Some people are so nice!

Today I got called to help a patron, who is also the spouse of a woman I've known for years, with an email problem. Usually, I dread these kinds of calls for help because it invariably involves trying to retrieve something from a webmail account like Yahoo or Hotmail that has "vanished" while they were typing. You just can't do that, and I hate delivering the bad news.

This time was different. This patron had sent off a test, in Spanish, to a school in Mexico. This test will be used to place him in the appropriate level class when he and his wife arrive in Mexico next week for their Spanish immersion class. She faxed hers, but he had decided to send his in via email - a wonder in itself since he only recently learned to even use the internet and webmail. He was concerned because his "sent items" folder did not show the email he was sure he'd sent to this school. Fortunately, a copy of the completed test was saved in a folder in his webmail. Apparently, some friend who was helping him did that for him. Since the mail did not appear to have been sent, I was simply going to help him resend it. But upon inspection of the saved test, we realized that several questions had no answers typed in. I decided I'd just copy and paste the text into Word so he could type in the missing data, and then we'd just email it as an attachment. I got the document copied into word, fixed the header's formatting, and left him to type away.

A short time later I was buzzed by the info desk. Could I please come help him again? So downstairs I went. He told me that while he was typing in the missing data, it suddenly appeared in the document! I sat down to figure out what the heck was going on. It turns out that the document's format was so messed up from trying to put it into the body of his webmail, that the data was in all the wrong places. Fortunately, it just involved doing a lot of cutting and pasting - something he was not yet capable of doing. Knowing that his time was running out, I sat down, and with him at my side and his handwritten test in his hands, I proceeded to cut and paste and arrange the data as it was intended to be arranged. I showed him how to put Word into Spanish mode so he could put all the accent marks on the words too. It took about 35 or 40 minutes, but we got it done. I then saved it for him, attached it to a new email, and emailed it off to the school. He was so relieved! I was happy to help. In the process of doing all this, I was happily surprised by just how much Spanish I still remembered. I could read the entire test, and even knew the answers to the questions! Too bad I have such a hard time speaking Spanish these days.

About an hour later, I was called to the upstairs info desk. The staff person said "there is a girl out here you need to see"... okay... what's up with that? I walked down the hall where I was met by a gal with a vase of flowers. She asked if I was Gina (my name tag says I am). I looked at her, puzzled. She smiled and handed me the vase, filled with beautiful spring-like flowers and smelling divine. I looked at the card. It said "Es un milagro! Mil Gracias!" and was signed by the patron and his wife. Now how great is that?! I called them and left them a thank you. It made my day.

So much to blog about....and so little time

By this time - 8:02 AM - I had expected to have completed a couple of blog posts. Unfortunately, that is not the case. I have been helping my blog pal Lorraine of "Here's The Thing" fame, figure out why Word is misbehaving for her. It's one of the kinds of mysteries I enjoy solving. I know, I'm sick. So, since I have so little time now, I will post a couple of highlights.

Parents' Weekend - last weekend was Whitworth College's annual Parents' Weekend. The weather could not have been better. It was the perfect autumn day. The day began with breakfast at Shari's with our friends, the Harrisons, parents of the Son's freshman roommate, with whom we connected the day we first met. They live near Portland, so we only get to see them a couple of times a year. This year, their daughter is a new freshman at Whitworth, so they have two kids to be parents of during this event. We had a hurried breakfast, then returned to campus for our "mini college" - one of about 5 different presentations from which we get to choose, put on by professors, to give us parents a taste of what our kids experience daily. We went to one called "Evolution vs. Faith" by Dr. Michael Sardinia, a professor of advanced biology and a veterinarian. It was fantastic! When I have time, I'll share what he had to say. It really was a wonderful class, as all the mini colleges we've attended have been. I am so jealous! I want to go back to college!

After the mini college, we had lunch (college dorm food - not the best), then went to the football game, which was also the Homecoming game. Whitworth killed their opponent, Lewis Clark College. We left at halftime because it was such a rout. The final score was 70-3. The next few hours we just hung out with The Son. At 7:30 PM we went to the auditorium for the fall production - The Pirates of Penzance. I LOVED it. The Spouse wasn't as thrilled. He doesn't go in much for theatrical productions. I did catch him chuckling several times, though. The performance was stellar. They even customized some of the lyrics of I am the very model of a modern major general to incorporate several Whitworth traditions. The audience roared. It really was a delightul performance. The Son did not accompany us. At the end of the show, we bid the Harrisons goodbye as we would not be returning on Sunday. We picked The Son up from his dorm and went to a late dinner, returned him to his dorm, and embarked on the long drive home at about 11:30 PM, arriving home at 1:15 AM. What a great day!

Next.... the follow-up eye appointments....

Is that frost?

What a beautiful morning! It's sunny, and from the looks of my deck, it's cold! My back lawn is covered in frost this morning, as is half my deck. This is it, folks. Autumn is upon us. The leaves on the aspens across the street make it look like the proverbial money tree, except instead of leaves made of greenbacks, the leaves are golden coins hanging from white-barked branches. Every few seconds, a golden coin falls from a branch and disappears into the underbrush. I'm convinced this is where the leprechauns get the gold for their rainbow anchoring pots.

My cat is laying curled up next to me. She is dreaming, her mouth twitching, little sounds emanating from within, her paws moving every few seconds as if in pursuit of some prey. It's funny that a cat who has never caught a mouse, or any form of prey other than a toy we drag around, or a hand under a blanket, has dreams that are obviously about chasing and catching some critter. The closest she's been to a mouse has been standing at the sliding glass door watching the squirrels play on the deck, aching to get out the door so she can eat one of them. She's an indoor cat. She can only imagine the life her outdoor counterparts lead, and apparently she does that quite often as she sleeps. She's so darned cute, and furry, and cuddly looking laying here next to me. I just want to pick her up and hug her, but she doesn't go for that. She likes to sit on my lap, likes to sleep next to me at night, likes to lay next to me when I'm on the sofa, but hates to be held. She'll bite me if I pick her up. She is, after all, a cat, with a very real mind of her own. And right now, she's dreaming, sun is streaming through the door onto her, the trees are beautiful, I have 20/20 vision, and life is great.

A Poetic Break

I have written a few poems in my life. I wouldn’t call myself a poet, though, much the way I don’t call myself a writer. I like to write. I sometimes like to write poems. I sometimes do one or the other well. When it comes to poetry in general, with the exception of the Shakespeares, the Keatses, the Byrons and Yeatses, e.e cummings, and a very few others, I’m often left like the comic strip character – with a question mark hovering over my head as I puzzle over the meaning of a poem about which some critic has raved. A lot of contemporary poetry is like a lot modern art – it seems it has to be beyond description or comprehension, as if hiding some deep truth that only those with enough insight, talent, and awareness are capable of seeing – in order to be considered praiseworthy by the snobs in the world of art and literature. God forbid the art should be of something recognizable, like a landscape or nature scene, or the poem should tell a story with which we can identify. When that is the case, it most certainly is not art. It’s too mainstream, too commercial, and too mundane. Given that, you can probably imagine what I was prepared to hear when a poet was listed as the speaker during our luncheon at the library conference I attended last Thursday. I expected to be subjected to a reading of his works, after which I would sit, eyebrows knit in puzzlement, trying to make sense of them, praying during his discussion of said works I would catch some glimpse of his intent. To my delight, that was not the case.

Robert Wrigley is the poet in question. I was so moved by his work that I bought his book. He is a charming, handsome man who adores his wife (a respected writer) and children. He is not overly impressed with himself. He writes well. When I bought his book, which he signed of course, I told him I like that his poems make sense, and tell a story, and I hate ones that don’t. He said he felt the same. He gave me hope. He even made me want to write some poems. This link gives a brief bio of him. And here’s a bit of that bio:

Robert Wrigley was born in 1951, in East St. Louis, Illinois, and grew up not far away in Collinsville, a coal mining town. He was the first member of his family ever to graduate from college and the first male--in Illinois, Pennsylvania, Wales, and Germany--never to work in a coal mine. In 1971, with a draft lottery number of 66, he was inducted into the U.S. Army. After four months of training and duties, he filed for discharge on the grounds of conscientious objection and spent the next five months attached to "Special Training Detachment #2" at Ft Sam Houston, in San Antonio, Texas. For two weeks in October of that year, he dug a trench eighteen inches wide by twenty-four inches deep by 80 yards long. It took him only four days to fill it back up. In November, he was honorably discharged….

Here’s an interview with him from the University of Idaho’s literary magazine. And another from Poetry Daily.

And here is a sample of his work:
The Local Myth of a Kiss by Robert Wrigley
That neighbor boy who tried to kiss the frost
from Alice Murtaugh's tombstone married
his lips to the legend of this place. Did he
notice the dates of her life at all, I wonder.
Or how despite the cold the flowers on her grave
were hardly spoilt at all: three red roses,
their petal edges kissed half as hard as he was.
There is someone, it is said, who remembers
just what it was Alice Murtaugh whispered
in the shotgun's mouth, who had tried
the tongues of love and found them wanton.
Remembers, and dies
a little every day, it is said, though no one
knows the source of the weekly flowers.
It's like the weather or the wind,
the way the fog crawls up the canyon walls
and freezes, until the cemetery's ornate gates
loom ghostly, and the stones recede in clouds
that cling. Had he not panicked
and snapped his head back hard,
the boy might have been all right.
Now, however, an odd blossom etched
in the polished stone, a faint gray rose
over the weekly, inclement others
no one ever sees arrayed.
How is it forgotten,
such desperate parting, the kiss
that won't let go?

