:

ALL IN A DAY

JEWELRY IN DRAIN

We dropped by the Post Office, and as my wife got back into the car, her gold bracelet fell off her arm onto the grating of the street drain. I thought to myself, "We came close to losing something very valuable down the drain". As we turned the corner, I looked to see an automobile which had just before plunged head first into a storm drain.

LOLLIPOP

While my wife and I were having dinner I heard "lollipops" mentioned in a song. It stuck in my mind. I was reminded of that when I went to the register and saw a vase of large lollipops on the counter.

We then traveled to our business. After the band stopped for break, the lead guitarist had something in his mouth. I said, "Frank what have you got in your mouth?" He pulled out a lollipop.

5 PAIR OF PANTS

During another break, the drummer was telling me about losing five pair of pants that day. He had put them in the dryer and someone else had picked them up. I thought to myself, "If I lost five pair of pants I might go to the flea market or Salvation Army and buy five more for a dollar a pair."

MOSQUITO

Driving to work the next morning, a mosquito was buzzing around on the inside of my windshield. I hate killing anything, so I left it alone for awhile. Finally, I reached up and smashed the mosquito. At that moment, an ad came on the radio station for mosquito repellant.

WATER LEAK

I hadn't been at work five minutes, when the foreman came in, looked at me and said, "See, this is one of five pair of pants I bought at the flea market this weekend for a dollar a pair."

Later that day, a leak developed in the plumbing. As I started to work on the leak, a sprinkler system ad began on the radio.

BEHIND TRUCK

As I drove home, I was thinking about these things that had happened the night before and that day. I looked up ahead and realized I was behind the same truck I had been following going to work that morning.

LITTLE BROWN STATION WAGON

As I left the motel for work in Ft. Lauderdale early one morning with Dougie Workman, I passed a little brown station wagon and glanced at the license plate. We drove out to United Technology where we were repairing some portable buildings, until we needed some supplies. After getting what we needed at Scotty’s, Dougie asked me to pull in to the Quicky Stop in front of Scotty’s. While he was inside, I looked ahead, and parked directly in front of me was the little brown station wagon.

TRADER JOHN

When I was at flight school in Pensacola, Florida in 1954, I, along with other cadets, would go to Trader John’s. It is still there and Trader John is still there. I went by again in 1991 and told him I would send him some material on a book I was writing.

September 21, 1991, I mailed him a letter. Later that day I opened the Florida Today newspaper and saw an article about him.

SHULLER BACK?

Days before, I had read in the paper that Robert Shuller had incurred a serious head injury while in Europe traveling. As I was sitting in my den on September 23, 1991, I thought, “I wonder if Shuller is back in the states?” I then looked down at the day’s sports page of the Florida Today and saw “SHULA BACK FOR NUMBER 300” in big headlines.

OPEN FLY

One morning while putting on my shoes, I noticed that I had forgotten to zip my pants. I thought, “As soon as I stand up, I’ll zip them,” but for some reason the task eluded me and I proceeded out to the patio. I sat down by my wife and began to read the morning paper. I got halfway through an article, which mentioned an open fly. I then reached down and zipped up my pants.

AND THAT’S THE TOOTH

November 18, 1993 I had done some writing, part of which was a pun. I said, “An eye for an eye, and truth for truth.”

The next day the newspaper punned the picture of a little girl with a tooth problem. It was titled: ‘AND THAT’S THE TOOTH.’

LORD, I NEED AN ELECTRICIAN

While working for Joe Browning in Miami after the hurricane, I realized I had a problem with the electrical wiring in some new units we were setting up for the Dade County school system. The problem was so big that I asked the factory electrical engineer to come down to Miami. I was standing with him, Joe Browning and several other people from the school system, talking about the complex electrical system when I realized it was “over my head.” I whispered a prayer, “Lord, I need an electrician. I don’t understand what they’re saying so how am I going to show these laborers working for me what needs to be done?” Just then a black man tapped me on the shoulder and said, “I’m an electrician and I really need a job.” His name was Norman.

I was sitting in my travel trailer after work that day, amazed at what had transpired. I thought to myself, “To remember the name Norman, I’ll associate him with a friends’ ex-husband named Norman.” She’s the one who’s present husband is always calling blacks ‘German’ jokingly.”

I then looked down at the Miami Herald sports section opened on the table. The headlines said, “FRESHMAN GERMAN INJURES HAMSTRING, MIGHT MISS OPENER.” Jammi German is black.

TWIN BRACELET

The day I hired the electrician, one of the worker’s, Carlos, showed me a solid gold bracelet he had found in some grass. His dog had pulled him over to it while he was taking the dog for a walk. It was exactly like one my wife has. She had found it embedded in an asphalt parking lot years ago.

SUPER BOWL

One morning about five or six years ago, on a Superbowl Sunday, I had to go to the bathroom. I had this terrible, terrible diarrhea - one of the worst that I had ever had - and I was thinking to myself, "Wow, this is a Super Bowl Sunday - I'll remember this one!" I had in mind a huge toilet bowl. I walked out of the bathroom and out into the yard to pick up the Sunday paper. When I opened it up there was just one big picture on the front of the paper - a huge toilet bowl.

TEXARKANA HIGHWAY

One day here in Florida, I was reading in a local newspaper about a traffic accident on a highway in Texarkana (Arkansas or Texas). At that moment the radio mentioned "Texarkana," in a song from Cannonball. I grew up in Texarkana.

SQUIRREL ON LINE

About ten years ago, I was lying in my bed thinking about life and God, and asking why these things were happening. The view from my bed through a window included a phone cable with a sky background. I said, "Lord, prove to me you're real. You know that squirrel that walks this telephone line sometimes, have him walk across this phone cable right now." I waited and nothing happened. A couple of hours later, all of a sudden a terrible storm came up. I had left the windows down in my car, so I dashed out the front door in the rain. I sat in the car with the rain coming down in "floods." I was thinking about God not proving to me that he was real. As the rain slowed to a sprinkle, I looked straight ahead from the driver's seat through the windshield, to see a squirrel running along the telephone cable.

LOVE ON-LINE

I looked out my den window and saw a squirrel run across the power line. I said, “God, that was love on the line.” I then went back to my newspaper to see in bold headlines: LOVE ON THE LINE.

DOVES ON-LINE

A year or so later, I looked out my window to the same place and saw three doves sitting. Two were on the top line, and one on the bottom. I said, “God, that’s a picture of the trinity, 704 (88 x 8). Then, one dove from the top flew down next to the one on the bottom. It was still a picture of the trinity of God (8 x 88).

SECOND QUARTER DROPPS

Ten years ago I was at Morrison's Cafeteria having lunch and I got up to pay my bill. It was my habit to give the cashier fifty cents and say, "buy you a coke" or something like that. But now I was getting low on finances, and things were getting rough. I was a bit tighter with my money. As I went to pay my bill, I asked myself, "Should I give her fifty cents or a quarter?" This was running through my mind, debating whether to give her one quarter or two quarters. I thought, "Should I drop a second quarter?" I did - I gave her fifty cents and she thanked me. I walked out the door and glanced over at a newspaper rack. The headlines on the Today paper said, "Second Quarter Drops."

MRS. NICHOLS

Three weeks ago, I got up one morning and dressed to go out to get something to eat. I reached into my pants to shove my pockets down, and as I did, I found a shiny nickle that had gone through the wash. I said, "Lord, . . . Why?" I gave it no more thought until I got to Morrison's Cafeteria. While I was standing in line, a neighbor walked up behind me. Her name is Mrs. Nichols.

SESAME ST.

As my granddaughter sat watching Sesame Street, I thought, “After putting it off several days, now would be a good time to scrutinize a dollar bill.” As a pulled one out of my billfold and stared at it, someone on Sesame Street said, “Look at this dollar bill.” They showed a picture of one.

WET DOLLAR

A week or so after I had loaned my book out to one of my bartenders to read, she gave it back. She said, “I had a miracle happen this weekend. I was walking with my mother in the rain and I looked down and there was a dollar bill floating in the water.”

I thought to myself, “How can she think that’s a miracle. It’s unusual; it’s unexpected - but not a miracle.”

The next day, I was in the parking lot working on the sign, when she drove up to work. As she got out of her car, I looked down at my feet. Lying in the grass was a wet dollar bill.

MAKE SOME MONEY

Early one morning in Miami I stopped into a restaurant for breakfast before work. As I sat eating, the lone waitress was talking and joking with the two other customers at the counter. Laughing, the waitress said, “John, why don’t you go make some money,” inferring she was tired of his company.

Through my meal, I had not joined in the conversation, but upon hearing ‘make some money’, I said, “I’ve got some out in the truck but it’s still wet.”

Finishing my meal, I laid some change on the counter and walked to the register to pay my bill. When I opened my billfold, all the money I had was a single one-hundred dollar bill. Due to Miami being plagued with counterfeit one-hundreds, she wouldn’t take mine after the comment I made. I had to use a credit card.

UNRETURNED PHONE

Through a long chain of events uncontrolled by me, someone borrowed a telephone of mine, but hadn’t returned it. I hadn’t seen or talked to this person in over a year.

One day I took a new pay telephone to my business, hooked it up, and called Joan at home to check the new phone. My wife in casual conversation asked me if the telephone that “so and so” had, was ever returned. I replied “no” just as the front door of the lounge, directly facing me, opened and that person entered. He does not know this happened.

¼” FALL

“I’m putting ¼” fall per foot on your roof.” Dougie explained when he called me in Miami a year or so later. I glanced down at the specifications for a job on my disk. My eyes fell on ‘¼” fall per foot’.

MARVIN AND MARTHA

My wife, attempting to reach my brother Marvin and not knowing his phone number, called an M. Bryant who was listed in the same town to which they had moved, hoping it might be him. When someone answered, she asked if this was the residence of Marvin and Martha Bryant. The person replied, “No, but we know a Marvin and Martha Bryant in Pasadena.” My brother and his wife had just moved from Pasadena.

THREE-DAY JOB

June 18, 1992, Margie, our bartender, called me and said she could work a day I had previously asked her to. When I had mentioned it before, she said her daughter’s boyfriend was going to Tampa on a job for three days, and she would have to baby sit. Margie explained, “They finished the job in one day, so now I’m free to work.”

That night my renter in Cocoa, 20 miles away, called. She said they would be late in paying the rent. “My husband had what he thought would be a three day job in Tampa, but they finished in one day”, she explained. They were both iron workers on the same job.

100 TORNADOS

One day in my life, I had so many bad experiences that I made the comment to my wife that "God was sick", knowing there were no accidents. The next morning I opened the newspaper to find that there had been over one hundred tornados that day and evening across the country.

MGM FIRE

One night, I felt everything around me was ugly. With no answers, . . . it was total chaos. I walked away from it, knowing that God can do anything, and also knowing that God has an ultimate purpose in everything, and I said, "Lord, burn it, just burn it." Then, as I drove on home, I said "No, that would be like confirming that you are real. Anyway, if you would do something like that, you would probably do it somewhere else." I was feeling very low. The next morning I got up, and still had this on my mind. As I drove into the Post Office, I said, "Lord, show me, what did you burn?" I looked up, and there was a newspaper rack in front of the Post Office. In great big headlines it said 'MGM Fire.'

SCREW THRU HAND

While working on a church in Orlando, I walked through a room where a drywaller was hanging sheet rock. He was working extremely fast with drywall screws using a screw gun. I'd never done this before nor had it crossed my mind - but I thought to myself - "that man could very easily run a screw through his hand working so fast." I commented to him - I said, "Have you ever ran a screw through your hand?" He said , "Why no, I haven't." As I walked into the hallway, I saw a man coming into the building from outside holding his bloody hand. I asked, "What happened!" and he replied, "I just ran a screw through my hand."

KNIFE IN THIGH

I was working on a job in Washington D.C. when a similar thing happened. As I was walking down a hall, a workman - (in fact his name was Workman - Doug Workman) had a knife in his hand and he was carving on something. I said to the man in passing, "Be careful, you'll cut yourself." I hadn't walked ten feet past him before he drove the blade deep into the middle of his thigh.

ARM OUT OF MANHOLE

One day I was looking at the newspaper and it had a picture of a manhole with an arm sticking out of it. Many things that day had had significance and I told my wife that this picture seemed to be important. We discussed it at length. Among other things in that paper was something about Noah's Ark being found - or thought it was found on a 14,000 foot mountain. A couple of months later, after I came in from work, my wife said, "I have something I want to show you." Someone had sent her a gift in the mail, I think it was from New Jersey. I don't recall what the gift was, but she said she started to wad the newspaper it was wrapped in and throw it away. For some reason she glanced at it and there on this newspaper was the same picture of this arm sticking out of a manhole.

HITCH-HIKER

I used to pick up hitch-hikers all the time as I was traveling, and fortunately I never was robbed or harmed, but I had some bad experiences. One of them I brought home and hired to do work and it turned out a very sour situation. Anyway, I made this comment that I just wouldn't pick up hitch-hikers, and in fact I told the Lord this. I said, "I'm not going to stop and pick up hitch-hikers." But, one morning I was turning from Highway 50 onto US1 in Titusville and a kid was standing there and I said, "Okay Lord, I'll make this one exception - I'll pick up a hitchhiker." The kid got in the car and I said, "Good morning, where are you going?" He said, "Oh, I'm going to the hospital. My friend was in an automobile accident last night and he had his arm cut off." I haven't picked up another hitch-hiker since.

