Anna Rashbrook's Blog, page 23

Christmas!

This time of year is the main time for book buying, then afterwards people are using vouchers. So here is a subtle hint from me about my books and then I’ll not bug you again until the new year!

All are available as ebooks and free on Kindle unlimited. Christmas and Collection are not available as paperbacks.

Bad, bad rain

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One the weekend following the snow, the rain fell and fell and fell. Sunday it was heavy and continuous for over 36 hours. The siren which had been going with snow problems was now going for cellars to be pumped out. Then on Karneralm, there was a landslide, and a power transformer slid down the hill and the water power station was flooded. Families were evacuated.[image error]

Then there was a mudslide behind a house in Ramingstein and towards Tamsweg. Roads were flooded, rivers burst banks. By Monday morning, you couldn’t move far as roads were shut as the clear-up operation began.

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The road up to Burg Finstergrun was all but washed away.

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In Kendlebruck, a wooden house was turned around 360 degrees by water.

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Our local railway was totally taken out by a mudslide, the tracks being pushed up in the air like a fairground ride. Stadl was declared an emergency area. The railway might not be repaired until Christmas.

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All over Salzburgerland, Carinthia and Tyrol, similar stories came in, two houses being knocked over by a landslide in Bad Gastein. Such heartbreak after the damage done by the heavy snow. The farmers who had been cut off with no electricity due to the snow, were now facing being washed away, Muhr at the end of the Lungau is only just out of being an emergency area.

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By Wednesday, our road was reopened by the herculean efforts of the local council workers. The mudslides will take longer. Here in  Austria where all the councils have their own teams and machinery and a local fire brigade, help was quick and efficient. I take my hat off to them all.

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Now we have a few days of relative peace and dry. I’m praying for a mild winter with not a lot of snow in the valleys!

Sunlight

[image error]The day after the big snow, I had to travel to Salzburg for a library conference. It was the most amazing day and I was glad to escape the snow and the powercuts. Usual Austrian efficiency had the main roads and motorway free of snow.

Once at the centre, we had discussions and seminars. In one room, I was sat near the window. Outside was a mature garden in what must have been the grounds of the house. It just caught the afternoon sun as it began to set, so I took a few photos. The colours were beautiful as they caught the autumn of the trees.

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I sat and watched the light change-and enjoying the discussion. Then it was gone. Sadly, I turned back. Then after a while, the sun returned for a brief few minutes, like an extra blessing.

The whole day was like a reprieve from the snow and pressure of the weather at home and I rejoiced in it. Writing this now, I wonder if it was a foreshadowing of what was to come in the next few days; enjoy this and treasure this now.

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Bad Snow

This is a shot I took last Tuesday.

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And this is what we woke up to.

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A low-pressure system had come up from Italy, bringing heavy wet snow. We had 30 cm here by lunchtime and it snowed until the late evening.

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As I walked the dog, I could hear branches cracking and trees falling. Many trees drooped as if in agony.

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The road to Tamsweg was closed, mostly due to lorries without winter tyres, but also fallen trees.

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Eventually, it was cleared, but there were power cuts all day and by the evening we lost all power until the following lunchtime.

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I took these shots by moonlight only!

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It took the area by surprise, being so early in the year for heavy snow.  We’ve since had heavy rain, the Mur is up 20cm, and tonight (Saturday) another low is due to sweep through, but it’s not certain that it will be rain or snow. Of course, the ski resorts are thrilled, plenty of snow to piste!

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My guess that this will be either the nastiest winter in our 12 years here; the plague of mice maybe really was a forewarning. Or this will all blow away and we’ll have hardly any snow at all. Guess which option I’d prefer!!!!

October

This year has been stunning. Here’s a small selection of my favourite shots!

FREEBIE!

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Just for this weekend, 2nd and 3rd November! Do enjoy and I hope you might like to read on into the Horses and Souls Series.