The view from here is exquisite

The transformation is complete. I have gone from a blind-as-a-bat, squinting to see the clock upon awaking, glasses wearing nerd to a now-my-vision-is-better-than-20/20 superhero. Okay, maybe I exaggerated a little - I wasn't really blind as a bat. It does feel almost superheroic, though. Someone who has always had perfect vision can't possibly understand. My fellow myopics know exactly what I mean. We've always dreamed of being able to see when we awaken in the middle of the night without first groping in the dark for our glasses. We've imagined what it would be like to swim underwater and actually see where we are going; or in my case, opening our eyes after diving in without the ensuing panic upon the realization that our contacts were in and they have probably now floated away. We've fantasized about falling asleep on a train, plane, or in a car, during a long trip, and not waking to dried out, hazy contact lenses, and eyes so scratchy it's obvious the sandman was on a bender and dumped his entire load into our eyes. Those were my fantasies. They are now my reality. I can't help but marvel at the technology that has made this possible. I wonder about the first people on whom this technology was tested. Were they so blind that the potential hazards were heavily outweighed by the potential benefits? I'm sure that information is available, and I'll probably look it up. But I can't imagine there is much that is more frightening than messing with your vision. I thank them for their bravery, the bravery that has made my better-than-20/20 vision possible today. It is truly miraculous. For those of you who are afraid - don't be. It is so easy, so relatively painless (there is some discomfort on day one, but day two is pain free), and so life altering, that if you are a candidate, you really should do it. If your corneas are too thin for Lasik, then do PRK. While it is more painful (the watering, scratchy eyes last two or three days instead of one), it too is well worth it. My daughter is on day three today following PRK this past Saturday, and is doing really well. On day two she already had 20/30 vision - an outcome they don't generally expect until day 5 or 6 with PRK. We both agree this was money very well spent (about $1700 for each of us) and we'd both do it again in a heartbeat.

Google bombs, digital natives, and lasik

Tomorrow is the big day. The left eye gets the Lasik treatment and I will have perfect vision in BOTH eyes. Yay! I can't wait.

Today was interesting. I attended an Idaho Library Association conference in Moscow, ID. I went expressly to listen to Stephen Abrams, VP of Innovation at SirsiDynix. He is trying to help librarians and libraries move into the 21st century, to embrace technology, to look at the services they offer and whether they're reaching their audience, and to figure out how to reach today's teens more effectively. He is talking about a paradigm shift in how we view the delivery of services to patrons. He is really motivational and thought-provoking. If you are even remotely interested, this article about Digital Natives is terrific. Stephen's blog is here. It's pretty library oriented, so it probably won't interest most of you, but the digital natives site is great, especially if you're a parent of a teen. Heck, I think it's interesting for anyone.

One thing I learned today that I didn't know was that Google doesn't just index the web and provide results in an unbiased way. The results are actually driven by various special interest (translated political and religious) groups to provide results that support their positions. They're called "google bombs". Want more info? Click here. Dumb me. I should have known this, and I didn't. So, I learned something new today. Lots of somethings new. I love days like today.

From 20/425 to 20/15 in 10 seconds

A week ago today, my vision was about 20/425 in my right eye, with a substantial astigmatism, and 20/400 in my left eye, with minimal astigmatism.  Basically, I was blind as a bat without corrective lenses.  

For the past few years, I’ve struggled with my beloved soft contact lenses.  I’ve worn soft contacts every day of my life since the summer of 1973 with great success.  I even went about 20 years without a pair of glasses for backup.  A few years ago, I decided I needed to start wearing a toric lens in my right eye to correct my astigmatism, which had gotten bad enough that it needed correction.  I had worn a toric lens several years ago quite successfully, but they were substantially more expensive, so when that one needed replacing, I went back to a normal lens.  Toric lenses are still more expensive, but nearly as much so as they once were.  Unfortunately, I could not find a lens that didn’t rotate once I put it in my eye.  It would seem to be fine, but about an hour after inserting it, it would rotate about 5 degrees, making everything blurry and defeating the purpose of wearing it.  I struggled through 5 different brands and at least two or three different lenses in each brand, to no avail.  I finally gave up and got my first pair of glasses in 20 years.  I was quickly reminded why I hated glasses.  I longed for perfect vision.  My sister had had Lasik surgery several years ago and couldn’t say enough good things about it, but it had cost her $4,000.  Everyone I knew who’d had it, had spent over $2,000.  I just couldn’t justify spending that much money on something that wasn’t a necessity, not with a kid in college.

The newspaper always has an ad or two about Lasik, especially Sunday’s paper.  I’ve seen ads for Lasik for just $295 per eye, but there is always fine print.  I figured those ads were loss leaders, and that the majority of people wouldn’t qualify for the advertised price.  Then, my son-in-law’s sister had Lasik – for $295 per eye.  She said she wasn’t pressured into a higher priced option either.  So, I made the call and went in for a consultation.  While my astigmatism did mean I didn’t qualify for the $295 per eye surgery, I did qualify for the $495 per eye surgery.  That was still a great price.  Last Monday, I went in for my surgery.  

During the meeting with the surgeon, we discussed the fact that I’d likely need reading glasses after the surgery.  Given the fact that I needed them now when I had my contacts in, I expected that.  What I wasn’t sure about was whether I would need them to see my computer or not. If I did, that almost defeated the purpose of getting Lasik, since I spend all day in front of the computer and would pretty much need to wear glasses all day long.  We decided to try correcting just my right eye – my worst, and dominant, eye – and leave my left eye uncorrected.  That would allow me to read without glasses, but still have clear distance vision.  It would take my brain about two to four weeks to adapt, but once I adapted, I would have the best of both worlds – near and distance vision without correction.

They have you take this pain medication – Lyrica – 3 hours before surgery, then another dose when you arrive at the office.  Now, I’m one of those people who never takes pain meds besides ibuprofen or aspirin.  I have a very high pain threshold and a very low tolerance for drugs of any kind, including alcohol, but I did as I was instructed.  By the time I arrived at the office, I was feeling pretty loopy.  I took my second dose neverthless.  During the meeting with the surgeon just before surgery, he gave me a Valium.  They want you to be relaxed.  Within half an hour, I was really feeling wobbly, but surgery was imminent, and they want you to sleep afterward if you can.

I was taken into the surgery room, feet and hair covered in those booties and hair coverings doctors wear.  I laid down on a table where they put a shield over my left eye (the one not being corrected), put anesthetizing drops in my right eye, and then put something on my eye to keep it open.  Within seconds they had cut the flap.  Now, for those who don’t know how it works, they cut a very thin flap in your cornea with, in this case, a laser.  Then, they use a different laser that works off the scan they took of my eye during my consultation/exam a few days earlier, and blast away corneal tissue to create the reshaped cornea that will provide perfect vision.  The flap is then folded back into place, and you’re done!  So, they cut the flap, stood me up – everything is a very hazy gray blur of shapes at this point – walked me to a different table, upon which I laid, had me look at this green dot of light, and then started doing the correction.  There is a smell that kept my eye open, and I was finished!  They put drops in right away, so everything is foggy, but I can tell immediately that my vision is better.  That was it.  I was finished!

I sat in the waiting area for my daughter to pick me up, chatting with a fellow who was in for a consultation and marveling at my vision.  I was starting to feel really woozy though, and really just wanted to nap.  My eye felt like I had a hair in it – annoying but not painful.  My daughter arrived in a few minutes.  I donned the provided sunglasses, wobbled to her car, got in, and started feeling kind of queasy.  I realized I hadn’t eaten all day, and it was after 3PM.  We stopped at a McDonald’s, where I grabbed a Coke and a burger, and then we headed for home.  I really did just want to sleep, so tried to doze on the way home.  I was battling waves of nausea, which I attributed to both the drugs and the uneven vision that my brain was struggling to understand.  At last, I did fall asleep.  90 minutes later, we arrived at my house.  As I walked in, I was overwhelmed with nausea.  I went straight to the bathroom and vomited, then crawled to my bed.  I got in bed, fully clothed, and passed out.  I did not awaken until 4 hours later.  Even then, I awoke only briefly, put in the antibiotic drops they had given me, and fell back to sleep.  As I said, I am a lightweight when it comes to drugs, and I was definitely not handling the combination of the Lyrica and Valium well at all.  

The next morning, I awoke to clear vision.  Even with just one eye corrected, I could see like I’d never seen before.  I got up to make lunch for the Spouse, and could see as well as I did with my glasses on.  I could see crumbs on the counter, yet I could read the calendar on my refrigerator and the newspaper.  I had a follow-up appointment that morning, so I had to leave pretty early.  The one down side – you can’t wear any makeup at all the day of, or three days after, surgery, and you can’t wear eye makeup for a week.  That has been rough.  

My follow-up appointment went great.  My vision in my right eye is now 20/15!  After a few days of work, I realized that my corrected eye is the one that is in use when I am at my computer as it is about 3 feet away.  Not only that, I can actually read with my right eye in most situations.  If the light is dim, like lamplight in my living room, I need reading glasses, but at work, and most everywhere else, I can read without glasses.  So, I am going to have the left eye corrected Friday.  Eventually, I will need reading glasses for everything I read, but I shouldn’t need them for the computer for some time.  I can live with that.  This time around, I am not taking any pain meds beforehand, and only half a Valium.  I should be in a much better state after this go around.  