MAY 10

May 10, 1981 was Mother's Day, and that May 10 I relate to the 1290th day in Daniel. It was a low point and something happened on that day that I won't describe here. Anyway, the following year on May 10, I remembered that this day was going to be an anniversary of the May 10 low point the year before. May 10, 1982 I got up to go to work in Geneva from Titusville. I got into my old '65 Mustang and when I reached Tropic Street I could not stop for a stop sign. The brakes had gone completely out on the car. But since I wanted to work and needed to work, I continued. There was very little traffic at 6 A.M. so I decided that I would proceed cautiously and try to get to work without any brakes. As I got on to 46, I saw headlights coming towards me out along the countryside. I am doing 50-55 miles per hour on the highway, and just at a point where you would have to decide to brake suddenly a school bus started to turn on its red flashing lights signaling that he was going to stop to pick up children. I could not stop. I had no emergency brake, and I thought to myself "this is crazy," but I had no choice. I went by the school bus coasting. I must have been doing 30 miles per hour, and the bus driver, I could see, was waving and cursing me. I had passed , on a very narrow two lane highway, a school bus that was stopped. The place I was working in Geneva had a downgrade on the road for one block to the house. I was thinking to myself, "How can I get down there without the car accelerating?" As I got to the street that I would turn on, one block from the house, I decided I would turn the car around and back down the hill. As I backed the car backwards it would start to accelerate. I would put the transmission in forward to stop, then I would start down again. Once when I did this, I heard a terrible growl in the engine and thought I had torn the transmission up. After I parked and opened the hood I realized the battery mounting had come loose and the battery was shoved into the radiator. I had knocked a hunk out of the corner of the battery and it was leaking. I don't particularly remember what happened at work during that day, but as I started to come home I was wondering if the car would start, because the battery had been damaged. It barely started. Here I am with a bad battery, no brakes coming home, and I'm thinking, "This is the anniversary of that bad happening." I pulled out onto the highway, got about 4 miles and thought, "Oh no," - I had intended to get gas before I started out on this long stretch and my gas tank was empty. Just about that time I ran out of gas. I got out of my car and walked a mile or so to a house. A man had a gallon of gas in his garage and I carried that back to the car, poured it in the Mustang and got back out on the road. I said "Lord, this has been a terrible day - I don't need this," Just at that moment the right rear tire blew out.

HARBOR CAY

When I left General Dynamics in March, 1981, I was told by a close friend that I would regret leaving. I had made up my mind that there were things I needed to do - writing this book was one of them. The hour that I left the gates of Cape Kennedy, Harbor Cay Condominium fell and 11 men were killed in the collapse of that building.

TICKET

This reminds me of a sad event. I had gotten a traffic ticket for not having a Florida tag on my old car at an intersection in Titusville. This I did not think much about except that sometime later the motorcycle officer that gave me this ticket at that intersection was killed at that same intersection. I believe it was New Years Eve or Christmas Eve. Anyway, I thought this ironic, but perhaps not, because he had parked many times near that intersection and so many people would have received tickets at that place. I was in Orlando two or three years later and was sitting eating lunch in Winter Park, a suburb of Orlando. I was thinking about this happening, recalling this officer on this motorcycle giving me a ticket, and then of him dying. As I was thinking about this, an ambulance came down the street blasting his siren, directly in front of me. A wrecker came by following the ambulance. I was still thinking about this Titusville happening when, about 20 minutes later, the wrecker came back by with a motorcycle - a police motorcycle on the back of it. Incidentally, I read the paper the next day, and the officer involved in that accident was injured but not killed.

SHUTTLE EXPLOSION

My wife and I went down to the Indian River to watch the shuttle launch. A minute or so before the launch, (I had not thought much about this before, and certainly had never made a comment to my wife), I said, "You know, if that shuttle were to explode it would really be a terrible disaster." I said "It really would." Everyone realizes that it certainly is dangerous - but I made this comment to my wife. A couple of minutes later the shuttle exploded.

FIGHT IN STREET

There are some parking spaces in front of the Ranch House and directly north, across the street, is a drive-in bank. I was sitting there thinking, "Lord, you bring confusion and chaos right in front of me and I don't need this." I said, "everywhere I turn people are ugly and you are showing me bad things, and I don't need this." At that moment, a couple in a car pulled out of the drive-in bank, turned right, stopped in the middle of the street, exactly in front of me and started fighting.

BOY ON BIKE

Last month I was driving home at night from a pub. It was 2:00 in the morning and things had been going bad. I was despondent. I said, "I will think about my son killed in a bicycle/automobile accident," and just at that moment a child darted on his bicycle directly in front of me on the highway.

PROLEXIN

A couple of years ago, I was at a doctor's office getting a flight physical to renew my pilot's license. I had made a note on my medical application that I had previously had some mental problems. The doctor inquired about it and asked me what kind of medicine I had taken. I said, "I don't remember." As he left the room for a moment I looked up on the wall. There, he had a picture in this office, a comic picture. It was about a tennis player and the title of the picture was "The Pro" - this brought to mine the kind of medicine I had been taking that had had such terrible affects on me mentally. (I would not recommend it to anyone.) The name of the medicine was Prolexin, and when he came into the room I explained to him that this was the kind of thing that happened in my life often. The only reason that I remembered the medicine Prolexin was that I had glanced up at the picture in his office.

BLOODY EARS

One morning about a month ago I reached into the medicine cabinet, got an ear swab and cleaned one ear. I noticed a little blood on the swab and I thought "Well, I'll clean the other ear and see if I've got blood in the other ear" (that was my thinking as I cleaned my second ear). There was no blood on the swab. A couple of hours later my wife said something to me (I had not mentioned this to her). She said, "Today I cleaned my ears and I had blood in both ears".

"LET THERE BE LIGHT"

My wife and I were just going together and we were up at the Citrus Lounge one night when the lights went out - the power failed. Joanie went back into the kitchen and got some candles and lit them. She walked back through the door, announced, "Let there be light" and held the candles up. At that moment all the lights came back on. She was quite startled.

CITY LIGHTS OUT

I was sitting in front of the Ranch House Restaurant one night. I was depressed. I was thinking about bad things having happened and I shouted out a very bad expletive and cursed at God. Just at that moment the lights went out over the whole city.

IT’S THE BULB, STUPID

After checking a ceiling light fixture with three different bulbs, I assumed the fixture was bad - so I changed it. I had used three bad bulbs to check it.

Two weeks later, after checking the cash register light with three different bulbs, I assumed the fixture was bad, so I tore it completely apart. Again, it was OK - I had used three bad bulbs to check it.

CHANGE LIGHT JOKE

Years ago I heard Paul Harvey tell a joke on the radio. He said, "How many psychiatrists does it take to change a light bulb?" and he said, "Well really, just one, but only if the light bulb wants to be changed." Days later, I was sitting at the Ranch House thinking about this joke, (about whether I should tell it to the person next to me). At that moment I looked up. The dishwasher had a stool and sat it down directly in front of me. He climbed up on the stool and started changing the light bulb in the ceiling.

$44.80

One of the most precious things in my life happened ten years ago when I received a check from an insurance company. Four days before that I was talking with someone and I said, "I don't know what will happen on a certain date, but it might be like Jesus talked about, "someone working for a penny a day." I said, "If that were true, I might get a check for $44.80." In my code, this was half of God's goods. A man said to Jesus, "half of my goods I give to the poor." (That equals the same number.) Also he said, "If I have wronged any man I will restore him four-fold," (that number comes up to 10% of the same number) so I said I might get a check for $44.80, and I put it aside. Four days later I got a check in the mail from Aetna Life Insurance for $44.80, and the check was made out on April 9, it was mailed on April 10, and I received it on April 14, 1981. In my mind I viewed that as a precious thing. I conjured an envelope from an insurance company containing a check hanging on a Christmas tree.

THE MONEY TREE

A couple of years later during lunch break at work, I was listening to the radio. Paul Harvey asked, "How would you like to get a Christmas card to hang on your Christmas tree?" and he said, "A check from your insurance company." I thought about the $44.80 and Lamech in the Book of Genesis - the story of 70 times 7 fold - if you fold 70 7 times, you come up with 8960, and if you divide it by 2, (1/2 to the poor), you come out with 4480. When Jesus was asked how many times should you forgive a man, he quoted Lamech. He didn't say "70 times 7," he said, "70 seven fold."

THREE’S

One day I was driving along 528 from Cape Canaveral west. I was thinking about threes and I said, "Lord it seems like everything comes in threes and a triangle is what holds everything together." (You've got to find the two ends and the middle, the fold in the middle to find anything in reality.) As I was thinking about this, I came upon the stoplight that intersects 528 and US 1. There, parked broadside directly in front of me, was a big van and it had three words on the side of it: "United, United, United." I turned the corner and was still thinking about this when I glanced up to a sign at the side of the road. There in front of a nursery a sign said, "Trees, Trees, Trees."

MARIA

In 1981 a ‘Maria’ miracle happened in my life. I didn’t put it in my first book because it was meant only for me.

When I gave my first book to a receptionist at Harris Corp. to read, because her name was Maria, I thought about the ‘Maria’ miracle that happened 10 years before. At the end of the day, when she returned my book, she said, “I had a miracle happen to me 10 years ago”.

THE THREE FACES OF EVE, MOTHER OF ALL LIVING

I have for many years believed that God has three faces. We love the one; tolerate the second; and hate to see the third. I believe these three are reflected in the Trinity. God said, “Let us make man in our image.” I think we are created like God. We have three faces: plus, zero and minus, which equate to love, indifference, and hate. We know when we are ‘in’ one of these three. One cannot be in two faces at once. One cannot go from left to right, or right to left without going through the middle face.

Years ago when the movie was made, I saw “The Three Faces of Eve.” To me back then, it was just an interesting movie. I thought Joann Woodard played three characters very well.

After years of experience and learning that God’s hand is in all things, even in creating the name Eve (with a fold in the middle). I knew God made the movie to show me additional evidence that my theories were correct. In the movie, Eve has three names, one for each of her personalities: Eve Black; Eve White; and (plan) Jane. Two opposites and a middle.

THREE AIRPLANES

I was thinking about a particular day that was coming up. It was a very important day, and I asked myself, "What would I be doing on that day?" I thought, "Well, it's sort of like hands joined," and I pictured something. Just at that moment, an ad came on the television that said, "See three airplanes chained together, next week." This was symbolic of what I had in mind. The following week, by an unusual turn of events, not of my choosing, I was present at that air show.

THREE PICTURES

One day aboard a ship, I was thinking a great deal about photography and combining three pictures, edge-matched to make a panorama. Then, I saw the exact thing I was thinking, framed in three pictures on a hallway wall. (I took a picture of it).

MOBILE MANOR

One night in a very noisy and very crowded club, I heard someone say over the crowd, "mobile home park." At the moment that they said that, I pictured a particular mobile home park, Mobile Manor. It is across the street from North Brevard Lumber company. I no sooner had thought about this than I heard someone, or the same person say, "The one across from North Brevard Lumber Company."

T-111

May 14, 1991 I left a job site to buy some nails. As I pulled into North Brevard Lumber Company, I thought about the happening mentioning their name. It crossed my mind to tell someone there that the store would be involved in an event in a book, but as I entered the store I decided not to pursue the subject. A female clerk approached me and I told her I wanted ten pounds of number six common galvanized nails. Awhile later another clerk came up to me and asked my purpose for buying the nails. I told him that I wanted to hang some T-111 siding. Then he said, "We are out of the nails you wanted but we have the nails designed specifically for T-111." I said, "Fine, I'll take ten pounds of those. He then turned around and picked up a sack from near the register and said, "A customer asked for these this morning but never picked them up." As he handed them to the female clerk to weigh I said, "I'll take the whole sack." It weighed ten pounds.

BD

I told the lady at the Florida Today newspaper I thought the daily number 111, which was drawn the day before, was the same as the trinity of God. She said, “That number is very special to me. It’s my grandfather’s birthday.”

ALFRED HITCHCOCK

Often when I was in the Ranch House a certain person would come in that I disliked being around. As I was thinking about this, I looked through the north window, (there's not a north window there now). I imagined that person walking into view into the window, similar to Alfred Hitchcock moving into the silhouette on the TV screen. I was thinking about this when that person moved into view in the window filling that image.

BILL EVERETT

One day while I was working for General Dynamics, I had a Boeing Company newspaper in front of me. I wasn't reading the paper, but thinking about a person in Texas who had been in my life years before. I had recently talked to him on the telephone. His name was Bill Everett. As I was thinking of this person my eyes focused on the middle of that paper. There, the name "Bill Everett" was in the title of an article.

COUP DE GRÂCE

After many hours of frustration, I finally thought I had found a stopped-up toilet problem when I pulled a kid’s rusty harmonica from the bowl. Needing some comic relief, I pretended in front of my wife to commence to play it. I anticipated her scream. She did.