Plague

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This year has been a good one for mice. In one of our holiday houses, they’ve been coming in since the beginning of September. They’ve got in the water meter reading station.  Eaten my apples in the cellar right down until there’s just a mark in the crate. Fighting with the birds for the peanuts. They’re big mice too. When I asked the chimney sweep, he says it’s like this all over the Lungau.

‘It means it’s going to be a very cold winter,’ he said in tones of deep foreboding.

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But is this plague not simply the result of a very successful breeding summer for the mice? They couldn’t possibly grow so big if there hadn’t been a lot of food and the right conditions? Or maybe in the past, a warm summer was followed by a colder winter? Often local sayings are right, so I’m off to buy some more fire wood…

Swingle to the Rescue!

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Something odd in the river…must investigate.

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Got it without too much hard work, it didn’t struggle.

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Nearly there!

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One lettuce rescued from a watery grave. Do I get Scoobie snacks for this?

Kickstart!

Our little house group asked for a kickstart, and this is what we got! We all have an instinctive knowledge of God, but it is at our peril that we ignore him when we opt in or out of belief.Bevere uses an allegory to show just what will happen to us, not only when we die, but on the judgement day. Scary and a real wake up call. It’s there in the Bible, but we all pass it by with complacency.As Christians, believing in Jesus, yes, we do get to heaven, but there is a life accounting to be made. I’m sure that I’m not just loving God for the rewards that Bevere goes on about. After all, you don’t love someone for them to thank you. For me, it’s the being with him. But then again, if something I’ve written or said brings a person to know Jesus, I’d like to know, that would be a reward for me.My first reaction was to yell, help to God, is this true? I’m sorry if I’ve goofed, let‘s start again, I repent. I thought I was in your will. Out walking I began praying in tongues and at work listening to the Bible on the phone, it took a while to find a UK voice! Not that it would make God love me anymore, but to let his word and spirit wash over me and clean and heal me. Was I still his beloved Anna? When I was a new Christian I heard this said behind me and jumped out of my skin!Then I began to consider the peace I had found writing and claimed that I felt this IS his will. He had given me the plots for the books in dreams, and I feel such a peace and contentment in this life now I’m doing it. Especially when creating, I can’t wait for the new day, however mundane.I began to wonder if my not writing, which I started in 1991, if I had kept on, what sort of writer for him I would now be. I have a talent for wrong decisions. Now I’m right and I’m holding on to it.I was also convicted that I needed to be giving Dave more respect, and to stop moaning and grumbling about him in my head, and when I asked Holy spirit, he stopped me (well mostly) we are so happy at the moment, even if not perfect. Both loners together, at this point of my change, I am so happy with him and he seems so too. I am at times aware of how much I do love him and when I’m engulfed in that, I send that feeling of love on to God as well.The other morning, while walking the dog, I was saying to God how do I witness to people in my situation here at the moment, the answer came autobiography, so that will come next year. Something I’ve avoided for years. I feel as if I’m in the calm, centre eye of the storm in his safety. I am in the right place now!Not that there aren’t lessons. Reading Bevere, about being jealous of other’s successes. I am. I must realise these books are Gods, funded by his money. I need to let God market and concentrate on writing his words. But being a perfectionist, I have to go on and on at the words till I feel they are perfect. But he okayed using the book marketing company, so he will use them. It’s his money.The Bevere book also has the best explanation of dying to self I’ve read. It’s the world set of carnal values that are about you, money, politics, ideology, replacing them with Jesus, so these values just don’t mean anything to you. Only God.Lastly healing. I’ve had my diverticulitis, my unbelief due to the symptoms taking over. I believe in speaking to my mountain as I am a born again Christian and believe the power of the risen Christ is in me. So now I say, in the carnal, symptoms you are toast, you are being treated by carnal medicine, and you are healed supernaturally. Illness, you’re pants. As you see or imagine yourself well, that builds hope, increases faith and enables the healing. A recent bug, I said you have a day symptoms, then you are gone, and the next morning they were! My unbelief is shrinking and my faith building, but I have a long way to go.

Water, rock and sun