My daughter is having her surgery on Saturday.  She is even more nearsighted than I am, but has no astigmatism.  She can look forward to 20 years of correction free vision.  Lucky kid!

Today, I can't even see the big E on the eye chart, but tomorrow.....

Today I go in for Lasik eye surgery to correct my ridiculously near-sighted vision. I have wanted to have this done for years, but it's always been too expensive. Well, too expensive to justify spending THAT much money on just me for something I didn't HAVE to have since I could see just fine with my contact lenses. But a few years ago, my astigmatism in my right eye became bad enough that I could no longer see clearly with just a distance vision correcting lens in it. I needed a toric lens.

I had worn a toric lens in my right eye about 15 years ago with no problem, but when it "wore out", I returned to just normal soft lenses because torics were so expensive back then and I could see well enough without the astigmatism correction. That was no longer the case. Unfortunately, this time around I could not find a toric lens that would sit straight on my eye to save my life. I went through five different brands and two or three variations in each model, and each time, the lens would rotate about 5 degrees. That left me constantly rubbing my eye in an attempt to get the lens back into position. After struggling with this for over a year, I gave up. I started wearing my glasses to work and left wearing my contact lenses for the weekends. I hate wearing glasses. I haven't worn them regularly since getting my first pair of soft contact lenses in the summer of 1973.

I remember the day vividly. I lived at home. It was the summer between my freshman and sophomore year of college. I was heading to UC Santa Barbara in the fall after a year at junior college in Santa Maria. I remember I had to go to Santa Barbara to get them for some reason - probably because podunk Santa Maria didn't have doctors who gave them out yet. Part of the plan for the day was to tour the UCSB campus. I remember that when the lenses were first inserted in my eyes, it felt like I had a hair in my eye for just a few seconds. As soon as my eyes teared up a bit, I couldn't feel them at all. I also remember walking around on campus amazed at how clearly I could see the leaves on the eucalyptus trees, and how cool it was to have vision that was not boxed in by frames. I took to soft lenses like a duck to water. From that day on, I did not wear glasses again, except briefly upon arising or just before retiring for the night. For the past 20 years or so, I haven't even owned a pair of glasses. But now, I wear them daily once again.

A few months ago, my son-in-law's sister had Lasik done in Spokane. The price was an amazingly inexpensive $1,000. That was a figure I could handle, especially since I have $450 in a health benefits spending account I have to use by the year's end or lose. I made an appointment for a consultation for myself and my daughter, who is also as blind as a bat, minus the astigmatism. Last Thursday, we both went for the exam. While I have pretty typical eyes and can have the normal Lasik procedure, she has thin corneas and will have to have either a different kind of Lasik or PRK. She will find out which today. At 1:00 PM today, I will be in the doctor's office preparing for my Lasik surgery. By 4:00 PM today, I should be able to see better than I've seen since I was a little kid. My only concern is how bad my presbyopia will be after surgery. I have the option of having monovision done - they correct your dominant eye for distance and leave your other eye uncorrected so you can read without glasses - but I'm not sure I would like that. You do lose some depth perception and it takes a couple of weeks to a month for your brain to fully adapt. I'll talk to the doctor today. Regardless, I WILL see without glasses after surgery today. I can hardly believe it, and I can hardly wait! My daughter goes in for her surgery on October 7. She, at least, won't need reading glasses for years. I wish I'd been able to have this done years ago so I could have enjoyed years of glasses free vision, but to be able to wake up and see, to see in the middle of the night, to be able to go in the water and not worry about losing a contact lens - I can't even tell you how exciting that is.

So.... tomorrow I will try to post and give you the scoop on what it's like post-Lasik.

The end of days - and post #203

Gosh, this is my 203rd post! I didn't even notice when I hit number 200. Of course, that's a small number of posts compared to some of my more prolific bloggy friends, but considering my workload, well, it's not too bad.

It's painfully apparent that summer is drawing quickly to a close. The weather isn't the giveaway, though. It's the absence of the sun at times when, in the very near past, it has normally hung high in the sky. I really noticed it this morning when The Spouse left for work. Usually, I can see his car just fine as I stand at the kitchen window waving goodbye. This morning, the sun had yet to peek above the horizon. The sky was almost still dark, and he needed his headlights. That was at 6:00 AM.

Wasn't it just last week that the sun was waking me up at 5:00 AM as it blasted through the bedroom window? It seems like it. Even now, at 7:50 AM, the sun is just barely above the tops of the 20 foot tall trees in the neighbor's yard. And it has moved into a more southerly position in the sky, as opposed to the very easterly one it occupies all summer long. And last night after work, as I mowed the lawn, I found myself doing so in growing darkness, barely finishing the front yard before it became too dusky to see where I'd mowed and where I needed to mow. By 7:30 PM it was too dark to continue. Not that it was actually dark, mind you. It was just not bright enough to continue mowing. In another week, it will be too dark by 7:00 PM.

The color of the sun's light has changed too, especially the afternoon light. It has taken on that autumn glow that signals the trees to change color, and evokes an innate sense of urgency and impending change in many of us. It has a more golden color to it, as opposed to the white-hot color of the July sun. The summer sun invites us to languish in it, to soak it in, to relax and take it easy. The autumn sun urges us to hurry, to organize, prepare, complete projects, stock our cupboards. It whispers to us, reminding us that winter is just around the corner; and no amount of tweaking of daylight savings time will stop its arrival. But between summer and winter is autumn, harvest, the season of change. I'm looking forward to the apple harvest festivals this region holds each year, to college football games, to Parents' Weekend at Youngest Son's college, to the end of mowing season, to the gorgeous, crisp sunny days when the sky is as blue as a topaz, and the mountains to the east stand out in relief against it. I will miss summer, but I am ready for fall, and it's getting nearer day by day.

Weight loss update

So, amazingly and surprisingly, I've started losing weight again. What I mean is, despite my best efforts over the past few months, I was fighting a losing battle against my weight. I'd lose three or four pounds, only to gain them back even more quickly. Over the past few weeks, I started trying more diligently to watch my diet. I was rewarded with a loss of a few pounds that stayed off. Then, this past week, I found myself losing about half a pound a day, to my utter astonishment. The net result is that I have lost about 17 pounds over the past 4 or 5 months! I still have 20 to go to get to where I was when Youngest Son went off to college in 2004, the weight at which I'd been "stuck" for a few years, and 35 to get to my ideal weight, a goal I haven't achieved since 1998, but I have a renewed hope that I can actually achieve those goals now. Anyone who has fought their weight understands how good it feels to achieve a goal, even a little, interim one, and how motivating that can be. My boss has lost about 40 pounds in the last couple of months, thanks to a renewed dedication to Weight Watchers. His success is what spurred me to work harder at my own weight loss, coupled with a concern for my health and fitness, which has always been excellent, but which was being negatively impacted by my weight. So.... a little success, with hopefully more to come!

9/11

Every morning, while getting ready for work, The Spouse turns on the news. Today, of course, it's all about September 11. I keep getting all choked up. Regardless of your thoughts about the president, the war in Iraq, or anything else, I suspect we all share similar feelings about that awful day. One thing that makes me sad is remembering how united we all were on that day, and the days following, and contrasting it with the climate in this country today. We weren't Republicans and Democrats, we weren't black, white, asian, or hispanic, we were just Americans who shared a national grief. And most of the world grieved with us. But today there is so much division, so much name-calling, so many doubts, so much second-guessing. And so much of the world looks upon us with disdain. It makes me sad. But then, I've never been one to handle division and conflict very well. I want peace and unity. I'm an idealist, I know.

Last Vacation of the Summer - Take Two

Note: I had a really great, long post written, and blogger ate it. All I could recover is what follows...not even half of my post. I am too aggravated to rewrite it now. In summary, we painted the garage doors too, which was a project in itself, and moved Youngest Son back to school on Labor Day. I did some long overdue transplanting of stuff, of which I took photos and might post about separately when I get over being peeved at blogger. For now, read what blogger didn't eat. Grrrrr!

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My last vacation of the summer is over. I am back at work. Oddly, I missed being at work when I was off. What does that say about me? Maybe it just says a lot about my job.

The week off was a busy one, as I said it would be. We successfully accomplished the power-washing and restaining of our deck (photos to follow), with the assistance of daughter and son-in-law, who came over one afternoon to help us get the project completed in at least half the time it would have taken the two of us alone. We repaid them with a BBQ dinner of tri-tip, roasted peppers and zucchini, green salad with tomatoes fresh from my dad's garden, and Italian bread, with ice cream for dessert. During the meal, Grandson, age 5, was stung by a wasp - the second time in as many days. The yard seemed to be infested with the darned things, and Grandson appears to be a wasp magnet. I have the magic potion, though, that stops the swelling and the pain almost immediately - Adolph's meat tenderizer dissolved in a bit of water, applied with a cotton ball to the sting and held in place for several minutes. Grandson is convinced Grammy is magic. Meanwhile, Poppy and Dad are out spraying wasps with "dead on contact" spray, knocking down wasp nests from hidden places, and stomping them to bits. Turns out there was a huge wasp's nest right next to the swingset on a post used to hold up the tarp covering our boat. Grandson was swinging when the first sting came - on his face next to his mouth. The second sting came while sitting on our wrought iron picnic table eating dinner. The little yellow striped buggers had made nests in each of the four open-ended pipes that made up the legs of the table - right under Grandson's seat. Lucky kid.