That still didn’t solve the toilet problem. I took the stool up, flushed water through it, but to no avail. I finally gave up, but I was going to find the cause of all my grief with a coup de grâce.

I took the bowl outside along with my hammer. As I raised the hammer for blow number one, sunlight from just the right angle revealed what I thought was a fishing lure stuck just inside the top of the bowl., where it joins the tank. It was a toy ball. I saved it.

TEA POT DOOM

Having several things in my hands, I finally managed to set a pitcher of tea precariously on the edge of the refrigerator shelf. I dared not take my eyes off of it to put something else down, lest it fall. I stood motionless with my eyes glued on the tea pitcher for several seconds, making sure it was safe to turn my eyes away. As soon as I did so, the pitcher fell.

VVZ TAG

I traveled to Atlantic City this last year. As I drove into the parking lot at Harold's Casino, I was thinking to myself, "If I play the roulette wheel, what numbers should I first play? I'll look for some kind of numbers, somewhere." As I got out of my vehicle and walked towards the elevator, the last car next to the elevator had a license with three letters, VVZ. To me V has a value of twenty-two and Z has a value of twenty-six. So I said, "Okay, I'll play twenty-two, twenty-two, twenty-six, in that order." As I started into the casino, I thought, "That's silly, to look for numbers to play." After watching awhile, I finally sat down, got some chips and placed my first bet on a number (it wasn't twenty-two). Twenty-two came up. My second bet I placed on another number and twenty-two came up, again.

666

There has only been one day in my life when I can say I knew what number would come up in the daily lottery. I didn’t bet on it, but I knew. The number that came up was 666.

Seeing a three digit number on the back of a school bus one morning reminded me of the 666 lottery drawing years before. Coming back from the lounge later that day, I looked up ahead and saw a white county truck - 666 was displayed on the back in huge, black number.

GAMBLING

At Harrah’s Casino in Atlantic City, NJ, I had gambled all day and into the night. I was down about $900.00, betting on double zero on the roulette wheel. I had two $25.00 chips left when I decided to put all of it, $50.00, on double zero. Double zero came in and I left Atlantic City, thanking God I was $900.00 richer, rather than $900.00 poorer.

Three or four years later at Harrah’s, Joan and I were talking after a day of gambling. I told her that all the bets I had made that day were $5.00 or $10.00 except once. Then I had bet $25.00 on double zero. The ball slowed and fell into the double zero slot, and when it did, I turned away and hollered, “Yes!” When I looked back at the wheel, the ball was in the next slot.

We continued to gamble for another day and I found myself down to one $25.00 chip. I had not bet $25.00 on a single bet besides the time I described to Joan. She was beside me as I placed all of it on double zero for one last spin. The ball slowed, then fell into the double zero slot, and I shouted, “Yes!” as I turned to her. When I looked back to the wheel, the ball was in another slot next to it.

As I was driving south leaving Atlantic City, I said, “God, I’ll never gamble again because I don’t believe in luck, good or bad. You made those two $25.00 bets rollover into the next slot after I thought I had won.” I then looked to my right to see a large sign: “GAMBLER’S ANNONYMOUS” with a phone number.

A year or so later, we were in the Bahamas gambling and I was down about $500.00 betting on double zero only. The number had not come up once since I had sat down to play. Joan was beside me and as I lost my last $5.00 chip, I stood up to leave the table and said to Joan, “Double zero will come up this time for sure.” It did.

While on a cruise, I had bet for a good while on double zero and it never came up. The number two kept winning, so finally I switched my bet to number two, and after I did, double zero started hitting. I was still sitting in my chair, loosing on number two, when I felt something behind me in my seat. I reached back and pulled from the crack between the cushions a 6” bolt about 1” round. Having missed placing a bet that spin, and being frustrated at number two, I placed the bolt upright out on the number two spot before the wheel operator said, “No more bets”. As she wondered what she saw on the table, the ball fell into the number two slot.

ASHO4U

I thought, “God this highway I-95 is like the trunk of a tree and it has branches. Its top ends up in the Keys (upside down); it’s like the tree of life.” I glanced at the tag on a greyish-silver van that had just passed me. It read: ASHO4U.

WHERE DID YOU GET THOSE SCARES?

I am not Jesus and I am not God. I am a carpenter with scares on my hands. I have had an appendectomy and nails through both feet. That’s just about all you know about Jesus’ physical appearance also.

I was in the Ranch House restaurant years ago paying at the register when the cashier asked me, “Where did you get that scare on your hand?”

As my wife and I sat having breakfast at the Triangle Café off Exit 64 south of Norfolk, I saw a picture on a wall showing Jesus with a little girl. She was looking at his hands and asks, “Where did you get those scares on your hands?”

Jesus explained the plan of salvation in the bible very carefully but it seems like some didn’t understand. You do not have to know Jesus to be “saved”. (Matthew 25:40)

I remarked to the owner of the Triangle Café that I thought the Trinity of God was a triangle also. She seemed surprised. There is a huge sign on her roof that says: JESUS IS LORD.

GOD IS MY PILOT

After taking Exit 64 south of Norfolk while traveling I-95, we pulled into the Triangle Café to have breakfast. I noticed a license plate on a car in the parking lot that said: “God is my co-pilot.” I see that plate often and when I do, I think about my basic feelings about God and life.

To me, God is not my co-pilot. He is my pilot and I am only a passenger. I am being taken on the ride of my life. I don’t know where I came from. I don’t know where I am. I don’t know where I’m going. Every sunrise brings a new day, new experiences, new surprises, and sometimes frustrations. I am not the pilot of this airplane. I am not a leader. I am not a light. I am not a navigator or a guide. I do not have a plan. I do not have a map. I do not know the age, condition, cost, speed or size of this airplane. I do not know its fuel capacity or destination.

I have never known a path finder to have a path or a leader a guide. A trail blazer does just that…blaze trails. If a trail was already there, he wouldn’t be blazing. God said if a man started building and didn’t, or couldn’t finish, he would be laughed at.

I think, hope, trust, and pray that God has plans for this plane, knows where he’s going and why.

I am comfortable in my first-class seat.

LAMB AND LION

I was driving south and almost everything had significance. I saw a large picture of a lamb and lion lying together. I thought, “God I must be in heaven.” I looked to my right and a large sign said: ARE YOU READY FOR THE RAPTURE?

TRUCK SIGN

While returning home from South Dakota, near St. Joe Montana, I saw a large billboard with a picture of a semi-truck advertising a truck stop. I thought to myself, “They could have shaped the sign like a full size truck in profile. It would have been more impressive.” A few more miles down the road I saw ahead what I thought was a full size silhouette of a truck on a large billboard. It wasn’t’. It was an actual full size semi sitting high in the air, advertising the same truck stop.

HAY DAY

Going from Oviedo to Geneva, on my way home from work, I would pass a racecar track which was bordered with bundles of hay. As I drove by the track one day, I noticed that all the hay had been removed, I thought, "People in Florida don't grow much hay, because there isn't a big market for it here. Pastures are green year-round, but if you wanted a load of hay, how far would you have to go for it?" I had hay-hauling on my mind. At that moment, a loaded hay truck pulled up to the highway from a side road.

RELAX FROM INTERSTATE

Once again in the Ranch House, I was sitting and thinking about life and philosophy. I thought, "It is more interesting to travel the crooked roads and the side roads of life than to go down the Interstate at a fast and furious pace." At that moment, someone behind me said to another, "It sure is good to relax and get off the Interstate."

AMTRACK

I said, “God I’m tired of driving.” I glanced right and a sign said: TIRED YET? TAKE THE AMTRACK.

LEISURE TIME BAR

Driving along the highway from Oviedo to Geneva at another time, I'm thinking, "Lord, I work so much and I travel so much, I'm busy, busy, busy. There are so many things I'd like to do, but I don't have the leisure time." I looked straight ahead to where the road tee'd into Highway 46. A big sign directly in front of me said 'Leisure Time Bar'.

EYESORE

I was driving from home to our business and thinking how things were in turmoil and not right. I said, "Lord, it's exactly like you want it but this is really an eyesore." At that moment I glanced left to read 'eyesore' emblazoned in large letters across the back of a warehouse.

AVAILABLE

Along the same road another day I was seeking answers and bumping my head against four walls. I said, "Lord, it's to no avail, I just can't find any answers." I glanced out into the woods beside the road. There a large billboard had one word printed across it, "AVAILABLE."

OH SHIT!

While driving back from work along Highway 46 from Sanford one day, I was thinking about philosophy, religion and God. I was thinking, "How can I find out anything outside of reality - how can I understand a creator making reality?" I thought of all the questions a newspaper reporter might ask; who, what, where, how, when, why. If you stand off and look at life outside of it, you get no answers. This I've done quite a few times. As I began to go up a bridge on the St. John's River, I just shouted in frustration, "Oh shit." When I crested the top of the bridge, I looked down to the foot of the bridge. There, an outhouse was turned over at the side of the road.

HARRIS CORP.

Last month I pulled out on Interstate 95 to drive to Harris Corporation in Palm Bay to work. As I merged, a small pick-up, pulling a large long flatbed trailer passed me. It just came into my mind - to remember it. I thought more about it - I said to myself "I wonder where that trailer is going, what would it haul, why is such a small truck pulling such a large trailer?", that sort of thing . Then I put it out of my mind as it went on ahead of me. It was traveling much faster that I. Harris Corp. is about 35 miles south of where I live. Anyway, I went into the office at Harris that morning to get a temporary badge, got back in my truck and pulled around to the back of the job site. As I pulled into where I normally park inside the gate, there was the little truck with the big trailer that I has wondered about 35 miles up the road. He went to the exact same spot as I.

IVY LANE

While driving in Winter Park one day, I was thinking of a person whose name is Ivy. At that moment I came to a stop sign and looked up. The street sign in front of me said "Ivy Lane."

OVERNIGHT EXPRESS

Driving to work one morning I was behind a truck that said "Federal Express," and I thought to myself, "that's one of those overnight express trucks. " Just then, another truck pulled up even with that one. On the back was written "Overnight Express."

LEFT REAR TIRE

Last October coming back from Ft. Worth, Texas, just as I was leaving the city limits I said, "Lord, am I ready to make this trip? I'm just beginning, and I had tire trouble going to Ft. Worth. Lord, you know that left rear tire is bad." Just as I got those words out of my mouth the left rear tire blew out.

LEFT FRONT TIRE

A few weeks later, leaving work on the Cape, I had a strange feeling that something was about to happen. It was such a strong premonition that I said, "What, Lord?" and just then the left front tire blew.

HUB CAP

Driving to Miami on I-95 one evening in my truck, the motor started to steam so I slowed down, pulled to the paved shoulder and came to a stop. The radiator hose had split so I cut it back shorter and reconnected it. I had to walk back several hundred yards to find water in a ditch to fill the radiator. It was just dusky dark when I finally finished and was ready to leave. As I closed the hood, I glanced to directly right of the truck and thought I saw something shinny. Investigation revealed a hub cap. I picked it up, threw it in the back of the truck and completed my trip to Miami.

The following day I noticed that I was missing my right rear hub cap. You guessed it. The one in the back of my truck was my own.

99 SHEEP

I said to God while driving down the interstate to Miami: “If you doubled 99 sheep, then ‘one fold’ would make sense. That would be 198”. I then glanced at a mile marker number 198.

FORGET ME NOT

Joan bought a beautiful souvenir coffee cup on our cruise to Alaska. One time when we were leaving the house, she poured herself some coffee in it to take along. After we had backed out of the driveway and started forward, she exclaimed, “My coffee cup is on top of the car!” After she retrieved her cup, we laughed at the message printed below the flowers on it: “FORGET ME NOT.”

P.S. My ex-wife’s daughter lost her wedding cake placed on a car top.

S5X

I thought, “God I’m going to make letters from the numbers on license plates and see if they make any sense.” The next plate I saw was S5X---, which to me said SEX---.

ONLY N.Y.-704

I was discussing with my wife one day my theory that New York license plates seemed so often to be significant. Those plates seem to relate to what I was thinking at that moment. I made the comment to her, "Seems like New York license plates are the only ones that the Lord gives me messages on." I said to her pointing up ahead, "See, that's not a New York license plate." It happened to be a Florida tag and when we came closer to the car, I could see that the tag had numbers that to me meant "God" on it. When I explained that to her we both laughed. I was saying,"See! now that plate up ahead won't tell me anything." And then it did.

EGG

I have a tag on the front of my truck. It's not a state tag but a sign and it says "Spoiled Rotten" (my wife spoils me). One day while driving, I was thinking about this tag and my mind drifted from "spoiled rotten" to "rotten egg". I was wondering if I could get "rotten egg” on a license plate phonetically. At that moment a car passed me and I glanced at the tag. It had three numbers and then three letters, EGG.

