Happy Thoughts

At least I'm not going to write about funerals today. I have been busy packing. Have I said that before? It seems like packing is a new career for me. Books look very nice on shelves, but when you take them off the shelves, they fill an alarming number of boxes. Things in cabinets fill boxes. Things in closets fill boxes. Our mover dropped off 40 boxes today. When I originally told the sales rep how many boxes I thought we would nee, he laughed and said we would probably fill at least 200 boxes.

I have been transporting fragile and delicate items myself, mainly so that I don't have to pack quite as carefully as if the mover was taking them. Then I wonder, where will all of those other 200 boxes go in the new house. Will there be room for furniture? Will we be able to walk around? How long will it take to get them empty? Will it all fit?

The buyers' bank's appraiser is coming tomorrow. The municipal inspector is coming on Monday. We haven't heard about the house inspection yet that was done on Friday. I don't know what's taking so long. I arranged for our New York auto insurance today, so that's one more thing to scratch off the list. One problem is that a great number of residents (and relatives) in our new town seem to be Buffalo Bills fans. I'm not sure I care about them (the team, not the residents or relatives). Of course, the do have "Bill" in their name, but, nevertheless. Maybe I should just be silent about the whole thing and smile when they begin to get all excited. Sigh! Nothing is easy.

Thoughts at a Funeral

Yes, I am sorry to say that we attended yet another funeral today. This time for my cousin, Liz, who had battled breast cancer and lung cancer for 23 years. The thing about Liz was that she never showed her pain. If you asked her she would tell you about it, but she never moaned or volunteered information. The church was packed and I found out that Liz was a regular volunteer for various ministries. She never mentioned that either. She married an Italian fellow, Harry. Her sister, Rosie married an Italian also and his name was Harry too. He died two months ago. Italians know how to throw a funeral, or at least the luncheon after the funeral. The selected restaurants are good and the food plentiful. That's not to say that other ethnic groups, including us German - Irish don't provide plentiful and good food, but, when it comes to food and drink, the Italians excel.

After listening to the eulogy and the stories at the restaurant, I came to realize that we don't really know people, at least I think I don't We get together with cousins maybe once or twice a year, recently more frequently at funerals. We see them for a short time and then we all go back home. When we see them again, we start up where we left off and I, at least, forget that these people have been living their lives every hour, every day, just the same as I am. They go shopping, watch television, read books, volunteer, interact with children and grandchildren, get sick, take vacations, perhaps feel lonely, happy or depressed and sometimes they die. All without any approval from or consultation with me. Of course, I do the same things. Then we come together and our view of the other person probably hasn't changed. Do we know about the good things they have done, before they're in the box at the foot of the sanctuary? I keep saying "we" when maybe I should say "I." Maybe it's my fault that I don't know these things. Maybe you, gentle reader, have a greater interest in people or have a better information network than I do. I think I will begin questioning people more about what they do. I am interested to know, although I have always been afraid of being thought nosy. I also don't want to embarrass anyone. If I go up to Mary and say, "So, Mary, how are your volunteer activities going lately," and Mary does not now and has never volunteered for anything, she may feel uneasy at the question. Once I have information about what Mary has been doing in her spare time, the problem is to remember it so when I meet her again I don't make the mistake of asking her how her husband, John, is, when she told me at our prior meeting that she had gotten a divorce and was now dating Larry. If we are having a conversation and you see me mumbling into a tape recorder or surreptitiously taking notes, you'll understand.

The Heavenly Closet / Garages

 I call it the Heavenly Closet because it was built to last for eternity. It was really overbuilt, in my opinion. It had painted plywood sides, 2x4 framing, sliding doors, adjustable wire shelving and was really put together very nicely. The only problem with it was that it took up almost the entire back end of the garage and prevented me from driving a car all the way in. I agonized over whether or not to remove it. Would it serve a purpose? It obviously served a purpose for our sellers. Should I get new, smaller cars? No. So, it took me a day and a half at least to get the thing down. Wherever there was a place to put a screw, they put a screw. If they could hide a screw, they hid it. If they could hide a nail, they hid it. I used screwdrivers, both powered and manual, hammers, crow bars, a reciprocating saw and brute strength, but I finally got it down and the car fits in. My back and arms will never be the same, but the cars fit in.