Once the staining was finished, it was on to the trim. The deck is 800 square feet of cedar with slate blue fascia and railings that are a combination of slate blue, white vinyl lattice, and white vinyl handrails. All the blue trim had to be painted - carefully so as not to get any paint on the newly stained deck surface. You have no idea how much work that involved. Backbreaking work that could only be done after 2PM when shade hits the deck. Spouse did 95% of it. All I did was get the small art brush and do the places that were too small or precise for his big brush. (subsequent paragraphs gobbled by blogger)

Another vacation

Next week I will be taking my last week of summer vacation (I still have a week in November and one in December coming). I am not going anywhere this time; I'll be working around the old homestead. So, you know what that means. I likely won't be blogging or commenting. I hope you don't miss me too much. :-) I'll be back at it the Tuesday after Labor Day, while the youngest son starts his junior year of college.

Beginning tomorrow, my days will be filled with painting of garage doors and deck trim, staining of said deck, digging out overgrown shubbery and replacing it with wonderful perennial flowers, with a few trips to The Big City thrown in for good measure. I am sure I'll be called in to work at least once, maybe twice, while on vacation. That's just par for the course. Maybe, just maybe, I'll be able to work up a post, but I am not promising anything. Ciao, friends! I'll miss you. Stay out of trouble in my absence (charlie, that means you!) And be nice to Amy.

Blog workshop

Hi everyone...guess where I am? At a library workshop on blogging and the use of blogs in/for libraries. I am one of only two people at this workshop, which about 15 attendees, who has a blog. The instructor is showing everyone how to set up a Blogger blog. Naturally, I am exempt from this part of the workshop. (I think I get an A on this section.) The afternoon session is about RSS. I have tons of RSS feeds (I like to know when you guys post as soon as you do, so I get your blog feeds!) but I don't know how to create a feed on our web site. So, that's what I hope to learn this afternoon. Since he's teaching everyone how to create a blog and post to it, it's okay that I'm blogging right now. In fact, we're supposed to blog right now. Yippee! Paid to blog! :)

Growing pains

My town is changing - quickly, and not necessarily for the better. Obviously, every town changes with time. Businesses come and go, as do people; some move, some die, all change with age, sometimes becoming unrecognizable. New neighborhoods spring up, new businesses sprout from once vacant lots, new roads go in to service all the newness, and the face of the town changes. For the most part, those changes have been gradual in my town. It's a small town, off the beaten path a bit, and short of its breathtaking geographic beauty, lacking most of the qualities that draw throngs of new residents. There are very few well-paying jobs in town. There isn't much in the way of affordable housing available. With the exception of WalMart, Home Depot, and the usual fast food enterprises, we lack major retail outlets. It's more than an hour drive to the nearest mall or movie theater. There is no institute of higher education within a 70 mile radius. But the area is beautiful - breathtakingly so. As a result, the various magazines that rate such things (Sunset, Outdoor Life, and the like), have deemed this town one of the country's most desirable places in which to live, going so far as to call it "the next Aspen". I want to thank those publications so much for those articles.

Not wanting to miss out on the latest, hottest, hippest thing, people are flocking to this area. They are not flocking to live and work here, though. They are coming to develop the area, build homes, drive up housing prices, sell their spec homes, then move on to the next hot market. The people who can afford these new homes are mostly retired, usually don't plan to live here year 'round, and add nothing to the economy in the way of jobs created. Sometimes they are people who need a tax write-off in the form of a second home, or maybe they want to escape city life for a week or two a year, so they build a home here to meet that need. Unfortunately, they usually bring their big-city attitudes with them when they are in town, driving aggressively, behaving rudely in our local business establishments, treating the employees at said establishments as servants, barely worthy of acknowledgement. Yes, my town is changing.

Houses are going up faster than I can keep track of them. Neighborhoods of dozens of ostentiously enormous homes, paved with wide, interstate-like roads, are being cut into the previously roadless, pristine forests, miles from downtown, changing the very nature of the area. If I take a different route to work, I am apt to be assaulted by the shock of seeing new "premier, upscale townhomes" being built where a block of quaint little homes once stood, as was the case this morning. Laughably, these premier townhomes back up to shoddy little houses (picture chicken coops in the yard, laundry hanging on the line) and front one of the few busy streets in town. Not exactly my idea of a "premier, upscale" location, yet they're asking more for them than the value at which my house, on half an acre, with lake access, was appraised. We are in the midst of a sort of tax revolution as a result of the meteoric rise in property values. My property taxes are set to increase by more than 50% this next year. Thank you, all you "hipsters" who are changing my town.

When I first moved here, if I called my friends at home, and they were not there, I could almost always find them by just driving around the few streets that comprise "downtown", locating their vehicle, and going into the store on that street. They were almost certainly inside, or walking down the street, easily spotted. Going to the grocery store took forever because I invariably knew 75% of the people in the store, and of course, had to stop to chat for a few minutes. Everyone smiled at everyone else. People said "hi" even if they didn't know you. They probably know your folks, kids, siblings, or neighbors. It was a nice feeling. If my kids were at the City Beach, and I had to leave for some reason, there was always a contingent of friends around me who would look after them for me. Now, I barely recognize a tenth of the people I see on the streets, or in the shops. Now that we've become "hip", the folks walking our streets and perusing our shops are usually tourists, or seasonal residents. Most locals don't even go downtown any more. The parking is a nightmare, the shops are tourist oriented, and unless you work downtown, you seldom have a reason to do so. Yep, my town is changing.

I used to joke that we didn't have rush hour here, we have "rush minute". No more. Traffic in town is choked from a two lane road into a one lane road on both ends of town, as it comes into town and as it leaves town. The volume of traffic has increased 5-fold, yet we have roads that haven't had their capacity expanded in over 20 years. We now have rush half-hour. I avoid it by leaving for the gym at 6:30 AM and not leaving work until 6:30 PM. My town is changing, and I am not thrilled with most of them. But I still love my town. I hope we find a way to deal with all the changes without losing our character, our heart, our core.

New blog additions

I have added a couple of widgets to my blog. They are wordy widgets. Considering the fact that I am often accused of being a bit wordy myself, they seemed apropos additions to my word-encrusted blog. I love words. I enjoy using them when I write, when I speak, and even when I think. Words intrigue me. Especially their origins. I should have been an etymologist, or a linguist because I like words of all kinds - English and non-English alike. I am a non-discriminatory word lover. In that vein, I have added a "word of the day" widget and a synonym matching widget to my blog. Go ahead, test your mettle. I know I'll be doing it often.

Tomorrow, tomorrow, I love ya tomorrow...

Last week was a tumultuous week, both personally and professionally. There was major drama at home - none of it good. Fortunately, it's on the road to resolution. Work was fraught with problems that have yet to be resolved, both at my "day job" and at my consulting job. It seems to be the way it goes with computer gigs.... everything goes really well for a period, every problem is easily solved, then nothing works, solutions escape me, problems cascade like a waterfall crashing over me, until I feel as though I'm drowning in them, rescue nowhere in sight. The fun part of my job, the part I slip off to do when I can't think another second about how to solve the technical problems, is being farmed out. I wanted to cry when I was told this would happen, but I had to admit I don't have the "mad skilz" necessary to do what the boss wants done, and I don't have the time to acquire them in time to do what he wants done. It's been a crushing week, but tomorrow a new one starts. It has to be better, right?

Sunshine, lollipops, and rainbows

Everything that's wonderful is what I feel when we're together,
Brighter than a lucky penny,
When you're near the rain cloud
disappears, dear,
And I feel so fine
just to know that you are mine.

I don't know why that song popped into my head, but it seems apropos. So, I've added a few blogs to my blog list. I've been lax in doing that, considering how often I read said blogs. So, Lorraine and Nicole in France are now included. I know there are others I should add, but I can't think of them just now. I suppose I should organize the list alphabetically or something, but that just seems so structured, something I do try to escape as often as possible.

I'm working on a new look for the web site at work. It's driving me crazy. I have this vision in my head....but I just can't get it out of my mind and onto my computer screen. I know what I want, but I don't have all the skills necessary for creating it. It's very frustrating. I keep coming up with "interim" designs, intending to get the "real thing" completed soon....but it is taking an awfully long time to get to "soon".

Another project on which I've been working for months and months is still causing me fits. It's the implementation of our internet access management software, and it's still not going well. Something is wrong, and no one can figure out what it is - not me, not the developers, not the tech people. It just is not working and we're all about to lose our minds. That is what I'm working on this week, with a few hours of web redesign thrown in when I can't take the frustration any longer. And so, I spend my days in a constant state of frustration and aggravation, with the only real respite coming in the form of reading the posts of my fellow bloggers. Thanks guys. You have no idea just how much I enjoy reading your blogs, and how doing so helps keep me sane. Keep it up!

It ain't over 'til the fat lady sings

I thought I'd be back blogging regularly by now. I guess I need to have another think. I'm still so darned busy, and I don't see any signs of it letting up any time soon, sadly. If it's not work, it's home projects, if it's not that, it's college financial aid stuff. It's just BUSY all the time now. I do have time to read posts on other blogs, for the most part, just not much time to write posts for mine. Since nothing is worse than a blog that is never updated, I am committed to writing at least something every few days, just to keep my few readers interested.

A former coworker, fellow Italian, and all around great lady just started a blog. It's called Rosemary's Attic. I put a link to it on my blog link list. Check it out. She's just getting started, but I can tell already it's going to be a good one. Charlie will like this - her last two posts are about her dogs. They will make you cry. Charlie, her dog's name is Charlie. She is an animal lover extraordinaire. Visit her blog, leave her a comment. Welcome her to Blogland. Now...back to work.