764

I had a Florida tag that had the number on it 764, and one day I thought to myself, "What does that number mean?" I looked at it close and I said, "It has the word God written there except one mark on the 0 that hides it.” I said, "If the 6 in the middle was a 0, to me that's the value of God, "704." As I had lunch at work that day I glanced at a wall and there an old license plate was hanging. The license number was 764, exactly the same as mine. I was thinking about this as I stopped at a red light driving home. I looked at the tag in front of me. The number was 764 and I smiled - (there was a double lane of traffic and I was in the left lane). I looked at the car in front of me in the right lane and the number was 764. I laughed even more, and as the traffic pulled away I thought to myself, "The one adjacent to me on the right is probably 764." As the car accelerated ahead on the right, I could see it wasn't 764 - it was 7664.

CAT

At about the same time my wife and I were on Interstate 95 driving north. As a car passed me I noticed the license plate. As another car passed me I noticed that license plate too. It struck me that the two license plates were similar but not alike. And then another car passed and it seemed that a pattern was set. On the three cars that passed there were three letters on each license plate - the first car said 'CAW', the second was 'CAV', and the third was 'CAU'. When the third came by I said, "Joanie, three cars have come by with a sequence of letters that follow each other going backwards up the alphabet - CAW, CAV, CAU." I said, "The next one might be CAT." This is the pattern that followed in my mind. I said to her, "The next license plate that comes along will be CAT." As another car passed us it wasn't CAT as I had predicted, but CAS. In other words God must have been saying, "You'll not predict what I think or do so I'll skip the one that you gave and I'll go to the next one. The order of the license plates that passed (there were no out of state cars in that group though most cars on Route 95 are tourists) was CAW, CAV, CAU, it skipped CAT and the last one that I thought about or looked at was CAS.

NJ TAG

Three years ago, I had just come back from working in New Jersey. They have some customs or things they do a little bit differently than in Florida. While in New Jersey I got very exasperated when I would drive into a gas station for gasoline and the service station wouldn't have a bathroom. In Florida all businesses that serve the public must have restrooms. Anyway, I was back on a job in Daytona, Florida, coming home from work, having just left the job site. I thought to myself, "I've got to use the bathroom, so I'll pull into a service station." Then in absentmindedness, I thought, "I'm in New Jersey and I will have a problem trying to find a restroom." Then I said to myself, "No, I can go anywhere to a filling station because this is not New Jersey - I'm not in New Jersey." At that moment I looked ahead. The car in front of me had a New Jersey tag and I laughed. I glanced to the right in the right lane and the car in front of me there also had a New Jersey tag.

SCOFIELD

About five months ago, I was driving home from work, coming through Titusville going north. I was thinking of the father and son in Greek Mythology who had built wings and flown too close to the sun, melting their wings. I said "If you fly too close to the light, you'll be burned in the fire, just like the Scofield Bible that I burned." At that moment, I looked straight in front of me. On the car ahead, was a New York license plate with just one word, "Scofield.”

HE CARES

A week or so later, coming home from work, I was at the same place downtown where the "Scofield" thing happened. For that reason, I deliberately looked at the plate in front of me. I said," Yes, that's significant . . . that means something to me " But it wasn't something real important. As I was thinking about that, a car came by me on the left and I looked at the tag, it said, "He cares."

DADDY, JESUS CARES

That reminds me of something that happened three years ago when I was searching for answers. I burned my Bible and I shook my fist at God. Thinking I was a puppet, I said, "Pull the damn strings!" Then, my life went into chaos. I went to mental hospitals about five different times for a week or two at a time. In one instance, when I was in the local mental unit, my wife and child came down to see me. My wife said, "Archie, Kelly has something to give you," and he gave me a letter. Inside the envelope there was a scribbled four-year-old's printed note that said, "Daddy, I love you, Kelly." As I was being driven to the State Mental Hospital that same day, I often thought about the printed note in my pocket. I wasn't paying too much attention to what we passed, but once I happened to look up, and on a billboard (on the right side, just south of Jacksonville), in a child's scribbled handwriting, was a message. It said, "Daddy, Jesus cares."

(Incidentally, the number of that ambulance was 666.)

AZ AMORA

One day while working in Orlando, I was on top of a house and started to daydream for a moment while I was working. I thought, "God is the first and last, so God is the A and Z" I said "and God is love - A, Z and love," and I looked down on the ground directly beneath me. There was a car sitting in the driveway. It had a front license that said "AZ AMORA.”

LRD ACE

Once I saw a license plate that totally confused me. It said: LRD ACE. I didn’t know whether someone meant: the Lord is one; the Lord is number one, the Lord is first; or lard ass.

I AM

While driving on Interstate 95, I was thinking about God and about what God said his name was. I was thinking, "Well - God is the first, which is A (A being 1) and I said, "If God later was 1 + 12 (13) which is 'M'." I said, "That's Am and God said that He is 'I am'." I said, "Well, maybe that's right." Just then a big black car drove by and I glanced at the license plate. There were just three letters on the license plate: it said 'I Am'

I AM TOO

I saw a tag in Miami on a little white car just like the one on the big black car. . It also said,’I AM.’

ARCHIE

Once on the interstate when a large semi truck started to pass me, I felt there was something God was going to show me. As the rear of the bakery truck past, I could see a dough man, like Pillsbury’s, in a white baker’s uniform. Beneath the picture, it said, “Archie”.

MILE MARKER 142

As I passed a mile marker on the highway numbered 142, I thought, “God, that’s my initials (ADB). Beside it was another sign which said: ADOPT A HIGHWAY.

"ARCHIE, YOU'RE A PLUMBER!"

After my trailer burned I was coming down the highway south of Hartford, Connecticut feeling very down. The trailer had contained my personal things, jewelry, clothes, etc. I said "Archie Bryant you're a real plumber" and I used that expression, "You're a 'real plumber' for having left a fire on in the trailer." I had left it on because I didn't want everything in the trailer to freeze. Just at that moment a truck passed me - a white truck, and on the side it said "Bryant's Plumbing".

BRYANT OR CLARK

My wife called Scotty's to reserve a fertilizer spreader for a certain day. We had just recently married and she reserved it in the name of Archie Bryant and gave our address. Not remembering that, she went to pick it up. She handed the clerk her credit card which had her former husband's name on it, William Clark. After the clerk returned from checking the reservations, he said, "We have a reservation today for a William Clark, but it's not for the same address."

ARCHIE SMITH

One day I was at work last year, and it seemed that just everything had a significance. I'd been thinking for maybe thirty minutes on things backwards, and I said, "Wouldn't it be funny if, when I got to heaven, I would be named Archie Smith because my wife's name is Eunice Bryant and her maiden name used to be Smith." I said, "If she was the most important in heaven and I was just a tag-along, I would be tagged Archie Smith."

In a few minutes my boss came around with a bulletin. I thought, "Well, most everything has a meaning in it. Lord, I'm sure there's a message here in this memo somewhere - I just know there is." As I read down through it I was hunting for a message, forgetting totally what I had just been thinking about. I got down to the last line and I said, "Lord, there's nothing here that makes any sense." Then I looked at the signature of the man that had signed the bulletin. The name was R.G. Smith.

R.G. BRYANT

September 27, 1991, I went to Sears to have some work done on our car. After I gave the salesman at the desk my name, he started to fill out a work order. He then looked up and asked, “Is that R.G. Bryant?”

BRYANT

“God, life is what you make it. Everything is in your hands. You create reality and you destroy reality. You probably even created that grave yard for me”, I said as I approached one. As I passed it, I glanced over and noticed only one big tombstone. It had only one word on it: ‘BRYANT’.

I drove on over to one of my rentals I was working on. As I pulled up, the couple living next door walked over to my truck.

“Hello, we’re your neighbors and our name is Bryant,” the husband said.

WALK TO ARCHIE

Flipping channels one day, I stopped shortly to see a beautiful little child being prompted to “walk” in a “healing” service.

I prayed, “O God, this little child should not be ‘used’ in this manner. I wish I had him in my arms.” Just then the preacher commanded loudly, “Walk to Archie.”

MESSIAH

Cybill Shepard was describing all the qualities she was looking for in a man, speaking to a close friend on her TV show. As she went through the list, I thought, ‘She’s not looking for a man, she’s looking for the Messiah’.

When she finally finished, her friend replied, “You’re not looking for a man, you’re looking for the Messiah”.

ANOTHER ANGEL

September 3, 1991, I had inadvertently bumped my glass against something several times on the table, causing a ding or ping sound. I had done this enough times that I asked God “Why”?

Someone on TV was interviewing a famous person, I’m not sure but I think it was Lamb Chop’s creator, the late Sheri Lewis. During their conversation, a ping was heard from off camera and Sheri said in response, “Another angel just got their wings”.

POLICE FORCE

October 1, 1993, I had already seen the news on TV so when the news broadcaster started to again say, “Yeltsen said he would not use force”, I switched channels after the word “use”. The next channel I switched to showed a tank gun firing loudly, timed perfectly to where the broadcaster would have said “force”. Immediately, I switched to the next channel. There, someone on a soap commanded, “Call the police!” As I switched on through to a fourth channel, which was a cartoon, someone screamed, “PAAA LEEEZE!” (Please)

Picture

ZAPPED

March 10, 1994 my father was upset because his favorite program ‘Murder She Wrote’ was not on as scheduled in the TV Guide.

Just as I checked it myself, a commentator on ‘Weird Science’ said, “We just zapped ‘Murder She Wrote’.”

TRASH

I was deep in thought, ignoring the TV my wife was watching. I was revisiting the Florida Keys where we had vacationed. Somehow my mind got on the many signs along the highway that said: DON’T TEACH YOUR TRASH TO SWIM. I then glanced at the TV to see a huge plastic bag of garbage in the middle of a kitchen floor, which was the object of conversation.

CUTE

Let me tell you a joke that I think is cute.

A little boy carrying a paper sack gets on a bus and sits down next to a grandmotherly-type woman. As the bus proceeds, the bottom of the paper sack becomes wet. Noticing this, the woman reaches over and touches the bottom of the sack, then touched her tongue with her finger. “MMM, pickles?” she asked. “No, puppy.” the boy replied.

I don’t remember the ad, but I saw something similar on a TV commercial. It had to do with a boy carrying a paper sack on a bus and when I saw it, I was reminded of this joke. I remarked to Joan, “I thought that was cute.” “Cute?”, she questioned. “Yes, cute” I again replied. “The word ‘cute’ is only used to describe a woman,” Joan responded.

Just then someone on TV said, “Is she cute?” “No, she’s married” was the reply from another man. “That was cute,” I said.

DENTAL APPOINTMENT

One day my dentist office called reminding me of an appointment I had forgotten. Other plans I’d made, I had to cancel. Joan and I were watching a sitcom on TV that night. On the show a couple was making plans for the next day when their phone rang. I said to Joan in jest, “She can’t go, she has a dental appointment.” She answered the phone, turned around and said, “I can’t go, I have a dental appointment.”

WELCOME TO BOTTLENECK

One night I watched an inning or two of a baseball game on TV. Stottlemier was pitching, and even though his name had been mentioned several times, I kept forgetting it. I thought to myself, “What is his name? It’s something like bottle. Oh well, I’ll call him bottleneck until I hear his name called again.”

Tiring of the game I switched channels. A group of cowboys were riding into town and as the camera paned down the street, a large storefront sign said: WELCOME TO BOTTLENECK.

THE STUFF

After my wife finished reading some of this manuscript, she asked me why I had used the word "stuff" in one of my descriptions. I replied that it was a word used in the Old Testament of the Bible. Later while we were together, an air conditioning commercial came on the TV. Last, the announcer said, "Bryant, the right stuff to last." (We have a Bryant air conditioner in our home.)

SPORTS SHOW

Last week I was watching a sports show on TV. They were showing the torturous job that a catcher has in playing baseball. This reminded me of a verse of scripture in the Bible. At that moment, a verse of scripture was superimposed on the TV screen.

BEST OF TWO WORLDS

One day I was thinking and scribbling and said, "If I had my choice of things in life, what would I want?" I thought, "Well, let's see: Solomon was the richest man in the spiritual world - he had wisdom - and Solomon was the richest man in the physical world - he had gold," and I doodled 888, which is 12 x Jesus. I drew a line down through the middle 8. Split in half, this gave me a value on the left side of 83 (the value of wisdom) and the other half reads 38, which is the value of gold. I thought, "Well, this might be true. Jesus said, 'I've chosen you 12'." If you combine two 8's, that is a P and the other 8 has a value of H, this gives you the "PH" factor, which might be the gold in Ophir. Anyway, just as I had thought about this, scribbled the three 8's, drew a line through it and said, "That's the best of two worlds. “The physical gold and the spiritual wisdom.” a radio announcer said, "Get the best of two worlds." He was reading an advertisement on the radio.

"FBI DID IT"

One night I was watching a story about the FBI being bad on TV. When it ended, the FBI had killed several people. After the story was over I flipped to another channel. There a closed garage was pictured with a car idling in it. Someone had apparently committed suicide, and I said to my wife, "The FBI probably did it." That was the beginning of a story. At the end of the story the FBI was saying, "We didn't do it."

UKULELE

I am the world’s worst speller. I watched a movie last year where the misspelling of a particular word was an important part of the plot. The word was ‘Ukulele’. By itself, that’s not unusual. What is unusual is it’s the only word years ago I ever made a consensus effort to learn to spell.

