It has been made public today that the Baptist Times is to close at the end of the year (here and here).  I am quite surprisingly sad about this, not least as I have subscribed for almost fifteen years (and if I want to be sulky will have a half year pre-paid subscription outstanding at that point!).  I first bought the BT because my then minister told me to - it would, he told me, give me a clue about the life of the Baptist world.  I have continued to subscribe through my ministerial training and on into each of my pastorates.  From time to time stuff I sent in has appeared - from worship ideas to adverts to press releases to a commissioned piece on the recent Baptist Assembly in Scotland.  In those fifteen years the BT has improved out of all recognition, thanks to the hard work of editor Mark Woods and his loyal team.  Yet depsite that, it has continued to lose money hand over fist and it can no longer be sustained.

I cannot in all honesty say I read the BT cover to cover, but among the things I will miss are...

• The baptisms, ministerial news and ministerly dispatches
• The letters page - with its regular contributors, annoying though some of them are
• The 'outside edge' type columns
• John Rackley's column
• The book reviews
• Bits and bobs of local church news

I am sure BUGB will come up with something interesting and techy to replace the BT, and I'm sure it makes good sense.  It just seems rather sad that the old rag has reached its sell-by date.  Sure I've mumbled about it at times, but I hope it was the affectionate mumbling of a friend.

Farewell Baptist Times... and thank you for the years we've shared.

Yesterday one of my dinner guests gave me a helpful hint for Holly grooming... and it works!

Holly tolerates being brushed but hates being combed.  My guest asked if I had tried the 'marigold method'... put on a pair of washing up gloves and stroke the cat normally.  It works!  The slight abrasion of the gloves coupled with static electric effects seem to successfully drag out the dead/loose fur and leave Holly looking even more lovely.  To have her purring as she's groomed is a definite bonus!

And here's another tip I was given by a vet for my last cat more than a decade ago... to get them to take pills.  Crush the pill, mix it with some squeezy cheese spread and smear it on the cat's paw or mouth area... it will then lick it off and consume the pill with minimal stress to cat or owner.

Simples, as the meerkat would express it.

Another couple of days of professional coffee drinking ahead... it probably sounds idyllic, but it is often emotionally/mentally quite demanding.  Privilege and responsibility are constant companions, along with the fear that my best endeavours are never quite good enough... that and a whole heap of Advent stuff to start preparing and a mountain of administrative bits and bobs to work my way through.

Hey ho.  Maybe I'll make some more tea before I go any further!!

Since commenting is its usual unpredictable self on this blog platform, and isn't letting me comment at the moment, here are my own recent replies to comments!

Re: Music Books

Tim, thank you, that's a kind offer; I have bought the copy Pam spotted on Ebay, so just waiting for it to arrive.  I still haven't located a Carol Praise music book, despite it having been published twice over.

Re: Frankincense

Radical and Stewart, thanks for the suggestions.  I know a lot of the posters we have at church come from the Paulist bookshop (as do our advent candles usually) - series I really like that used to be sold in St Denys Anglican bookshop & suppliers in Manchester, which doubled as our college bookshop.

Apologies to anyone else whose comments have vanished into cyberspace... I'm too stingy to move to a pay-to-blog platform (I've been on here so long I still have the free tariff) plus not all platforms would allow me to import 6 years worth of posts and I wouldn't want to lose them (even though Blogspirit don't seem ever to remove 'dead' blogs).

Just been doing some online research for an upcoming service broadly titled 'Frankincense' and, on the basis that a couplple of years ago I threw away the tiny box of it I had and had never used, looking to buy some.

In the end I ordered a small Tibetan incense burner which includes a little pack of frankincense and some indoor charcoal (way easier than trying to find a thurible secondhand or making one out of baked bean tin) as well as some scented cones.  I did look at packs of frankincense ranging from 50g to 5kg - but studying the images and imaginging trying to explain to the Glasgow constabulary if the package split open before it reached me, I decided not.  I think a trip to the local RC suppliers may be called for...

(I have myrrh, which I'm offering to lend to my colleague who's doing that week... we reckon the mutual colleague who landed gold ought to provide his own...)