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At the end of September, I went to the temple to see a friend's daughter receive her endowments.  There were several ward members there including Kimberly Majeske who has been a friend for the past few years.  She is also a skilled pianist.  While waiting in the celestial room, Kimberly told me she had a question for me about a job.  My interest was immediately piqued, and I didn't delay in getting the details. The middle school that her children attend, Millenium Middle School in South Lyon, Michigan, was looking for a studio accompanist for the choir program. Hold. The Phones. Seriously? If I have hoped to have one dream job in my life, a school studio accompanist would be it.  In fact, I had always hoped for a job like this when I had kids at home because it follows school schedules (which means I'm off when the kids are off school) and because it was a chance to spend some time with own kids.  With no kids at home anymore, obviously I couldn't focus on ...

As the summer ended, John anxiously waited for the brochure to come from Symposium Medicus for the annual OB/Gyn conference in Grand Cayman.  For reasons unknown, they decided to no longer host that conference in Cayman but instead hosted one in Hawaii.  John thought it was really one half dozen or the other, but I remembered that Hawaii isn't nearly as easy for us to reach as Cayman is.  Nevertheless, he signed up, and I put it on the calendar. Our last experience in Hawaii wasn't the best...although to be fair I don't really remember it at all....which is why it wasn't really the best.  Unbeknownst to me, I was a month away from my first back surgery, the result of a herniated disc.  Being yet undiagnosed but in terrible pain, I was sent on my first trip to Hawaii with a bunch of muscle relaxers and pain medication which led to me not remembering pretty much anything we did there.  I hoped this trip would be different. On August 8, 2023, the historic dist...