POTTERY PIECES

How do I know there is a God? I sometimes reply when asked, “Well, it’s sort of like if I saw an old piece of broken pottery dish in the trunk of my car next to the jack and didn’t throw it away, then drive halfway across the country, have a flat tire, walk to the shoulder of the road for a rock to set my jack on, and when I pick it up, find a matching piece of pottery lying beneath it. Then I know there is a God. I saw a similar scenario on ‘Back Track’ with Jody Foster in December 1992. It had nothing to do with the plot of the story, but it matched the one I had been telling.

THE DEVIL AND McDEVLIN

April 10th is a very special day for me. It’s like the anniversary of a special event. It’s like a birthday, beginning, or turning point in time. I was taking a break one day at the lounge and the TV was on. Disney’s “The Devil and McDevlin” was on, but I wasn’t really watching it. I glanced over to see the devil giving McDevlin hell for not getting someone’s signature on a contract to sell his soul. He said, “It’s already April 10th and you don’t have their signature.”

HAVE AN ICE DAY

“As the Eskimo says, ‘Have an ice day’,” I joked as I ended a conversation with someone that morning. I had thought up the joke the day before, and had said it to people several times April 10, 1992.

Knowing that April 10th had something to do with a sacrificial lamb, I was not surprised when, as I past a TV, someone on a day time soap remarked, “What do you think I am? A sacrificial lamb?”

The following morning I opened the Florida Today newspaper to see the three daily lottery numbers for April 10, 1992. They were three, nine and five, which, to me, mean ICE (out of order). The Play 4 number was 1992. (A = 1; B = 2; C = 3, etc.)

ET

I have seen Stephen Spilberg’s “ET” twice. The first time was right after its release; and then again about two years ago. In the movie, a little boy pricks his finger on a radial saw blade and ET heals the wound. Both times that I saw “ET”, I had pricked my finger on a radial saw blade that day. I don’t ever recall doing that any other time.

FREE WILLIE

Joan and I were watching the movie, ‘Free Willie’ on TV. Willie had been loaded onto a truck to be carried to the ocean. As the truck was rolling down the road, I remarked to Joan,”A tree will probably fall across the road.” The next scene showed the truck coming to a stop because a large tree was lying across the road.

“I WOULDN’T WASH YOUR WATCH”

June 13, 1992, Joan was washing clothes when my father asked her, “I didn’t leave my watch in my dirty pants pocket, did I?” Joan replied, “Dad, I wouldn’t wash your watch.” When she finished washing and drying another load, she found her own watch in the dryer.

TIMEXES

On June 19, 1992 a very unusual thing had happened involving my watch that day. While sitting at the bar at the Citrus Lounge, I was thinking about telling it to Chick and Barbara next to me, when he suddenly brought up the subject of watches. When he showed me his, I realized his Timex was identical to mine.

GATOR ADE

I had installed another bathtub in a rental unit the same day the Timex story appeared. Going home, I was thinking how fortunate I was to find a nice, used tub at Alligator Plumbing for only $30.00, especially when I thought I was going to have to buy a new one. Just as I was thinking this, I looked up ahead to see I was behind a Gator freight truck turning to cross the railroad tracks in front of Alligator Plumbing. As I saw this, the radio announcer started advertising a restaurant in Orlando called Gator Dockside.

The next day as I crossed the same tracks again, a Gator freight truck was in front of me.

JETS

One day I was sitting in my quiet place and I thought to myself, "If none of these things had happened, I would still look for beauty and I would look for love." I had a calm peace about this. Then, out of the blue, two jet fighter planes came directly over my head flying very low, perhaps five hundred feet, and extremely slow, with their flaps and speed-breaks out. I thought to myself, "This is one of my first loves. This is something that I used to do." This was very moving. Something I valued so much was happening at that moment.

TIME 3:51 A-Z

One morning while sitting in a quiet place I looked at my wrist watch and I saw that it had stopped. I thought, "I'll guess at the time and put a time on my watch - 9:00 - 10:00 o'clock." I thought to myself, "Lord, you know what time it is - I don't" and I forgot about it. I was in a cafe having coffee that afternoon and wondered what time it was. I looked at my watch and then thought - "No, that's probably not right," - I said - "I guessed at that time" and so I looked up on the wall for the time. My watch had said the same thing that was on the wall. In other words, I had set the watch that morning - exactly right according to that restaurant clock. The hands on the clock read 3:51, which is a significant number to me. If you add all the alphabet together (A being one and Z having a value of 26) the total is 351.

SOUTH STREET

In 1981 I was driving east on South Street in Titusville when a grapefruit was thrown into my windshield. I never mentioned this to anyone. Five years later, Joan came home one day and told me that someone had thrown a citrus fruit into her windshield on South Street. This occurred in the same block where I had been hit.

In April 1991 while returning from taking this manuscript to be retyped, I received a broken windshield from a rock thrown into it. this happened on South Street just one block west of the previous incidents. The bill for the new windshield was $351.00.

ORANGES

My wife packed a large box to mail to South Dakota containing Christmas presents for her son’s whole family. She made sure that, in addition to the gifts, she had room for several fresh Florida oranges from our backyard.

“Even if the clerk at the Post Office asks you if you’re mailing oranges, tell him ‘no’,” she instructed me as I left with the heavy box.

As I sat the package on the counter, the postal clerk joked, “You’re not mailing oranges, are you?” With my wife’s final admonition fresh on my mind, I would have lied to my mother.

Rick called from South Dakota the next week thanking his mother for the gifts. He said, “The package arrived while we all were away, but the kids came home first, so they opened the box. Mom, did you mail some oranges in that box?”

COAT IN ORANGE GROVE

This hitchhiker was working for me building brick steps in front of my house. When I came home one day I was upset with the poor workmanship that he was doing. I said, "Bruce, just get your things and here's some money. Leave, I'll do the job myself." When I handed him the money, he threw it up in the air and walked out into the orange grove. I thought to myself, "Lord, it's in your hands." Two or three hours later, after dark, he came back and said, "Something very unusual happened in the orange grove." I asked, "What happened?" He said, "Well, I was very upset. I was out there talking to God. It started to get dark and I was cold. I said, 'God, I'm cold.' I turned around and down on the ground was this blue jacket."

GOOD ORANGES

One day I was telling a friend some of these experiences and I asked, "Don't these things ever happen to you?" She said, "no." I said, "Well, just be aware of them or look for them." The next week I went over to her house, and as I pulled up her mother said, "You've got to listen to what has happened." The daughter said, "Archie, you know I promised to fix a salad for a party and I wanted to make an orange salad. I like to pick out nice fruit, so I went to the grocery store but I couldn't find any nice looking oranges. I went to another grocery store and looked for good oranges. I thought and talked to the Lord and said, 'Lord, you know that I need some nice oranges for this salad,' Just at that moment as I thought this in my mind, some little old lady tapped me on the back and said, 'Mamma, would you like some nice oranges? I've got some growing in my yard.' I went over and got my oranges for the salad."

A LITTLE RAIN

The next week she said something else had happened. She related to me that she was coming home in her car - we had had a very dry spell at that time in Florida - and she said, "Lord, you know that we need rain - give us a little rain." At that moment, she said, a few drops of rain sprinkled on her windshield. She said "I got just exactly what I asked for."

EXACT FISH

This same lady was with me at Morrison's. We went through the serving line, got our food and started to the table. I looked at her face and knew something was wrong or something had happened. I asked, "What is it?" and she responded, "Something very strange just happened. As we were going through the serving line I imagined that you would pick fish - why did you pick fish?" I said, "I don't know, I never eat fish - this is the first time I think that I have ever picked out fish for lunch." She said, "Well, while we were in line I imagined that you were going to have fish, but not only fish, the very exact fish that the server picked for you."

FISH BAIT

This past summer, I was at Sebastian Inlet in a small boat with my stepson. We were both fishing with shrimp and weren't doing very well. Rick decided to try some dead shiners three or four inches long. He put one on his hook, and I continued to fish with shrimp. He got a bite and when he pulled the line up, we could see a fish had taken a chunk out of his shiner. He let his line back down and lost his bait the next good bite. Five or ten minutes later, I finally got a bite with my shrimp. I jerked my pole, and I thought I had hooked a fish. As I reeled it in, I could see a fish on my line, but, it was a dead shiner with a chunk out of it.

REBAIT

A couple of years before, I was fishing in the surf and got a good bite. When I pulled my line in, my casting bait was gone. An hour or so later I reeled in my line from a cast and hooked to my lure was the previous one that I had lost.

153 FISH

For about a year, because I found exactness in everything else, I was beginning to suspect that everything had an exact value, . . . it was just hidden, if I couldn't find it. And, because of relationships of hidden numbers in the Bible, I could come up with no other explanation than that the value of PI was 3.15. I wanted to remember the date I decided this, but I didn't have a good way of doing that. For a number of months, I had expected another nation to come into the UN before a certain day that spring. When I got home that afternoon, I read the paper and found that another nation had been added to the 152 nations in the UN, making a total of 153. I first saw this as possibly the 153rd fish mentioned in John 21:11. I was surprised too, that, to my knowledge, no preacher or prophet, nor someone in the religious world had not seen a gradual building of the nations to a sum of 153. Incidentally, the name of that nation is Zimbabwe, and starts with a Z, which is the last letter of the alphabet. To me 351, 135, 3.15 and 153 are all "one." Jesus said, "I and my Father are One."

FISHES!

My three-year-old granddaughter was alone with me going to ‘Grandpa’s’ house. The truck radio was playing a soft song, “When I Fall in Love” and she was quiet.

I thought to myself, “I wonder how much of life a three year old grasps? How many of the words to this song will she understand? Is she even aware of the radio playing a song?”

My answer came when, as the singer sang: “In a restless world like this is”, she exclaimed, “Fishes!”

NAZARETH

The evening of December 7, 1991, I spent about 30 minutes thinking about one word, ‘Nazareth’. I made a crazy sentence using the letters. . . In AZ (first and last) are MAN (th). All this was done as I showered and dressed.

I then walked into the den where my wife was watching “Wheel of Fortune.” The answer to the final puzzle was ‘NAZARETH’.

REARVIEW

July 31, 1991, I left home to go to the store to get some super glue. The rearview mirror had fallen off the windshield in our car. Starting out, my intent was to buy super glue, but while on my way, I decided to go to Discount Auto Parts for a glue, made specially for that purpose.

As I went to the front register with the glue, there were only two other customers in the very large store. One was paying for just one item ahead of me, a glue kit just like the one I had in my hand. I said to the customer who walked up behind me in line, “Looks like a ‘rearview mirror’ day”. “Yes”, he said, “I’m a salesman at a car lot and three rearview mirrors fell off this morning. I had enough special glue to repair only two of them, so I just used super glue on the third”.

A couple of weeks later, I was reading a story in Reader’s Digest about a man who had died of cancer, written by his widow. She wrote, “One day I came home and our son was very excited. He exclaimed, “Mom, Dad finally got out of bed to do something. My rearview mirror fell off and he said he knew of a special glue to fix it. He insisted that he go with me to the store to get some”

Ref. Reader’s Digest Sept 91, pg. 209

MOUNTAIN CLIMBERS

One night I was doing something and the TV was on. As I glanced up a picture flashed on TV of two mountain climbers harnessed together falling off the edge of a mountain. As I got up to go to another room, I reached for a Reader's Digest from a magazine rack. When I opened it up, a picture of two mountain climbers falling off a cliff appeared.

ORDER FROM CHAOS

I was compiling notes about these happenings in my life. I took a break from them and picked up a Reader's Digest and started to read the January 1991 issue. I was on page 157 "Points to Ponder" reading the first item. As I read that, I lost my concentration and started thinking about how I might prove to someone that God existed. How would I prove that order didn't come out of chaos - it was sort of like the thousand monkeys with a thousand typewriters. Then I got back to reality and started reading the second item, and I quote:

Ronald Reagan: “Sometimes when I'm faced with an atheist, I am tempted to invite him to the greatest gourmet dinner that one could ever serve, and when we have finished eating that magnificent dinner, ask him if he believes there's a cook.”

1 Speaking My Mind, by Ronald Reagan, 1989, pg.442, Simon & Schuster Co. Inc. Reprinted with permission from the January 1991 “Reader’s Digest.”

CHARLES OSGOOD

Charles Kuralt wrote a book about his experiences on the road. The excerpts that appeared in Reader’s Digest were so unusual, I likened them to mine.

One story told of a reporter with him wishing for a cold beer while rowing through a swamp. Moments later, he reached down into the shallow water and pulled up a six-pack of beer.

While watching ‘Sunday Morning’ on TV, November 10,1996, I was thinking how similar the show’s style was to that of Charles Kuralt’s. I knew the narrator’s first name was Charles, but I couldn’t remember his last name. I wanted to make note of it the next time his name was mentioned. Joan was sitting with me making conversation, unaware of my desire to catch a person’s name if it appeared on TV. Five or ten minutes later, the announcer said, “For ‘Sunday Morning” this is Charles Osgood.” Joan then interrupted her train of thought by asking me, “What was that last word he said?” “Osgood” I replied.

