TOUR AMERICA, 2019: TUCSON, ARIZONA – THE GRAND CANYON STATE

Places We Have Called Home In 2019

Home Is Where We Park It:   Tucson Metropolitan Ministries Family Services

Oct 27, 2019

Temperature 86 degrees

Mom is Looking Good

Interfaith Pack-A-Thon

First things first, thanks one and all for prayers for my Mom.  She is looking good today and in good spirits.  We are guardedly optimistic about her future.  We’ll know more this week as more test results come back.  So please keep those prayers coming.

Today being Sunday as a team we again went to the St. Johns United Methodist Church for worship. It was an uplifting and positive experience.

The day wasn’t over though.  After church we went to Wendy’s for lunch in preparation for the big event of the day.

Lunch over it was time – time for the big event, time for the Interfaith Pack-a-Thon.  This is a picture of a T-shirt from a couple of years ago.

So you ask what is an interfaith Pack-a-Thon?  The Interfaith part is easy.  The Catalina UMC partnered with the Muslim Community at the Muslim Community Center to pack 50,000 meals for Southern Arizona food needs.

And the Pack-a-Thon part?  You get to pack meals of rice and beans that have a shelf life of two years.

The details of each meal are as follows:

OK, that’s the nuts and bolts of the program.  Let’s take a look at how it all came together today.  The entrance to the community center.

 The check in table

Time to get all cleaned up and don the appropriate attire.

Barbara modeling the latest attire for the trendy Pack-a-thoner

Here’s the whole team ready for action.  From left to right:  Ken, Hedi, Scott, Teresa, Barbara and myself.

Here is what we get to do.  See the yellow funnel in the middle of the table?  One person puts and holds a yellow bag on the bottom of it – Barbara’s job this afternoon.

Then through the funnel and into the bag goes a vitamin bag

A level scoop of beans and vegetables

A level scoop of soy and rice.

The bag is then weighed and adjusted to make sure it has the proper amount in it.

Then it is sealed, labeled and boxed.

Here we are ready for action.

Here we are in action.  Filling the bag.

Weighing the bag.

Sealing the bag prior to putting the label on and boxing the meal.

This is the pile of supplies we started with in the one corner of the center.

This is the same corner two hours later.

Thanks to our team and all these people

Those supplies turned into these boxes of meals – at last count 36,000 meals – that will be used to feed the hungry in the Tucson area.  The meals will go to local food pantries run by different churches as well as the Salvation Army.

That my friends is how our team spent their afternoon.

Of course such a successful day called for a celebration.  We all agreed once it was over the only place to go was Culver’s for ice cream.

That is how we spent our day on The Road of Retirement.  Working together we managed to take a big bite out of hunger in this area.  The biggest plus for me today, though, was seeing that big smile on my mother’s face.  You rock Mom and we’re all looking forward to throwing you your 100th birthday party.

Thanks again for checking in with us.  We  always appreciate your company and your comments. Catch you tomorrow.  Time to get some sleep since its back to work painting an apartment tomorrow.

These are the voyages of  Graybeard and it’s two intrepid travelers.  Our continuing mission: to explore as many new states as possible, to seek out new acquaintances and make new friends, to boldly go where we have never been before

See you on down the road!