100 degrees? No problem!

This past weekend was a hot one, not only here in North Idaho, but all across the country it seems.  We spent it the way anyone with any sense would spend a weekend with temperatures hovering around the hundred degree mark – in the water.  Our kids and their families set out Friday morning for a campground on the lake just a few miles from our house.  The campsite is most easily accessed via boat, though there is a dirt road to the campground.  Via road you have to park in a parking lot and lug your stuff about 500 yards to the campsite, while via boat, you simply pull up onto the beach, and walk about 50 feet to the campsite.  

About noon Saturday, we drove to the marina from which they launched their boat and jet skis, parked our car, and waited for them to pick us up in the boat and take us to the campsite, about a 10 minute boat ride away.  We were told all we needed to bring was the meat we wanted to cook for dinner, something to drink, and ourselves.  We considered staying the night, but decided we’d rather sleep in our bed in an air-conditioned bedroom than on some rocky ground somewhere.  

We had been to this campground once before several years ago, but I had forgotten that.  I really had no idea what it was like.  It turned out to be much nicer than I had imagined it would be.  The tents were set up in amongst the trees overlooking the beach below.  There was a picnic table and a fire ring with a grate, and the kids had a really nice setup with coolers, camp stoves, hibachis, storage totes, and camp chairs.  The beach is made up of smooth, flat stones (not sand) upon which they had sheets and towels laid out next to beach chairs and umbrellas, positioned to provide shade.  The jet skis and boat were beached and available to play on, as were a wide variety of beach toys like air mattresses for floating on the water, snorkeling gear, and sundry children’s toys.  It was a very nice setup and we found ourselves wishing we’d brought camping gear.  

We spent the day riding the jet skis, pulling the grandkids on the tube behind the boat, swimming, sunbathing, and napping.  It was a perfect way to spend a Saturday.  When it was time for dinner, we grilled our tri-tip and t-bones, baked some potatoes in the fire, cooked corn-on-the-cob and steamed broccoli on the camp stove, and all enjoyed an outstanding meal together.  At about 8 p.m., the kids took us back to our car, we drove home, and fell into bed, exhausted.  We were to meet them at the dock at 9 a.m. Sunday so we could enjoy a breakfast of sausages, pancakes, strawberries, and whipped cream with them.

The next morning, while we ate breakfast together, they related the events of the previous night.  Turns out, it was a good thing we didn’t spend the night.  Apparently, at about 9 p.m., a large group of twenty-something “granola people” invaded the campground, coming in on sailboats, motor boats, and a catamaran.  They proceeded to party very loudly, screaming, laughing, banging drums, and performing some sort of apparent spiritual dance until the wee hours of the morning.  No one got any sleep.  The kids decided the best way to retaliate was to jump on the jet skis and roar around making as much noise as they could at about 7 a.m.  Before doing so, they went down the beach to let the folks in the next camp in on the plan – a plan they enthusiastically endorsed.  The day before, as I was floating around the lake, a guy on a jet ski rode up and asked me to save the beach and campsite for him, explaining they’d been looking all day for a spot to camp and finding everything full.  As I talked with him, my daughter-in-law recognized him.  Turned out, he and his wife work for the same company in Spokane as she and our son do.  Small world.  They too were camping with their folks and siblings.  They too were upset by the “invaders” who had kept them awake all night, and agreed it was only fair that they fight fire with fire.  So, the kids zipped around just a few hundred feet from the beach on the jet skis and watched as heads popped up, like prairie dogs on the lookout, from amongst the group sleeping on the beach.  By the time we arrived, the twenty-something “hippies” were up, including one girl who decided to strip naked, apply sunscreen, and then sunbathe nude for the next few hours.  Considering we had small children in tow, it was a good thing they were about 100 yards up the beach from us, though the men in our party were looking for excuses to wander down the beach in that direction.  

I spent pretty much the rest of the day floating on the lake, getting a nice sunburn on my back and legs, although not a bad one.  I did put on sunscreen.  We were going to go via boat to the next bay over at about noon, where the library was having a staff picnic, but the boat started having problems.  It wouldn’t idle, it was becoming difficult to start, and it kept dying once you did get it started.  Everyone was worried that we’d be stuck there if we didn’t just get going back to the marina.  So, we helped the kids pack up, hopped in the boat, and headed back to the cars – and I missed the staff picnic.  But we had a very relaxing weekend.  Weather permitting, we’re going to go camping in two weeks in one of the coves about 1000 yards from the campsite – a cove you can only access by boat, and that has room for just one camping party, so you can’t be invaded by noise-making partiers in the middle of the night.  It will be a lot of fun, provided the weather holds.  Right now, I’m kind of a big fan of global warming.

I'll be back soon....really

I am just way too busy at work to blog right now. Work is taking all my time - 12 hours a day or more. So, bear with me a little longer and I promise I'll come back with a vengeance. I had a blast with my brother and his family. I still have tons to tell you all about the UK. I am just falling so far behind.... I'm in the middle of all the filing of forms for financial aid for Jonathan for the coming year, planning my budget for my department here at work (which is always an arduous task), and implementing a bunch of new technologies, so I'm a bit overwhelmed. Oh, my dad is doing well. He is recovering, albeit slowly. Summer is flying by, and it's been a HOT one. Life is good....busy, but good.

Sun and Sand and Fun....

I have a major sunburn.  I spent way too much time in the sun without enough SPF in my sunscreen.  It’s been hot – mid-90’s – and sunny.  The days have been filled with family, sun, sand, boats, jet skis, food, and fun.  My brother is en route.  He will arrive tomorrow early AM.  I am having a great time.  We all are.  Miss you all….

Blog respite

In the tradition of Charlie, I will be taking a blogging break. Not because I have other more pressing things to do, but because I will be on vacation next week. My brother is coming to visit and we're going to camp with him and his family, go out on our boat, and just have a great time enjoying the summer in Sandpoint. So... I will be back, and will post more about our UK Trip, and maybe even some photos from next week's vacation too. Happy 4th to you all. See you soon. I'll miss you all.

UK Trip - Day Two (continued)

Pitlochry is a great little town. It’s quite picturesque and was one of our favorite little towns in all of Scotland. We spent quite a bit of time in the visitor center there, partly looking for souvenirs, partly gathering information about the area. The woman who helped us was really wonderful. Her accent was great too! After buying some t-shirts for friends of ours that said “I have friends in Scotland”, a refrigerator magnet, and a great map of Scotland, loading up with every brochure imaginable about Scotland’s various regions, we trekked on down the main street of Pitlochry. There were dozens of great little shops, and I think we went into every one of them. We didn’t buy anything, just did a lot of looking. Around lunch time we noticed several people eating fish and chips from Styrofoam containers. It looked really good, so we asked one couple where they got it. There was a place on one of the side streets called “The Plaice to Be” (spelled just that way). We headed straight for it since we were starving. There was a line of about 10 people that wound out the door and in front of the take out place. Obviously, this WAS the “plaice” to be. We looked at the menu and decided to just go for the fish and chips, though there was pretty much anything you could want on the menu. They had steak pie, haggis, sausages, and some things I had no clue what they were. We saw the steak pies and they looked pretty tasty, but we were ready for some fish and chips – our first since our arrival in the UK. We were not disappointed. The piece of fish was huge! In the US, you usually get two or three small pieces of fish and a pile of chips (fries), so we were awed by the giant piece of haddock that we were given and the enormous of steak fries it was served with. Jonathan and I opted for the vinegar, of course, but Tom hates it, so he just had salt. This was strictly a take away place with no seating, so we walked down the street a bit and found a stone wall upon which we could place our take out boxes while we ate. We joined the others who were eating their fish and chips while standing on the sidewalk. One bite and we were hooked. The fish was hot, moist, and delicious! My only complaint was that, by the time we got to the fries, they were kind of soaked with grease from the fish, and I really couldn’t eat much more. Tom wanted to eat every dinner there for the rest of the stay. He really, really loved it. It was good, but I’d take it somewhere I could sit down to eat it, and separate it from the fries so they didn’t soak up all the grease. If you go to Pitlochry, give “The Plaice to Be” a try. It’s just east of the main street on the north end of town. Excellent food!

After we ate, we explored the town a bit more, taking in the scenery, the quaint stone houses, the beautiful gardens, the old churches. It was a really great day and we would love to go back and try out some of the pubs we passed. I highly recommend a visit to Pitlochry. I know we didn’t see half of what we could have had we spent more time there. Interestingly, I found out from my sister that she stayed at a B & B there when she visited about 8 years ago. I had no idea.

There are some great sights in Pitlochry, like the River Tummel, Loch Faskally, and the Edradour Distillery. I believe the Queen's View at Loch Tummel is close by as well. We didn't get to take in any of those sights - this time. We will next time. We did stop by Blair Atholl and Blair Castle, though after hours, so all we could see was the outside of the castle, the grounds, and the Hercules garden. I will post photos of it in the next few days. I have posted about 15 new photos from our trip to Stirling, which comes on Day Three, so checkout my photobucket.

The reason I am not a worldly success

I was reading an article in today’s paper about a man who was struck and killed while riding his bicycle with a fellow bicyclist along a straight section of the road. It was a really tragic accident. The man had apparently logged over 10,000 miles on his bicycle. What struck me was the way he was described by his brother. He could have been describing me. …well, except for the enormous number of friends who loved him to pieces.