ADORE

JESUS said he was a door. I thought to myself, “Doors are for keeping people out as well as letting them in.” I glanced down at the March 2002 Reader’s Digest on the table. The cover said, “Immigration Now, Who To Let In. Who To Keep Out.”

434

Because I use a system whereby every word has a value, everything means something. It must fit as a piece of a puzzle. This is my own theory, but everything that I see fits in this puzzle. I found this code years ago. When I say I found it, I realize that I can't find anything unless God shows it to me. "A" equals one and "Z" equals 26. Because I sort of peeped into heaven, I saw something beautiful. I don't know whether you'd call it a vision or imagination, but I wouldn't accept it. Then this system, this simple code made all of this fall into place. What I saw was what few preachers preach about, and what you can't find much information about in the libraries. I accept that and there's a reason for it. It is the significance of the one piece of gold from which Moses made the top to the Ark of the Covenant. (the lid to the box in the Holy of Holies.) God described in detail how Moses was to make it. I have a numerical value for this. The number is 434. (74+360 or Jesus + nothing.)

I was up in the front office at General Dynamics and had 434 on my mind. I had told the personnel director that I wanted to change my charity account to equal my union dues. He said, "The union dues changed in January, and they're up to such and such figure, and you pay your charity weekly. "So," he said, "here's what we'll do - we'll take the new union dues, multiply that by 12 and divide it by 52." He did that on the scratch pad and said, "I come up with $4.34."

I got to thinking about 434 and I realized that highway 434 in Orlando was the place that I spent the first full night in Florida when I came here ten years ago. Then I found 434 in the 62 weeks in Daniel. That would be 434 days. 69 weeks is broken down into 7 and 62 weeks, and there's no reason stated there, but it's simply telling me that 62 X 7 is 434 and that has significance.

One day I was at Morrison's and as I was eating, I was thinking about all these 434's that had been coming up. In fact DCD, which in the code is 434 - was put on Brevard County license plates. In other words, this is the only county in the state that was given that numerical designation. That was very significant to me as well. I was thinking on all these 434's when in walks this preacher and his wife. They sat at a table nearby, and throughout my whole meal I wanted to go over and tell him that I thought I may have found out something. Then my better self, because of my past experiences said, "No, leave him alone. But I want to tell him about these 434's that keep coming up," and something said, "No, just leave him alone." Finishing my meal, I picked up my ticket and looked at it , it was $4.34.

I bought an old car in Eufaula, Alabama, and I went to pick it up in a 1970 Marquis. The gas gauge had been out for about three years - so as I started to leave, I noted the mileage mentally. I do this when I fill up - otherwise I may run out of gas. I noted when I filled up that day that the mileage read 410. I thought, "How can I remember that?" I said, "Well, I'll think of a 410 gauge shotgun." That was my way of remembering what my mileage was as I started out for Alabama. Before I left I made a one-mile detour to see somebody, and then on my way I picked up somebody and took them to a filling station - went out of my way, and I got lost one time because of a detour. As I began to approach Eufaula, Alabama I looked at my speedometer and guesstimated what my mileage there would be. I said, "It looks like it might turn out 434 miles added onto 410. But no, that really wouldn't happen. I would be searching for answers, I would be trying to say, 'Is God real? Would God do that?' even though I 'm looking ahead that that might happen." The more I read the number of miles to Eufaula, the more I realized that it might work out to be 434 miles. There's a lake on the east side of Eufaula, and the city boundary is on the west end of that bridge as you enter the city. As I hit that city limit sign of Eufaula I looked at my speedometer and it read 844, which would have worked out, subtracting the 410 to exactly 434 miles.

It took me a while, but I finally realized that the initials of the company I had worked for five years were GDCD, General Dynamics Convair Division, and I knew that GD has the same value as Jesus (74), and that CD was 34, which has the same value as one, so GDCD meant Jesus + 1. It also had reference to "a city (CD) on a hill" if Jesus was the hill and the CD was the 0 "nothing in me" split.

In 434, I see hidden a total of 11 - 4, 3 & 4 - Jesus said, "The kingdom of heaven is like 3 measures in which a woman hid leaven," but I read it as 11.

ASS & FOAL

On this same road - one day coming home, - I was thinking about Zachariah 9:9 which John sort of quotes when he says "this description of Jesus riding into town on an ass fulfills Zachariah 9:9." I'm thinking in my mind, "that doesn't fulfill that prophecy." I said, "Zachariah 9:9 talks about an ass and a foal, and he only describes an ass, one donkey," - and as I'm thinking this, I look out to the right. There (near Christmas, FL) came an ass and a foal running along side the road.

About six months ago I was thinking about this happening while I was driving (the ass and the foal and looking out the window and seeing an ass and a foal). I came to a stop at a red light and there in front of me was a horse trailer with a horse inside and all I could see was the ass.

CHRISTOPHER CROSS

Three names that I call the Trinity, as well as Father, Son and Holy Spirit, are Christ, afar and cross. I had these three names for a year and a half and it fits everything as far as Trinity - Christ, the golden wedge of ophir and cross, which has the same numerical value as Jesus - 74. The value of all three equals 217 (one half of 434).

One morning, the radio woke me up, announcing what had happened on the Grammy Awards the night before. Three awards went to Christopher Cross for Best Album, Best Song and Best Singer. This was just one way of God showing me this was true, and this was hidden.

6 CENTS

Man, I think, has six senses.

Wages for six days work at a penny a day equals six cents. Pentecost might have something to do with penny cost. (point, penny, and Jesus all have a value of 74)

Each of our senses has a zero in the middle.

One side is plus; one is minus, just like our bank account.

Here’s an example: For feeling, plus equals pleasure. Zero equals numb. Pain equals minus.

Man’s sixth sense is balance. It is located in the ear but has nothing to do with hearing. If you lose it, you just want to die. Have you ever been seasick or air sick? The word ‘Eve’ is balanced. The word ‘Level’ is balanced. Cold (34) is the opposite of hot (43). Live is the opposite of evil, and lived is opposite of devil. God said he loves balance. Psalms 37:37 says, “ Mark the perfect man...” 37 equals fold, 37+ 37 equals Jesus.

While tending bar one day, it crossed my mind to explain this to a couple of customers by using seven pennies but then I decided not to pursue the matter. After they had left, I went over to where they had sat to clean up. In front of me was a seven-cent tip.

MARK THE PERFECT MAN

Returning from Miami, I was thinking about God ‘making the perfect man’ (Psalm 37:37) Also God’s making Cain. From that train of thought, I began to think about how perfect God had made the human body. There is nothing extra. There is nothing that does not serve a useful purpose. Just then a truck passed me that said, HUMAN DIAGNOTICS, on the back. My curiosity caused me to speed up and come along side the truck. There was a company sign on the door that said: ABET (ABEL, except for one mark being in the wrong place). I have suspected for years that Cain’s name was Ain and God hid him by adding a “C” in front.

NO VERTIGO

Dr. Mark Galfo assured me that my vertigo would go away after I had seen him about having several days of dizziness.

That weekend, Joan’s sister and her husband were visiting. We all agreed to get dressed and go up to our club for the evening. When Joan and I returned to the den, they were still their and hadn’t started to dress. They said, “We decided not to go.” Joan and I sat down and there were a few moments of silence. To make conversation, Joan asked, “Honey, how is your vertigo?” I replied, “Well, I’m all dressed up and no vertigo.”

SMELLS

Early October 14,1996, I was thinking about the sense of smell. I also thought about the combination of fragrances God instructed the Israelites to use in the Holy Place. He specifically forbids them to make or use it for any other purpose. I then opened the Florida Today paper to find on the front page, an article testing the effect of good smells on people.

FOR ADULTS ONLY

Early one morning in August 1996, I sat down and wrote a letter to the Florida Today newspaper. I said some heavy things and knew most of them would not be understood, especially if one was not mature. I thought, “Children can only comprehend simple things. This is complex so I think I’ll title my letter ‘FOR ADULTS ONLY.’

I finished the letter, opened the morning paper to the editorial page and glanced at a letter to the editor. It started “About that article titled ‘FOR ADULTS ONLY’.”

Seeing that, I never sent mine in.

(Golden Rule for babies: Coo unto others, as you would have them coo unto you.)

NUMERICAL IS A MIRACLE

Once I saw a movie about Jewish life and one of the actors mentioned that every letter in the Jewish alphabet has a numerical value.

NEW MATH

“I’ve got a great new way of counting and I’d like to teach it in school, but the teacher’s and parents would never permit it”, I thought to myself.

“They’ve got a new system of counting in our school’s” the TV newsman announced, and followed with a full report.

THE KEYS

Five years ago, I was finishing a church in Winter Park. I'd built an elevator in the church and tried it out once, and it had worked fine. As I was going to go up the elevator again, two electricians accompanied me. Between floors, the elevator stopped, and we were stuck inside. I phoned the office to have the elevator company send someone to open the elevator. Sitting there in the elevator I'm thinking, "What shall we do? What shall we talk about? I have a captive audience." I thought, "Well, the first thing I might do to start an interesting conversation would be to give these two men the keys." I was thinking of a verse of scripture where God said, "Only the sons of Zadok would serve the Lord's table." If you turn Zadok backwards, phonetically it says codaz (the code is AZ).

As I was thinking about this, one of the electricians reached in his pocket and pulled out some keys and said to the other, "Here, let me give you these keys." With that startling statement, I kept my mouth shut.

KEYS TO THE CITY

I believe that wisdom is a city. Jesus said, “ A city on a hill can not be hid.” I believe a fence is a C D. A CD on a hil (child) can knot. (be hid)

Wisdom is seeing both sides of the fence and knowing where the fence is. (zero)

A dumb king and a wise queen had a child they named Wisdom.

Three days after I wrote the above, a book review in the Florida Today mentioned ‘zero’ on a fence, September 15, 1996.

THE MIRACLE CITY

September 10, 1996, I took some pictures and negatives to Miracle Photo in Titusville to have more prints made. I told the owner that I was writing a book about miracles in the “Miracle City”, and if she wanted to, she could make copies for her business since it was also named “Miracle Photo.” I told her I thought the scene in the photos was a miracle. “This is the Miracle City, isn’t it?” I asked. “It used to be, but not anymore.” she replied.

BE HID

For months, I had known what Jesus meant when he said, “A city on a hill cannot be hid.”

I was working at Harris Corp. on a building and glanced to the east. A sign said ‘C D CARE CENTER’. I then moved a little to one side to see the full sign. The letters ‘HIL’ had been hidden by something. The sign actually read, ‘CHILD CARE CENTER’. A childcare center is what the trinity of God is all about. A C D on a HIL can knot (be hid).

PH

One day I was compiling notes on PH. I debated whether to include them in my book. In PH, I see the words God, Jesus, and gap. The word Jesus has a numerical value of 74. My pool test kit says that a PH of 7.4 is perfect. When a tropical storm's winds reach 74 miles per hour, it is then classed as a hurricane. Joseph, Mary's husband's name contains PH. The golden wedge of Ophir includes PH. Ph plus one equals phone.

As I was thinking of these things, NASA began a news conference on TV following the return of the shuttle. The first question by news reporters brought a response that NASA was "concerned about the PH in the fuel cells."

7:04

Occasionally I flip the TV to the weather channel. Once I turned there and found 704 in both the upper right and upper left corners of the screen. It was 7:04AM, July 4, 1991; 704 only appears there for one minute, morning and evening, once a year. (24 times 74 (Jesus) = 1776 Rev. 4:4)

#704

To me, the number 704 is one of the names of God. I see in G, O, and D, “Seven circles folded.” Jesus said there would be ‘one fold’. There are seven spirits of God. (Rev. 4:5)

The children of Israel circled Jericho seven times, making a total of 2520 degrees. The two witnesses witnessed for a total of 2520 days. (2 times 1260) This is no accident.

704 says, “An ass and a colt, the fold of an ass.” (ZA. 9:9)

704 says, “First, last and nothing.”

704 says, “Alpha, Omega, and nothing.”

704 says, “Beginning, end, and nothing.”

704 says, “Jesus plus ‘nothing in me’.”

704 says “Where two or three are gathered together.”

704 says, “11 hidden on three measures.”

704 says, “You 12” (7, 4, and zero).

704 says, “88 x 8 (Jesus x 12 = 888)

704 says, “The starting point is in the middle of God.” (Mark 12:30) (12 x 30 degrees = 360 degrees) Here, O is real. Here in reality, O is real. Here in God, O is real.

In the morning and evening, when I see 7:04, I thank God for that day.

When I see 704 on Archie Bunker’s door, I think God.

When I see 704 on a General Dynamics submarine, I think God.

When I see 704 over a church door in a movie, I think God. When I think or see 704, I thank God.

SKY LINE

One morning at 7:04 A. M., I looked through the pine trees north of my patio to see a contrail-like cloud, but much larger, in otherwise a clear blue sky. I thought nothing about it until I saw another exactly like it in exactly the same place at 7:04 the next morning. I took a picture of it.

CROSS IN THE SKY

I took the picture of a cross in the sky in the spring of 1996 from my back yard.