I learned an interesting thing in my agonizing over the closet. Most people that we know in the Rochester area don't put their cars in the garage in the winter. I found that very puzzling, but I was told that the road salt is very hard on the garage floors. My son had a three car garage built next to his house in PA a couple of years ago and he confirmed this. Our new house had a large piece of indoor-outdoor carpet laid down in the garage and I guess I now know why. I know they had a large SUV which they never put in the garage, so maybe they had a small car that was compatible with the Heavenly Closet. I like the idea of storing my cars in a garage. Even on this latest trip, we were constantly brushing leaves off the windshield and the rest of the car that fell as it sat in the driveway. I will have to research the salt / garage floor issue since it seems somewhat defeatist to me to have to scrape ice and snow off your car all the cold winter long when you have a perfectly good building to store it in that you don't want to make into a family room. Someone probably makes some sort of coating for the floor for this purpose, or, maybe a piece of carpet is a good solution. I guess you change it every year or take it out and wash it off, preferably on your neighbors driveway.

Where Have All the Young Folks Gone?

We went to another funeral yesterday. My cousin Rosie's husband, Harry, died. He was seventy five. That's not real young, but it's not terribly old either. He had Parkinson's disease. He was diagnosed with it when he was forty nine, but you wouldn't have known it until later years. He was a quiet, gentle man. After the Mass, there was a luncheon at a nice restaurant. What was disturbing to me was the gray hair on my cousins' children. Some also had receding hairlines and children of their own, the eldest of whom were now preparing for college. I remember as a child romping around with my cousins, all of whom, except one, are older than me. My aunts and uncles were the older generation. We were the kids. I remember my cousins graduating from high school. I remember them getting married. Life moved on and we're clearly not the kids anymore. We have become the older generation, the old folks. When did this all happen? I don't remember it.

Sometimes I forget how old I am. When I was at the doctor's office a few weeks ago, I had to do some quick math to answer a standard inquiry as to "how old are you?" It turns out that I am a year older than I thought, so I don't think about it anymore. Age is nothing really but a number. Because you are a certain age doesn't mean that you can't do this or that. I still think I can do the things I did when I was twenty. Some I can do, a lot I can't. My body quickly lets me know which ones I can't. When I think about a number associated with my age, I think, "No, that can't be right. That number doesn't apply to me." Well, it does apply to me. Four of my nine cousins have now died and two husbands of the remaining ones are gone. They all had higher numbers than me, though. But where have all the young folks gone? They're still with us, but they are different people. They are the kids we used to be and we're not the kids anymore.

The Microwave

Our new house has a microwave / convection oven built in over the range, so the small counter top one we have here would probably not be used very much there. Unfortunately, it recently stopped working and since it is handy for a lot of things, we reluctantly decided that we should get another one. You would think that buying a microwave would be a simple thing. Maybe it is for most people, but not for us. I found one on line at Target that was reasonably priced and looked nice. Since Walmart in Old Bridge is closer than Target in Middletown, Anne though that we should look there. She found one on line that she liked and the site said that it was in stock at the store. We got to the store and the first thing I noticed was the large number of people standing in line for customer service. The second thing I noticed was that the microwave was nowhere to be found. A lady employee, who was very pleasant, but ineffective, said that she bet she knew where we got the idea that it was in stock - from the internet and cautioned us not to believe such things. She didn't work in microwaves so tried to conjure up someone who knew about them by speaking into a little box. After several attempts without success she wandered off. We wandered to Home Depot and Lowes where it was difficult to pair the boxes with the actual microwaves with the prices tags on the shelves. By the way, as we left Walmart, the customer service line was now about half of what it was when we went in. We continued to drive south on Route 9 until we were at the Target in Manalapan where we found the one I had first mentioned. It is a little smaller than what Anne wanted, but we got it. We can now microwave things again. Yippee.

Ramblings on a September Evening

Once again, I have been admonished because I have been derelict in my blog postings. It would be nice if the complainers would themselves post something, or even get a blog, but no, I alone am admonished as though I were the blogger in residence or blogger laureate, expected to provide new and scintillating material for the enjoyment of my readers. Very well, here goes, but remember, I am not Noel Coward (thank God) or John Wayne, or anyone of serious note and nothing much that's exciting happens to me. I suppose that's a good thing for me for the most part, but it makes it difficult to get enthused to write about the normal hum drum of daily life, but I will try.