“Smith had a master’s degree in energy planning and was interested in sailing, cooking, and desktop publishing. He memorized dozens of sea dirges and recited Lewis Carroll at gatherings of The Well. ’I think he had far too many interests to be a worldly success in the late 20th century, but he had an enormous number of friends who loved him to pieces,’ Creighton Smith said.”

It doesn’t say Smith was interested in photography or writing, but I’ll bet he was. Probably liked gardening too. At last, I understand why I’ll never be the next (name your favorite prominent successful, brilliant female). Too many interests. I think they call that ADD.

Father’s Day Excitement

Wow, it’s been 11 days since I last posted. Right in the middle the tales of my UK Trip, I stop and leave everyone hanging…well, all five of you who read this blog. My apologies. Stuff happened. You see, on Father’s Day, June 18, I called my dad to wish him a happy Father’s Day. No answer. So, I left a cheery message wishing him a Happy Father’s Day and hoping he was out having fun. I learned later that each of my siblings did likewise. We were to meet my son-in-law, daughter, and their kids for breakfast at 9:30. We arrived a bit early, took our seats, and awaited their arrival. A few minutes later, our daughter and grandkids arrived sans our son-in-law. Daughter was visibly upset. When asked where SIL was, she looked at me and said “he drove your dad to the hospital in Coeur d’Alene”. Naturally, a million questions went through my mind. The obvious one finally popped out “what’s wrong?” She explained that my dad had called very early that morning and said simply “I’m in the ER and I need a ride to the hospital in Coeur d’Alene”, to which SIL responded “I’ll be right there”. He promised Daughter he’d call before he left town to tell her what was going on. An hour passed and he had still not called, so she called him. He was already in Coeur d’Alene. The fact that he’d not called first didn’t sit too well with Daughter. He explained that my dad had asked him not to say anything to anyone until they knew what was wrong for sure. Turns out, he had been having chest pains for a few days, but he thought they were gas pains. They got really bad Saturday night, but he refused to go to the ER. Early Sunday AM (they got to the ER at 5:30 so it must have been 3:30 a.m. or so) he finally relented and drove himself and my stepmom to the ER. Apparently, after an EKG and some other tests, the ER doc wasn’t sure what was wrong. He called the cardiologist in Coeur d’Alene and discussed the case with him. That doctor told him to send my dad down to Kootenai Medical Center (KMC) so he could check him out. They wanted to put him in an ambulance, but for some reason still unknown to me, he refused. It was at that point he called SIL.

Why not call me, you might ask? I wondered the same thing. I alternated between furious and worried. Needless to say, my appetite was ruined and the $15 buffet breakfast went to waste. SIL called Daughter a little later saying they still didn’t know what was wrong for sure. Daughter and SIL had a heated discussion about keeping secrets and not letting family members in on what was happening. SIL was caught in the middle, really. Finally, mid-afternoon, SIL called Daughter to tell her my dad needed bypass surgery. He had six blocked arteries. I immediately called SIL’s cell phone and got voice mail. I basically said “this is not cataract surgery, this is “you could die” surgery”. I want to know what’s going on so someone needs to call me as soon as possible.” Moments later, I got a call from my stepmother. She told me what I already knew – my dad had six blocked arteries. It was a miracle he hadn’t had a heart attack, wasn’t dead, and had no heart damage. The surgery was scheduled for Monday at 10 a.m. I asked why SIL was called instead of me and was told it’s because I’m too excitable. What that means is, I would probably cry when told my dad needed to go to ER, and I would probably be worried and/or scared, but I would have been completely capable of driving him to the hospital without freaking out. I do maintain my composure quite well in emergencies. I can’t help the tears. They just come. My real frustration was that my dad hadn’t taken an ambulance to KMC. What if he’d had a heart attack en route? I was left to fume while my stepmother went on to make other calls. I needed to call my siblings. Fortunately, the doctors said they expected an excellent result.

At 9:40 p.m. I got a call from my stepmother. Dad was going into surgery right away. He’d gotten worse as the day had progressed. Now I was scared. And I hadn’t been able to talk to my dad at all since all this had started – another reason I was upset at not being called first thing. What if…. I called my brother and sister on the west coast, but not my sister in the Midwest. It was too late. Besides, the surgery was supposed to last 4 or 5 hours and was pretty routine. I tried to sleep. It didn’t go too well. At 6:30 a.m. my stepmother called. Dad was out of surgery. It had lasted 8 hours. They had had a very difficult time finding enough veins in his legs to use for the bypass. I found out later he had 18 incisions where they’d tried to get veins. His veins are crap – small, not very elastic. Aside from that, it had gone well. He would be unconscious for most of the day. I had to go to Spokane that afternoon anyway, so I told her I’d stop by briefly en route to see him, conscious or not.

I had many conversations with siblings over the course of the next few days. High cholesterol runs in our family. My paternal grandfather died of a heart attack in 1973 at age 75. My dad’s sister also died of a heart attack several years ago. I think she was in her 70’s. My dad’s remaining brother and sister are fine, and both are quickly approaching 80. I just found out that my uncle takes cholesterol lowering medication. My dad does not, though his cholesterol is 325. I suspect that will change. My brother informed me that his cholesterol is 320. He is not on medication either. I will work on that when he visits me next week.

I saw my dad that Monday. His eyes were open, he was nodding to me, and he squeezed my hand, but I doubt he really knew it was me. He was on a ventilator so he couldn’t speak. They were in the process of weaning him off of it and it was going slowly. As it turned out, it took several days to get him off of it. In fact, his entire recovery is taking a bit longer than they had thought it would take, but he is doing well. He has had atrial fibrillations, where your upper chamber of your heart beats faster than the lower chamber. They are not uncommon after heart surgery, usually brought on by the irritation of the surgery. They make him dizzy, nauseated and sweaty. He’s had a tough time getting enough rest because of it. He has been up and walking on his own a few times, and the doctors say he may go home in the next couple of days. That is great news, but a bit worrisome because he lives in a very remote setting, 9 miles from the nearest town, and 45 miles from the nearest hospital, on a private dirt road. My stepmom doesn’t really drive anymore, and she’s a tiny thing, so I don’t know how she will help my dad get around. I don’t know what their plans are. I did visit Dad the day they moved him from ICU to CCU. He was awake, though drifting in and out of sleep, and could speak a few words. His throat hurt from the ventilator and he couldn’t catch enough breath to talk for very long. I told him I loved him and I was praying for a speedy recovery. I know he’s disappointed in himself. He looks at this surgery as some sort of sign of weakness I think. He has always prided himself in being such a tough guy. Sometimes God has a way of showing us just how human we really are.

So, between dad’s surgery and the insane workload at work lately, I’ve had to leave you hanging in regard to the UK trip narrative. I’m sorry. I’ll get back to it as soon as I can. There is so much more to tell.

UK Trip - Day Two, Part 1

The second day dawned wet and grey.  The plan was to go into Kenmore, the little town just half a mile from the resort, and just walk around a bit.  I made a hearty breakfast of eggs, toast, bacon, and orange juice.  Jonathan downed one of the mini boxes of cereal as well (growing kid and all).  We gathered up cameras and maps and headed off for our first day in Perthshire, Scotland.  I have to say this – Perthshire is perfectly situated for getting about in Scotland, especially where we were.  We were smack dab in the middle of the country, making everything around us pretty accessible within a couple hours drive.  I highly recommend to visitors to the country to find somewhere around Pitlochry to stay.  Now, on to our day.

Kenmore is a very small town.  It sports a hotel with a restaurant, a church, an antique shop, a few houses, a school, and that’s about it.  We walked down the path that led from the old Taymouth Castle gate toward the castle.  It started sprinkling lightly, but not enough to make us bring out the umbrellas.  The walk was beautiful and peaceful.  The path was lined will all sorts of trees we’d never seen before.  We’re from a land of lodgepole and Ponderosa pines, grand fir and cedars, aspens and birch, larch, maples, and cottonwoods.  I’d never seen a beech before.  I have no idea what some of the trees were.  All I know is, they were beautiful.  The yews really caught our attention.  We have small yew shrubs around that people plant in their yards, but I’ve never seen wild ones, and never any as large as the ones we saw.  I found myself marveling at the different flora as we walked along the path.  We finally realized the castle was a lot farther along than we’d thought, so we decided to turn back and drive to the other entrance so we could see the castle – our first.  The narrow roads were still a challenge, this being only our second time on them, but we drove slowly and had no mishaps.  When we finally arrived at the castle, we were disappointed to find it surrounded by a chain link fence and covered in large green tarps.  Apparently, it was closed while it was being remodeled into a 6 star hotel.  Previous visitors had commented on how beautiful it was inside, so it was disappointing to not be able to see it.  We decided to drive the few miles into Aberfeldy and explore there.  

Aberfeldy is a really cute little town.  Oh, a warning to Americans.  We tend to call everything a town.  We’ll say things like “hey, I’m going into town tonight.  Do you want to come along?”  We might use that phrase whether we’re going into Portland from one of the suburbs, or whether we’re driving 45 miles from our cabin in the woods into the population 350 town closest to us, or just going from our subdivision into the part of town where the movie theaters are.  Well, in the UK, they make a distinction between a town, a village, and a city.  Once we said something like “how large a town is Birmingham?” and the person to whom we were speaking quickly said “it’s a city”.  Ah-ha… so…how big is a city versus a town?  I suspect Aberfeldy might actually just be a village, not quite meeting the qualifications for townhood.  Nevertheless, it is a great little village.  The first thing we noticed as we entered Aberfeldy was a road sign, their version of a caution sign, that read “Elderly People” with an icon of two people, slightly bent, with canes.  Okay….so we were to be on the lookout for random old folks crossing the streets?  Jonathan, naturally, insisted Tom and I stand under this sign as he took our picture.  You’ll see it on the photobucket site.  We saw several of these signs sprinkled throughout Scotland.  We realized they were positioned wherever there was a nursing home.  Interesting.  We saw other interesting signs.  One was a pretty typical pedestrian crossing sign – an adult and child and a crosswalk – but the school signs were interesting.  They showed kids running.  Oh, and emergency exit signs in restaurants and stores made me laugh.  You know how you’re always told never to run in an emergency, right?  Well their signs show a person fleeing and the word exit.  I guess in the UK you’re supposed to run as fast  as you can to get the hell out in case of emergency.