Picture

WASH CLOTH

One day I had been thinking about the summitry of every living thing, including leaves and grass. I had pictured a leaf in my mind. My wife came to me to expressingly show me a perfect imprint of a leaf on a washcloth. She asked me if I knew how the stain got on it.

GIFT TICKETS

One day I wrote two numbers down on a scratch pad because they are, to me, very special numbers. The numbers were 1490 and 1491. I then glanced at two tickets to a benefit basketball game given to Joan and I by friends. They were lying next to the scratch pad. The ticket numbers were 1490 and 1491. We saw the game and I saved the stubs.

CITIZEN KANE

One morning Harry Smith mentioned on TV that the movie, "Citizen Kane" was about to be 50 years old. When he said that it was released in 1941, I jotted the title and date in a notebook. In the next breath he asked a guest, "In your notebook, is this the best movie made?" (To me "Cain" and "1941" are synonymous.)

NIAGARA FREIGHT

As I was getting out of my car in front of the Ranch House Restaurant one day, I noticed the license plate on an automobile parked next to me -"1491" - which meant 'NIA' --I think that's the same Nia that was meant when Jesus said, "The kingdom of heaven is nigh." I said, "Thank you, Lord" - I see this quite often. But just as I saw it that day, a big express truck came down the road in front of me. Written in big letters on the side of it was Niagara Freight.

God said that the Pass Over (1491 BC) should be remembered forever. Roosevelt said that 1941 would live in infamy.

16-PENNY NAIL

At the same house in Geneva, I was sawing with a power saw through some old wood to fit an outside corner. When I completed my cut, there, embedded on one side, was one-half of a sixteen-penny finish nail. I had not cut diagonally, or across, but had split the nail all the way down the middle as if it had been placed in a tooling machine. I gave that nail to the owner of the house, telling her that it was similar to the things that happen to me daily.

DOOR STAPLE

Like the 16-penny nail in my first book, I cut through a door in Miami and sliced a staple in half. I threw it away.

The next day, I was thinking about what a miracle that was, because I had cut through the only plane in three infinities that would still produce the shape of a staple. As I thought about this, I looked out into the newly raked dirt yard, and something shiny caught my eye. It was the staple half that I had tossed aside. I still have it today.

SALAD IN THE MIDDLE

One night Joan and I were having dinner out. In our discussion, I commented that I believed life was like a feast or dinner with (I was about to say "the salad in the middle"). At that moment the waitress came over with a large bowl of salad and said, "I'm going to place this right here in the middle." (Salad has a numerical value of 37, one half of 74, Jesus. Fold equals 37. 37 equals C G, center of gravity. 74 over 2 equals Za. 9:9)

GOLD IN THE MIDDLE

For years I knew the center of heaven was gold. As I entered the large convention center in Sioux Falls, South Dakota for a middle school state teachers conference, I smiled when I saw their large banner proclaiming: EDUCATOR’S FIND GOLD IN THE MIDDLE.

NO SIGN OF RAIN

My letter on the “Citrus Lounge” sign blew off in a storm. I waited about two weeks for a dry time when I was there, to glue it back up. Finally, I was there on a beautiful day, so I gathered what I needed: glue, letter, ladder, etc., and went out front.

As I finished covering the back of the letter with glue, big raindrops stared falling on my head. There was one tiny rain cloud overhead, and I hadn’t even looked up.

THE POINT

April 20, 1992, while I am thinking about directions to go, and from what point to start, the TV was on and occasionally I would be aware of it. I was basically trying to define what a point is. At that moment, Hugh Downs said, “The point is the beginning of any direction.”

The numerical value of ‘point’, in my code, is 74.

THEORY ON NOTHING

March 24, 1994, I was theorizing about God and creation (reality). I had long known that the starting point was zero, the inferred or assumed number at the beginning end of a measuring tape. Here, O is real.

My father was watching one of his favorite programs when I overheard Perry Mason remark, “You built a whole theory on nothing.”

‘Nothing’ in my code has a value of 87.

‘Truth’ in my code has a value of 87.

Smoke Ring

While my musician was on break, I was sitting at the bar talking with him about the importance of zero. I don’t think I got my ‘point’ across. I watched him as he returned to the bandstand. As I turned my head forward again, a perfect circle of smoke from my cigarette was rising in front of me.

YOU 12

What did Jesus mean when he said, “I have chosen you 12 and one of you is a devil?” If you add the letter ‘L’ to many words, it changes the meaning entirely. I say ‘L’ because in my code for the value of letters, ‘L’ has a value of 12. If you add then ‘L’ to ‘word’, you then have ‘world’. If you add ‘L’ to God, you have ‘gold’. ‘L’ added to ‘roof’ makes ‘floor’ (foundation). All of the music ever composed or played contains only 12 notes.

Then Jesus could have meant ‘12 pairs, like the 70 he sent out by twos. The animals also went into the ark by twos. There are 24 elder around the throne of God in revelation. That might be 12 pairs. That might be the ‘12’ in Rev.4:4). One of ‘‘EL’’. God’s name is ‘EL’. Could he have meant ‘L’? The value of ‘Jesus’ in the code equals a total of 74. If you multiply 74 times 12, you have 888; three infinities turned 90 degrees. If you multiply 88 times 8, you have 704 - ‘GOD’ (Jesus, [GD] plus nothing ‘in me’. John 14:30) 24X 74 =1776

MUSIC IS A GIFT OF GOD

When I saw a little framed remark on my step-daughter-in-law’s wall in her music room, I smiled. It said, “Music is a gift of God.” If God meant the 12 notes in all of music when he said “I have chosen you 12, then ‘you 12’ plus God (one plus 12) would equal 13 (M). So the word music could say “13, us I see.” (m,us i c)

Are there not twelve hours in a day?

Are there not twelve, ours in a day?

A few months later, April 1, 1994, while waiting before Dr. Booho’s office opened, I saw a lady waiting also. She had on a T-shirt, which said, “Music is a gift of God.”

WORLD SERIES

Leaving a job site one day, I pulled up to a red light, reached down to a pad on the truck seat and drew a triangle. On one corner I wrote "God," on another I put "love," and on another I put "1260." I said, "This totals up to over 47 million." At that moment the World Series was on the radio. The announcer said baseball was "a pastime loved by over 47 million fans."

ONE FOLD

One day 11 years ago I was wondering what Jesus meant when he said, "I have chosen you twelve." I decided to multiply the first twelve numbers together. When I had reached eleven, I ran out of space on my calculator so I started again. I decided to skip the number 10. Then I could get a total for 12 numbers by adding a zero later. The answer I got for these numbers was 47,900,160. I then wrote down 1260 and the numbers for God and love. The total for those three multiplied together equaled 47,900,160. Then I multiplied the Trinity times the Word and came up with 47,900,160. I thought my computer was going berserk.

A week later I took "one fold" and multiplied that by 99 sheep and love. The answer was 47,900,160. For over 15 more years, I knew there was a number that when subtracted from the above would result in reversing the 900 and 160, but I didn’t bother to find it.

One night in 1996, I was very bored, so I picked up a calculator and punched in 74, squared it, and then multiplied that by 135. (ace, one) The result was 739,260. Having no purpose in mind, I then subtracted that from 47,900,160. The answer was 47,160,900.

STRINGS AND THINGS

A few years ago I had a dream that came true. Here is my dream described as clearly as I can remember.

I was on a road to the Super Bowl in heavy traffic when my old car ran out of gas. I started walking, hoping there was a gas station close by. No one stopped to offer me a lift. I guess they all were in a hurry. I heard one shout as he passed "On to the f---ing Super Bowl."

Anyway, after walking several miles, I realized I was going to miss the big game, which put me sort of down. Suddenly I came upon an old building on the side of the road. I could tell by its condition, it had not been used for years. Weeds had grown around it and the broken windows were all boarded up. There was a faded sign nailed across the front door that said, "Zadok String Factory, Keep Out."

Since it was starting to storm, I tried the door and to my surprise it opened. Upon entering, I could see that inside, there was only one huge room. By the dim light from the open door I could see nothing inside but a pile of scrap string heaped in the middle of the floor. Along the full length of one wall, a table was set up and a long measuring tape ran the full length of it.

Having nothing to do because of the storm outside and having no radio to listen to the Super Bowl, I reached into the pile of string and began to pull. Finally finding a single string, I took it to the wall and placed it on the tape measure stretched along the table. It measured 47,900,160 inches. I thought to myself, "What a nut I am!"

I then went back to the pile of scrap string and grabbed a handful. After seeing I had taken three strings from the pile, I laid them end-to-end next to the one on the table. The three butted together matched the single one in length exactly, 47,900,160 inches. This motivated me to do this again. I found two strings, laid them next to the others and the two, end to end totaled 47,900,160 inches. I repeated the procedure the fourth time, again with the same results.

Finally the weather calmed and I walked to a phone along the road. I called my best friend to see who had won the ball game. He said Dallas had won and I really had missed an exciting game. He remembered that once during a break in play, the TV announcer had estimated that over forty seven million people were watching the game.

I opened my newspaper the next morning to find that someone had won $47,900,160 in a lottery. I thought, "Lucky man."

Fourteen years later, I was cleaning out my garage when I found an old spool of string. I started to throw it in the trash but then thought about my dream. I measured it and remarked to myself, "This does not make any sense." I had come up with 739,260 inches. Why, I don't know, but I subtracted 739,260 from 47,900,160 and the answer was 47,160,900.

This "dream" is like ‘One Fold’ the last story in my book, Miracles In My Life. No one has ever commented or asked a question about it. I wonder who will win the next Super Bowl?

The evening of the day I wrote the above, Thursday September 5, 1996, I took all the trash baskets in our home to the large one in the kitchen to empty. (The next day, Friday, was garbage pickup day.) As I turned the last basket upside-down, emptying its contents, there was a pile of scrap string lying on the top of all the papers. I placed it in an envelope to save.

The following morning as I was having coffee, I thought about the three temptations of Jesus in the wilderness. I have heard many sermons on the subject, some long and some quite confusing. I thought, "I'd like to condense this to simplicity by trying to figure out what God was saying. I finally came up with one simple explanation for Jesus' answer for each temptation. I decided that if the subject was ever brought up in my presence, I would say, in a nut shell, Jesus answered after temptation number one, "Don't compromise a position.", in reply to the second he said "Don't compromise a position.", and for the third, "Don't compromise a position."

A few hours later, I was with 3 men playing golf at La Cita. On the fairway of hole number 6, Norm Herman turned to Tom Hemingway and said, "Tom, in business, the three most important considerations are: Number one, location. Number two, location. Finally number three is location. There are also three rules of golf to remember: Rule number one is position. Rule number two is position, and rule number three is position."

LIFE IS BUT A DREAM

I said, “God, life and reality are products of your imagination. Everything is exactly the way it is because you want it that way. In other words, reality is God’s dream.” Just then the music ended on my truck radio and a commercial began about a resort in Daytona Beach. After describing his fantasy about going there, the announcer said, “Wow, what a dream. How did this sand get in my bed?”

NO SWEAT

Driving home from golf, I was thinking about God’s law to the priests in the holy place. “They may wear linen clothing but nothing that causes sweat.”, I said to myself.

At that moment a commercial commenced on the radio. A man began by saying, “I’m a long distance runner and I sweat a lot.”

TAKE STOCK IN AMERICAL

Jesus said, “I have chosen you twelve.” I had thought about that a great deal, and had come up with many possible answers: 12 apostles; 12 months; “Are there not 12 hours in a day?” 12 notes of music; 12 pairs around the thrown in Rev. 4:4; 12 thirties equals 360, a circle (MK. 12:30). The letter “L” to me has a value of 12 - “EL” is one name for God.

One day my boss at General Dynamics handed me a government bond brochure which said on the front, “Take Stock in America”. I thought, “If God chose America and he added 12 (an L to it), it would say Americal (A Merical).”

After I added an “L” to America, the brochure read, “Take Stock in Americal.” Then I scrutinized the brochure further. When I turned it 90 degrees, the skyline of mountains in the background showed the classic profile or silhouette of Jesus.

Every land on this Earth is surrounded by water, sort of like the firmament in the midst of waters God called ‘Heaven’ in Genesis 1:8.

THE MAIL BOX

I drove to a commercial mailing store to rent a box for an address to order this book. As I approached the counter, I could see a full size poster of the Xerox monk standing inside a back room. He was holding a sign that said, “It’s a merical.”

When the clerk handed me my key to the box, a key chain was attached containing a small American flag. I had thought, when I registered for the box, to title my book, God Bless Americal.

SOMETHING FOR NOTHING

I let my barber read my book. When I returned for another haircut, he returned it to me. He said, “Archie, I liked your book but there’s just one thing wrong. I would buy it but it’s just too expensive.”

All the way home I was thinking, “People want a bargain. People want something for nothing.”

As I pulled into my driveway, a young lad was leaving my front door. He had placed something on the door handle. Upon examination I saw it was an advertisement for Domino’s Pizza. It said: DOMINO’S PIZZA, SOMETHING FOR NOTHING.

