The Fat and the Skinny

So I'm at 262 in case anyone is wondering. I still exercise my butt off. I still eat 1300 calories a day. I still am fat. I have lost 86 freaking pounds and am still fat. I can't believe it. People may say ohh you're in a 3x now, good job or my you're not as big as you use to be, but darn it, and i mean darn it, i am still fat. I hope to lose 30 more pounds and I will be overtly happy. 230, that's the goal. I don't ever want to be rail thin, but I wanna be out of the fat pig, close to a heart attack category. I'm working man, just not there yet.
The skinny on my life is that we are still waiting to hear from FCC Yazoo City, MS. This is the process thus far - I requested an application from the BOP in May, the day after I graduated from MBTS. I had to call 3 times, email 3 times, and anxiously wait another week until I received it. The application was complete by July. I was told in August that FCC Yazoo City wanted to have my file forwarded for the next step in the application process. I was then interviewed in Kansas City 2 weeks ago. It took 3 hours. I was told I interviewed excellent and they Fed Exed my file that day to Mississippi. The regional director told me that if I hadn't heard anything by September 5 to call them. I have called once already and have also called the regional director that overseas chaplaincy in Mississippi as well as the supervisory chaplain in Yazoo City to no avail! So everyday I hope to get a call that hasn't come so I can go one small step further in the process.. I thought the deal was done, but there still is a chance my file could wind up in the ole trash can. Going crazy here, moreso everyday.

An Invitation

I invite you all to look at this sight for some interesting bible study - theinsulae.blogspot.com

Yahoo for Yazoo

So, after three hard years of school to get a Master of Divinity, working as a janitor at an elementary school the first year(very glamorous, loved having strep throat 4 times the first winter I was there - no exaggeration), being the chaplain at a military academy the second year, and finally working at Wal - Mart as a cashier (of which I love because they are so concerned about their employees and bringing in the union would be such a bad idea. Insert heavy sarcasm and extreme bitterness here) and being a chaplain at The VA Medical Center of Kansas City averaging 40 hours of work plus another 10 for prep. at the VA (papers, devotions, etc.), after countless hours of studying and watching my wife go sleepless for days (we didn't have a babysitter the first semester and she just didn't sleep, she worked nights and still does) and humbling herself to do a job that others refuse, and doing it well, and somehow being an excellent mother, after living off of WIC, foodstamps, Medicaid, and various other excellent government assistance programs, after 3 months of waiting for a call from the BOP, last week I got the call I have been dreaming of getting for over 3 years.
This call was a little funny. Wal-Mart and Shirkey's will go down as 2 of the worst jobs this side of the equator. I dread going there. It's a thankless job, and pays nowhere near enough what we need to survive. Becca gets knots in her stomach as she heads out the door to Shirkeys. Needless to say our employment adds to the humor. We sit on the porch when we can and talk. Mostly complain and gripe, it's part of my charm. One night as we were "discussing" our jobs, we started to wonder if the call would ever come and I found my prayers turning into a pathetic begging session with He who has made the universe. It took 2 months just to get my application complete and I was starting to consider other options. (I applied to the Missouri Department of Corrections and had an interview within a week.) I have spent hours on the BOP website and know my way round there like a pro. Anticipation is what I am getting at. That night we were sitting there, I thought to myself, it'd be just our luck to wind up somehwere like Mississippi, we have history there, the kind you don't repeat. So another month passes and the head of the BOP's chaplain department and I are discussing open institutions. The next day she calls and says FCC Yazoo City, Mississippi would like my file forwarded for the next step in the application process. I literally laughed when she said that. Isn't it just like God. He never stops teaching us. He never stops his dominion. No matter what we want, think we deserve, or wish, he will always show us who is in control.
Luckily for this large, stubborn ox, he loves us as well. So he is giving us hope. I don't have a job yet, but the future is getting so bright I gotta wear shades!! I don't have to feel stuck in Wal-Mart when I go. Becca can rest assured that her run at being the major bread winner at about 9 something an hour is almost over. (Is this what emasculation feels like?)
So here I sit at 12:35 in the morning, spending yet another hour long journey exploring Mississippi and its culture via the internet and all I can do is smile because God has humorously proved his sovereignty to me and my wife again and thus the expression, "Yahoo for Yazoo" is now the cool catch phrase around the Sutton Empire.
Pray for us, it'll just now start getting bumpy.