Aberfeldy has a cute little town center with a little roundabout in the middle of it.  There is a co-op grocery store there, some cute little shops, and a Bank of Scotland.  We went into the grocery store and bought some necessities – Coke, cookies (biscuits), potato chips (crisps), sausages for breakfast, and a few other things.  I honestly believe Coke has a monopoly in the UK.  You could find Pepsi, but it was really hard to find Diet Pepsi, and I never could find it cold.  But any flavor of Coke you wanted – lime, cherry, vanilla, you name it, it was there and cold.  Weird.  

Down the street, we found the most delightful bakery.  You have to visit a bakery daily in Scotland.  They have the BEST stuff!  We went in just as it started raining a little, ready for something hot to drink and sweet to eat.  An older Scot gentleman and his buddy were ordering something he called “double D’s” “for the way they look” he told us.  Basically, they’re meringues and whipped cream, and yes, they do look like “double d’s”.  Jonathan ordered banoffee pie, I ordered scones and clotted cream.  Tom just had a latte.  We chatted a bit with the teenage girls working the counter, mostly so we could listen to them talk and find out a bit about life in Aberfeldy.  Our first Scottish meal out among the natives, so to speak, and it was delightful.  The older man and his buddy were really delightful, very friendly, and great to listen to.  We were loving it!

After our snack was consumed, we continued our walk along the main street of Aberfeldy, meandering into shops, buying some coffee since all we had at the room was instant, and marveling at some of the unique sculptures we found in one of the little gift shops.  But Aberfeldy is a village, and it didn’t take long to exhaust our shopping options.  On to Pitlochry…..

UK Trip - Arrival at the Resort

We finally arrived at our abode in Scotland, The Kenmore Club, in Kenmore, Perthshire, at about 4:00 pm. The trip from Edinburgh took just about 90 minutes. While Tom had become somewhat comfortable driving on the carriageway, the Scottish version of a highway, the road we had to turn onto from it, which would take us to our resort, was a different story. If we thought the lanes on the A9 were narrow – and they were, although there were often two lanes traveling in each direction and not just one – they were nothing compared to the A827. The A827 is a two lane road with no shoulder at all. In fact, not only is there no shoulder, where the shoulder should be, right along the fog line, there was usually a stone wall. We had the distinct impression that, in order to avoid having the side view mirror on the driver’s side ripped off by oncoming cars, we would have to drive so close to these fences that we’d surely scrape all the paint off the passenger side. The car seemed much too wide to traverse this road without some sort of collision with oncoming traffic, especially when the oncoming traffic was a truck (lorrie) or bus. And of course, the road was a winding, twisting road with sharp turns at very frequent intervals. Now and then we’d run into a sign that said “oncoming traffic in the middle of the road”. Uh, okay…and what were we supposed to do with that information? I pretty much sat in the passenger seat and used body English to keep the left side of the car from making contact with the stone walls, closing my eyes when oncoming traffic approached so I wouldn’t have to actually see us scrape the side view mirror off. I just waited for the sound of crunching metal and shattering plastic. Amazingly, it never came. With a sigh of relief, we arrived at the resort and I went to check in.

The staff was very friendly. They quickly gave us our key and parking pass and directed us to our cottage. The resort is made up of a group of white cottages with black wood trim, all arranged in a square around a beautifully landscaped courtyard. Each cottage is comprised of two units. Some units are two-bedroom, some are three-bedroom. We had a two-bedroom unit. The cottages are surrounded by a high stone wall, once part of the original castle’s wall. Two ancient stone gates guard the entrances. Each cottage is two stories with bedrooms and bathrooms on the main floor and the living room, dining room, kitchen and another bathroom on the second floor. As we entered our unit for the first time, we were very pleasantly surprised at how spacious and modern it was. From the outside, it looks to be quite old, but inside it is pretty new. Each bedroom had its own bathroom. The master bedroom had a large bathroom with a tub/shower combination. The other bedroom had a smaller bathroom with a stall shower. Upstairs was another full bathroom with a tub/shower combination as well. The kitchen was spacious and well-stocked with dishes, silverware, utensils, and pots and pans, as well as the “food packs” I had arranged to have delivered. These consisted of a loaf of bread, half a dozen eggs, a variety pack of cold cereals, orange juice, butter, milk, tea, orange marmalade, bottled water, and instant coffee. I had ordered two food packs, so we had plenty of food for breakfast for the week. We would have to remedy the coffee situation as soon as possible, though, and add some bacon or sausage to the list for a hearty breakfast. But first, we needed to sleep. We unpacked our toiletries, had some eggs and toast, then went to sleep. It started raining as we fell asleep.

Below is the view from our balcony at the Kenmore Club in Scotland. The water in the distance is Loch Tay. The old stone gate between the cottages is one of the original gates to the Taymouth Castle, upon whose grounds this resort is built. Behind us is Ben Lawers, one of the tallest mountains in Scotland. This was taken on a really beautiful, rare, sunny morning at about 6:00 a.m. I'll post a larger version of this photo, as well as some more photos of the resort, on my photobucket site: http://s45.photobucket.com/albums/f58/ginaemory/Scotland%202006/

Microsoft Office 2007 Beta

I just installed the Office 2007 beta and all I can say is “wow!” The interface for the familiar apps – Word, Excel, Publisher, and even Outlook, is completely new. I’m still getting used to the “toolbars”, such as they are. They are completely different and very functional, once you become accustomed to them. Outlook has one feature I really like. You can flag an email for follow up, and instead of the silly blue, red, orange, etc. flags, you select today, tomorrow, this week, next week, and the item is then put into a to do list that shows up on the right side of your screen. That is cool.

One feature of Word 2007 is the option to blog the post. So… this is my first attempt at blogging a post from this beta. That’s the sole reason for this post, so please bear with me.

Edit: a glitch in the publishing feature has been uncovered. I tried to publish this post, and it would not let me, saying I was either not connected to the internet, Blogger was unavailable, or my password was incorrect, all of which were false. I tried "publish as draft" and lo and behold, it worked. So, a kink Microsoft needs to work out, hence the reason for betas. Aside from that, this could prove to be a nice feature since I do my best typing in Word, what with auto-correction of typos and whatnot (gotta love those whatnots).

Things to know when visiting Scotland

Everyone in Scotland owns a dog, and they walk them all the time, no matter the weather.

They don't have restrooms in the UK. They have toilets. It felt odd asking where the toilet was (a bit impolite), but I'm not sure they'd have understood had I asked for the restroom.

Do not confuse the "To Let" signs with the "Toilet" signs. Your bladder may never forgive you, although your brain wants to fill in the missing "i" more often than not.

"Give way" signs = our "Stop" signs, not our "Yield" signs.

They have speed cameras. Radar checks your speed, and if you are speeding, the camera takes a photo of your license plate. I suspect you get a ticket in the mail a few days later.

The whole of London, and I suspect most of England, is under CCTV surveillance 24/7. The ACLU would have a field day with that here.

Scottish food has gotten a bad rap. We found the food to be excellent, as were the ales and wine.

Visit a bakery every day. They are full of wonderful things!

On a dual carriageway or motorway, the right lane is the fast lane.

Cookies are called biscuits, so don't go asking for biscuits and gravy or they'll think you're daft. They have cookies called "digestives". I have yet to understand why they're called that (Charlie?). They're like a shortbread cookie with or without chocolate coating. I liked them. No one else did. They were great with tea.

Potato chips are called crisps and come in all sorts of flavors like lamb and mint, steak and onions, prawn cocktail, and salt and vinegar. It's hard to find plain old potato chips. We never could find chips in a large bag like we have here. They were always sold in large bags of small bags, usually with a variety of flavors in one bag. I really liked the prawn cocktail and steak and onion flavors.

The checkers in the grocery stores are seated, not standing like they are here. I told them our checkers would be jealous.

The Bank of Scotland does not charge a fee for using the ATM to get cash with your debit card. At another one I used (can't recall which one) I was charged $10 to withdraw 50 pounds. I didn't find that out until I got home and looked at my bank account. :(

"To go" is called "take away".

UK Trip - Day One (cont)

Upon arrival at the airport in Edinburgh, we made our way to the Hertz counter. I was waiting in line, furiously digging through my file folder with all our trip info, trying to locate my Hertz reservation. The gentleman at the counter saw me pawing through my papers and motioned me up to the counter. He had a wonderful Scots accent, much like Sean Connery. He said he saw a look of panic begin to cross my face and figured he'd help erase it. All I needed was my last name and he'd get our reservation. Sure enough, in a jiffy, he had my reservation on the screen in front of him. Since I had no intention whatsoever of driving in the UK, I motioned Tom to the counter. He presented his driver's license and credit card, signed the documents, and we were handed the car keys. The man behind the counter was SO nice! He was just a foreshadow of the kind of people we would meet in the UK, especially in Scotland. He took the time to get me a map of Edinburgh and Scotland and to give us instructions for getting out of the airport and en route to Kenmore. He honestly couldn't have been nicer. Next to me at the counter was a couple who were not so nice. They apparently wanted some specific SUV (WHY????) and were upset when the only option was a Volvo XC. Gee, rough life. They were not very nice to the guy helping them, but he remained professional, polite, and helpful. Fortunately, the people didn't sound or appear to be Americans.