In early summer of 1996, I was at our lounge scrubbing the large sign out front. My mind was on my book and people not wanting to pay the $30.00 price I had set for it. I thought again, “People want something for nothing. They do like I, go down to Dixie Crossroads, pay $30.00 for a meal for two, and never think a thing about it. They’ll be satisfied for a few hours on a full stomach.”

Just then, as I’m still scrubbing the sign, a voice behind me asked, “Are you Archie?” When I turned around, I saw a tall, well-dressed lad standing there with a book in his hand. He said, “The bartender told me you were out here. My church is selling these discount coupon books for $30.00. If you go down to Dixie Crossroads to eat, you can get two meals for the price of one.”

Joe Browning dropped by and said hello about 30 minutes later. I had not seen him for about two years. He was the first person that had bought my book five years earlier.

TOOTH FOR THE PRICE OF ONE

I asked Dr. Simmons if he would fix two teeth for the price of one. He laughed. I left his office to buy a box of Ronsoni Zetti at Publix. I asked a clerk who was restocking where the zetti was. She reached into the box on the floor and handed me one. As I turned to leave she handed me another and said," They're two for one."

"SUPER DUPER POOPER SCOOPER

One of God’s laws which he said was to be kept forever, and ever, and ever, requires every soldier in God’s army, to carry a foxhole-type shovel, permanently attached to the other end of their spears. This is not for digging foxholes. It is to be used each and every time you do your “business” in the camp. The point emphasized is, that should someone fail to cover it up, the Angel of the Lord just might step in it when he is walking about the area at night. The consequence of this, should it happen, is not described, but I for one, would not want to put it to the test.

5/17/08 I was thinking about the above story when I glanced
down to the Florida Today newspaper which gave me an answer:

Picture

Ps:

Thursday, November 18, 2004, I opened my paper to find an article written by Billy Cox in the Florida Today newspaper. He did a feature about me several years ago.

A woman, named Julie Arnold, had a pet clean up service called, "SUPERDUPER POOPER SCUPPER".

I had the article on my scanner a few days later as I was working with a family member at my computer.

I glanced at my scanner and thought,

"I'll tell her about this item in the paper."

Then I changed my mind and kept on working at my desk as she left the room.

A few minutes later, Joan, my wife, stuck her head in the door and exclaimed,

"Paula just stepped in some dog poop."

IT DEPENDS ON WHAT "IT" MEANS

The children of Israel called the little round things that kept them alive forty years “Manna”, which literally means ‘‘it’’ “What is it?” Jesus said, “It is finished.” I suspect that’s the same ‘it’. I also suspect it’s the same ‘it’ in the Trinity. (father, son and whole sphere, it) A sphere is the only shape in reality that does not change in appearance, no matter how you look at it. God said, “I change not.” Its shape also fascinates people in sports. . . . golf, baseball, basketball, pool, bowling, etc.

A day when I was thinking about ‘it’, I opened the Today paper to find a headline: “BOY FINDS WHERE IT’S AT.” That same day I found where my cousin, Anita Bryant was, Eureka Springs, AR. (Eureka means, “I found it”.)

AAAAASK

Columbus Day, 1996, while driving down Garden Street, I thought, “Lord, you said, ‘Ask, and it shall be given.’ I’ve got it all. What else could I want? Your plans work out so well. I dare not ask for anything.” I glanced at an auto tag ahead of me. It said, “AAAAASK”.

Whitney Houston

I turned in my manuscript, got in my car and said, “Lord, it’s done. It’s down on paper and I don’t have to keep thinking about miracles.” Just then, Whitney Houston commenced to sing on the radio, “There’s a miracle in store for you.”

PIE CRUST

The night before, Joan and I were sampling the pumpkin pie. As I held the remaining edge of the piecrust, wondering if I should eat it, a piecrust commercial appeared on TV.

PARTS LEFT OVER

11/15/07

I went to Publix for a few items.

As I reached for my wallet to pay, I remarked to the pretty young clerk, "You need to be patient with us old folks.” just to make conversation.

She waited a moment and then replied, "Sir, you're trying to swipe your driver's license.”

Thirty minutes later, I’m home, breaking down three humming bird feeders on the kitchen counter to clean and refill.

Then after putting them all back together, I was astonished to find a part left over. I finally realized, it was my wife’s food chopper lid.

ONE HEADLIGHT

Quote (richardthughs@April22, 2008 13:34)

Okay, let's assume there is an omnipotent creator.Given that we've getting somewhat sophisticated as a species and now understand an array of things fairly well, is it safe to assume that the creator doesn't want to be found? I can think of umpteen places he could have put 'made by god'.. but we're just not seeing it. Does this mean he doesn't want proof? Will he punish people for looking?

IMO, God wants you to see his handywork, not him. For thine is the kingdom, power, and glory. A sort of ways and means committee. I thought, "To see creation, one needs three things: A universe, light, and one eye, two for focus.” At that moment, at 5 O'clock this morning, my neighbor started his car and turned on his lights. He only had one headlight.

Zero

IS GOD DEAD?

After I posted Nov. 05 2006, 00:15 this thread was dead until May 27, 07.

Check my post May 28 2007, 21:47

Link here

Cute

I’AM LATE I’AM LATE.

While driving through a residential area that had a 30 mph speed limit, I wished the truck in front of me would go just a little faster since I was running late. As I pulled up closer to it at a red light, I glanced at the license tag. It read 'SPD KILS'.

TOASTER OVEN

2/20/08

While watching Wheel of Fortune, I asked my wife if the toaster oven was still on. As she ran to the kitchen to turn it off, Pat Sajak mentioned how Vanna had opened her toaster oven and blew out the fire.

BALANCE SCALE

October 16, I posted on a web site: “Symmetry is balance. Job 31:6 Let me be weighed in an even balance, that God may know mine integrity. Balance: Seventy seven fold x love x (love + anger) = God x God x God Mathematically the answer to both is 47,900,160."After that, I picked up my morning newspaper, the Florida Today. There was just one large picture centered on the front page, a balance scale. Around 2 O'clock, I went to a thrift store to look for only one item, a cordless phone. I discovered that they had none on the shelf. As I turned to leave, one of the clerks was walking toward the shelf with a cordless phone. The next morning, at 10 o'clock, I took my wife to an eye doctor. As we were waiting in the reception room, Joan pulled two bananas from a bag and handed me one. She ate hers but I held mine in my hand, deciding to eat it later. I accompanied her to the pre-exam room for awhile but when it became too crowded, I left. I then decided to eat my banana, and as I began to peal it, I noticed that a technician across from me was pealing one also. I tried to mimic her every move. When she would take a bite, I would, hoping she would notice. She never did.

PLAN “D”

Yesterday I posted what, I thought, was a long, profound statement on my thread.

When I awoke this morning, I checked for a response, any response. There was none.

I was angry and thought of the post I had made yesterday on another site titled:

Does God Have Plans? (I was specifically thinking of Plan B where he was taken lightly.)

Plan A: Mat 22:3 And sent forth his servants to call them that were bidden to the wedding: and they would not come. Plan B: Mat 22:4 Again, he sent forth other servants, saying, Tell them which are bidden, Behold, I have prepared my dinner: my oxen and [my] fatlings [are] killed, and all things [are] ready: come unto the marriage. Mat 22:5 But they made light of [it], and went their ways, one to his farm, another to his merchandise: Mat 22:6 And the remnant took his servants, and entreated [them] spitefully, and slew [them] Mat 22:7 But when the king heard [thereof], he was wroth: and he sent forth his armies, and destroyed those murderers, and burned up their city. Plan "C "Mat 22:8 Then saith he to his servants, The wedding is ready, but they which were bidden were not worthy. Mat 22:9 Go ye therefore into the highways, and as many as ye shall find, bid to the marriage. Mat 22:10 So those servants went out into the highways, and gathered together all as many as they found, both bad and good: and the wedding was furnished with guests Plan "D" Mat 22:11 And when the king came in to see the guests, he saw there a man which had not on a wedding garment: Mat 22:13 Then said the king to the servants, Bind him hand and foot, and take him away, and cast [him] into outer darkness; there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth.

That made me think about story # 47 on my site:

DOORS

I thought to myself," Jesus said he is the door. Doors serve two purposes. They let people in and they keep people out. I glanced down at the Reader's Digest that "happened" to be lying in front of me. On the cover was a story title: "Emigration now. Who To Let In and Who To Keep Out"

BIG DOG

SEARCH FOR GOD September 18, 1996, I went to the Netscape search engine and typed the word “God” on my computer. When the result came back, it read: “No matches found. Your search is too general. Be more specific. Instead of “Dog”, use “Cocker Spaniel”. I thought, “Should I search for “big God” or “little God”?” A few weeks later, I ran across this joke in the October 1996 Reader’s Digest: Did you hear about the insomniac dyslexic agnostic? He stayed up all night wondering if there really was a dog.

Today, November 6, 2006, I realized "big" plus "dog" (297 + 407) = God (704) There use to be a commercial for toilet paper called "Mr. Big”. It came in three rolls and the jingle said, "I love you, Mr. Big."3 x Big (18) = Love (54) (3/18 is my wife's birthday) 318 + 360 = 678 (666 + 12 foundations)

678 = (God + Jesus + AZ) x 3

Search http://www.blueletterbible.org/index.html for "the father".(KJV & old search)

GOD’S FOOT STOOL

Psa 110:1 [[A Psalm of David.]] The LORD said unto my Lord,

Sit thou at my right hand, until I make thine enemies thy footstool.

I posted the above on some discussion boards during the day. That night my wife and I went to see the play, Gypsy. During the middle, a landlord, Mr. Goldstone, was being patronized. One of the actors got down on his all-fours and Rose placed Mr. Goldstone’s foot on the actor’s back. (A gold stone is what the lid to the Ark is made from...one hunk of gold)

2Ch 9:18 And [there were] six steps to the throne, with a footstool

of gold, [which were] fastened to the throne, and stays on each side.

THICK BILLFOLD

My wife had mentioned to me several times, "Your billfold is too thick. We need to go through it and take out all the old and unusable cards."

So two days ago we did just that.

Yesterday, our handyman came by so my wife went in the bedroom, to get her purse for the money. When she found none, she lifted the weight she had placed on my billfold to press it down, and removed some cash.

In a few minutes after she returned, the conversation turned to health.

The handyman said, “I don't know what is wrong with my hip. Lately it's been sore. It could be because my billfold is “too fat”.

SHUTTLE RETURNS

I had been conversing on a fundamentalist’s site, The Highwaymen, for a couple of weeks, when I stated some things I thought were profound. It was the morning of the shuttle return. I was informed that I was banned. At the same moment, the shuttle broke apart over Texas.

ANSWER ON LAP

On the game show "Jeopardy" the question was:

"What is the code notation a physician writes on a prescription like 'take one once a day' to be filled?"

The answer was in the TV section of the newspaper on my wife's lap.

She said, "I read that today!"

When the doctor asked the little girl if she had a favorite flavor to add to her prescription, she leaned over and whispered in his ear. That night, her mother happened to notice the comment the pharmacist had placed on the bottle:

“DO NOT TAKE WITH BROCCOLI"

HEALTH FIRST

Last night, 10/31/07, my wife was reading our Health First policy while I watched TV. She asked me if I knew whether a referral is required to see a specialist.

I replied, “I don't know but I think the referring doctor gets a cut of the specialist's fee."

At that moment, a Health First Ad came on TV and the announcer said, “Referrals are not required for consulting a specialist."

DOES GOD HAVE A PATTERN

Exd 25:9 According to all that I shew thee, [after] the pattern of the tabernacle, and the pattern of all the instruments thereof, even so shall ye make [it].

Exd 25:40 And look that thou make [them] after their pattern, which was shewed thee in the mount.

Num 8:4 And this work of the candlestick [was of] beaten gold, unto the shaft thereof, unto the flowers thereof, [was] beaten work: according unto the pattern which the LORD had shewed Moses, so he made the candlestick.

Jos 22:28 Therefore said we, that it shall be, when they should [so] say to us or to our generations in time to come, that we may say [again], Behold the pattern of the altar of the LORD, which our fathers made, not for burnt offerings, nor for sacrifices; but it [is] a witness between us and you.

1Ch 28:11 Then David gave to Solomon his son the pattern of the porch, and of the houses thereof, and of the treasuries thereof, and of the upper chambers thereof, and of the inner parlours thereof, and of the place of the mercy seat,

1Ch 28:12 And the pattern of all that he had by the spirit, of the courts of the house of the LORD, and of all the chambers round about, of the treasuries of the house of God, and of the treasuries of the dedicated things:

1Ch 28:18 And for the altar of incense refined gold by weight; and gold for the pattern of the chariot of the cherubims, that spread out [their wings], and covered the ark of the covenant of the LORD.

Does God have a plan?

Dan 9:24 Seventy weeks are determined upon thy

people and upon thy holy city, to finish

the transgression, and to make an end of sins,

and to make reconciliation for iniquity, and to

bring in everlasting righteousness, and to seal up

the vision and prophecy, and to anoint the most Holy.

Dan 9:25 Know therefore and understand, [that] from

YELLOW BRICK ROAD

WELLS FARGO

GEORGIA

COLUMBUS DAY

TEXARKANA HIGHWAY

FIGHT IN STREET