After we got the keys, we decided to get a latte and catch our breath before embarking upon what was sure to be an adventure in driving. As we sat drinking our lattes, two gentlemen, one with a Scots accent and one with a "down under" accent, sat near us. We ended up talking to them for a bit. They were in Scotland en route back home to New Zealand after being in Germany on business. The one guy was from Scotland but now lived in Kiwi-land. The other was a German who had lived a long time in New Zealand. They were very reassuring about how easily we would get to our destination, how easy the roundabouts were to navigate, and how easily Tom would adapt to driving on the right side of the car on the left side of the road. They did chuckle when we bid them adieu saying they would be watching from the plane for the car stuck in the roundabout. Funny.

We took the shuttle to where the car was parked, located it, checked it out, and started off. We had a Ford Mondeo Estate Wagon - basically a Ford Escort wagon. It was a very nice car! Tom practiced driving on the left a bit in the parking lot, then ventured out onto the open road. We made it through our first roundabout at the airport with no problem. We followed the directions with which we had been provided, which were to take us to the Forth Bridge, then on to Kenmore. Somewhere along the way we went east when we should have gone west, or something like that. We ended up in downtown Edinburgh. Some soccer game must have just gotten over, and the folks in Edinburgh were very happy. The streets were teeming with fans laughing, yelling, carrying flags in maroon and white, honking horns, celebrating their victory. And here are three crazy Americans, driving on the left side of the road on the right side of the car in the midst of all this madness and traffic. Welcome to Scotland! We drove all over the place with no idea where we were or where we were going, and Tom was getting really stressed. We finally asked a car in the next lane how to get to where we needed to go (the A9 north). He gave us directions, which we were able to follow, and we backtracked along the route we'd traveled into Edinburgh, finally seeing the signs for the Forth Bridge, and making our way to the A9 toward Perth. Phew! We had survived! Somewhere along the way, we came upon a toll booth. Thankfully, one of my coworkers had given me a little coin purse with some British coins before we'd left and we had enough to pay the toll or we might still be on that bridge. The Forth Bridge, and it's companion railroad bridge, are beautiful. Too bad I couldn't get a decent picture of either of them. The Forth Bridge reminds me a bit of the Golden Gate Bridge, only not red. It's pretty huge. The scenery around it is breathtaking. I wish we'd had more time to really take it in and take photos. But we were tired and wanted to get to our resort.

The "carriageways" in Scotland - in England too - are really nice. They are very well-marked and have lots of pull-outs, which they call "laybys", in case you need to stop for some reason. But they don't have much of a shoulder most of the time, so for Americans, this is a bit harrowing. The lanes seem impossibly narrow, and they drive really, really fast! We felt like we were holding up traffic whenever we were on a single carriageway, though we seemed to be going way too fast. When the road would change to a dual carriageway, we could take a breath and try to take in the exquisite scenery around us. It was all so new, so different, so beautiful, and so green! Little stone farmhouses dotted the lush hillsides while sheep grazed on the green grass that was cut into squares by ancient stone fences. There was nothing like this in the US. We definitely weren't in Kansas anymore!

First set of Scotland photos

Some lovely homes in Pitlochry. They had beautiful gardens.






The main street in Pitlochry. As you can see, it was a bit damp out.




We just liked this view from above the town with the beautiful green hillsides and the interetsting rooftops.





This is the golf course in Kenmore on the grounds of Taymouth Castle upon which the resort we stayed at was situated. We took a little walk along here first thing upon arriving.





This is a monument in Pitlochry to those who died in WWI.





Again back at Taymouth Castle grounds walking along the lane that runs alongside the golf course. It was so beautiful!





This is the elementary school in Kenmore, alongside the path we were walking.





One of the gates of Taymouth Castle, looking into Kenmore. The clock is in Kenmore on the church there.





This is the main gate to the castle and golf course about three miles from Kenmore.





Jonathan insisted we pose for a photo next to this sign. We did get quite a kick out of these signs, which we found in several towns. Notice the frizzy hair I'm sporting? The damp conditions and hard water left me with a head of frizz for the entire trip.





This was one of the hundreds of streams (or burns) and waterfalls we saw along the way during our trip to Isle of Skye. The photo doesn't do the scene justice. It is hauntingly beautiful.





This is a view from the castle Eilean Donan looking up Loch Duich.






The road back from the Isle of Skye.





Eilean Donan - a beautiful castle.





The bridge over which one must pass to get to the Isle of Skye.





A shot from the viewpoint near Kilt Rock on Isle of Skye.





Another little waterfall just along the roadside.






The harbor at Portree on Isle of Skye. The dark blue part of the building on the right is a restaurant at which we enjoyed a delicious lunch.

UK Trip - Day One

The journey began at 6:00 a.m. on Saturday, May 13. We got up, took our showers, dressed, finished packing our toiletries, laptop, reading materials, and miscellany, and headed for Spokane. Our plane was scheduled to depart at 1:14 p.m. and we had been advised to be at the airport two hours early. We were to arrive at our oldest son's home at 9:30 a.m. so that he could drive us to the airport, eliminating the need to pay to park our car at the airport during our absence. That meant we had to leave our house by 8:00 at the latest. We left our driveway at 7:30, well ahead of schedule. In fact, we had time to stop for a Starbucks on the way. So far, so good. We arrived at Tommy's in plenty of time, he drove us to the airport, where we arrived with time to spare. I saw the Northwest e-ticket self-check kiosk and headed for it. It was pretty darned easy - just swipe my passport and it brought up all three of our names. In a matter of seconds, we have three boarding passes with seat assignments. Off we go to security. We decided to take only carry-on luggage. That meant we each had a carry-on suitcase with wheels and a backpack, or in my case, a large messenger bag which contained my laptop and important travel documents.

Security required every passenger to remove their shoes, regardless of type. We complied, placed our bags on the belt so they could be x-rayed, and went through the gates. They decided to pat down Tom for some reason, but beyond that, not a single hitch. We were over two hours early in Spokane International Airport. All I wanted to do was sleep. The previous night had been a restless and short one. Too bad there was nowhere to snooze.

The plane arrived and began boarding right on time. Almost three hours later we were landing in Minneapolis for a brief layover and a plane change. When we boarded our international flight, the bin with my suitcase in it didn't want to close. I did NOT want my bag checked in and watched anxiously as a passenger and a flight attendant worked to close the bin, finally succeeding. Unfortunately, on this flight, Tom, Jonathan and I occupied the middle three seats in a five seat row. Tom between Jonathan and me. We were squished, and would remain so for the next eight hours. That was the worst part of the trip. The plane was scheduled to land at Gatwick at 9:30 a.m. London time. The person next to Jonathan was obviously a frequent flier. He had the eye mask, the neck pillow, and the Bose noise-cancelling headphones. He told Jonathan if he needed to get out to just punch him in the arm. He was asleep almost before we left the ground.

I made the mistake of wearing my contact lenses on the plane. It didn't take long for my eyes to feel as if someone had poured sand into them and was rubbing it around. My contact lens solution and case were in my suitcase. Boy, was I dumb. I tried to snooze, but it just was not happening. We had decent food. Don't ask what it was because I don't remember anything except that it wasn't as bad as I thought airplane food was supposed to be. We had a movie, but I don't remember what it was either - one I'd seen before. The picture quality was horrible, as was the sound. You'd think in this day and age of amazing electronics they'd put in an LCD screen or a plasma. This was pretty terrible resolution and the color was way off. I got up to stretch my legs a couple of times and got a glimpse of first class... wow, what a way to fly. But not at triple the fare I'd paid. Although those wide, reclining seats sure looked inviting in the middle of the night.

We touched down at Gatwick right on schedule. I got off the plane first, Tom's suitcase in tow since it was nearest me. He and Jonathan were busy retrieving Jonathan's and mine. I waited for them at the entrance to the airport...and waited...and waited... and waited. Finally, a passenger coming off the plane said to me "you might be here a while. They can't get the bin open to get one of the suitcases." Great. Finally, they came walking up the jetway. Tom's body language gave his aggravation away from 30 feet away. Apparently, they almost had to get a mechanic to take the bin apart but a combined effort finally got the bin open and my suitcase was retrieved. Unfortunately, the delay put us at the end of the line for Immigration instead of the front of it. We had a half hour wait in the hot, stuffy bowels of Gatwick Airport. I was tired, thirsty, and my eyes felt like I'd been in the Sahara for a month. Finally, we were cleared through immigration and customs and headed for the British Airways gates.

Gatwick is weird. The gates for local flights are not pre-set. You have to watch a monitor and wait for it to tell you which gate your flight will be boarding at. It was barely 20 minutes before our Edinburgh flight was scheduled to leave that the gate was finally posted on the monitor. We nearly ran to the gate, but got on board, suitcases stowed, with no further mishap. Just a bit behind schedule, we landed in Edinburgh. Off to the Hertz counter to retrieve the car I'd reserved so we could embark on our Scottish adventure.

More to come...