On Friday I visited my old place of employment because I had a luncheon with Mr. Michael K. I enjoyed my lunch and our conversation, but my real love is seeing the ladies of ETA, my former co-workers. I do miss them. Having said that, I want to assure my readers and myself that I don't miss work and that retirement suits me just fine, thank you very much. Most of my working career I have worked primarily with women and have had mostly women bosses, when I have had a boss. Maybe that gives me a different perspective on things. I have liked almost all of the women with whom I have worked and still keep in touch with some of them through the wonder of Facebook. Maybe I fancy myself as a modern day Gardner McKay sailing to Tahiti with an all girl crew. Hah! What did I have to drink today? Anybody want to go on a sailboat ride?

So, last evening Anne and I went to Best Buy to look at televisions. We need to get one or two eventually for our new home. We have been putting off buying HD TVs in anticipation of our move, so we thought we ought to go look at them and see what we could learn. At first we were struck by the similarity in the pictures between the 720 p and the 1080p sets until we found out that the signal that they get in the store for all sets is 720p. Well, gee whiz, how the heck are you supposed to make a decision on that basis? Even at that, all the pictures looked pretty good. Then there's the thing about smart TVs and do you want Google TV, Netflix, Hulu, Pandora and what do all of these things do and who cares. What about 3D? Everybody wants you to pay money to watch or listen to entertainment today. We didn't buy anything, just looked. I need to find a sixteen year old to explain it all to me before we buy anything.

Tomorrow is my father's birthday. He would have been 105, but he died in 1987. We went to the cemetary this afternoon, because I got confused and though his birthday was today. The cemetery isn't being kept up very well, which is disconcerting. The headstone seems to be leaning a little also. I don't know what I can do about either thing. I guess and hope it doesn't matter to my parents. If it does, we all have a lot more trouble than we realize.

Peter is finally in Mexico. Last week they finally got shipments of all of their goods, all on the same day and found themselves somewhat overwhelmed. They don't know where they will put it all because their house is not quite as large as previous ones. Peter's delay in getting there had to do with the government's language school and their insistence that he achieve a high level of fluency in Spanish. Since he's been there he said that he hardly has to speak any Spanish except if he goes to a grocery store.

I know that there were other things that I was thinking of adding to this post, but I don't remember what they were. I believe that will allow me to write another post when I remember them and if I remember that I am supposed to blog about them. So, good reader, you will have to be content with this content for the time being.

A Walk on the Beach

We took a walk on the beach last evening, Anne and I and our friend Alice. The weather was about as good as it gets; a slight sea breeze and no bugs. I always find the wave action calming and restorative, but it's not just that. I think it also has to do with the sun on the water, the birds swooping after their dinner, feet touching the sand and water, the immensity of the ocean. I was thinking that we have made a decision to move away from this, so I hope that Lake Ontario has some restorative properties. I believe that there is nothing quite like the ocean, though.

I have lived near the ocean all of my life. I started out in Newark, NJ, which isn't quite what would be called "near the ocean," but we spent many weekends at the shore when I was a child, then moving to Sea Girt when I was in my last year of high school. Thereafter, I never considered myself a "Day Benny." I believe that I will be closer to the water at our new house. It is about two miles to the lake straight up Holt Road. It's a pretty big lake. Not big as far as the Great Lakes go, but big, nevertheless. You can't see across to Canada. All you can see is water, so, except for your knowledge of geography, for all you know, it could go on forever. But, I don't know if it will be the same as the ocean. There's something about the beach. There was one sight, however, that somewhat marred the experience and that was the lady in the bikini. An older woman who had no business being in a bikini because a good portion of her hung over the bottom part of it. Shouldn't there be a naturalist or someone to point out to people that they are disturbing the balance of nature, not to mention the view.

Too Many, Too Young

In the past few years I have attended far too may funerals for people who have died before their time, at least in my way of thinking. The latest was yesterday which was a funeral for the thirty-six year old son of a woman, BJ, with whom I used to work. Michael was, for all anyone knew, in great health. He was an avid kayaker, an archer, fisherman and a lover of the outdoors. Apparently he was in good physical shape, but he was felled by what was probably a brain aneurism. It came out of nowhere, suddenly, and, of course, the family was devastated. When someone "old" passes on, you figure that they lived their life and that's what happens eventually. I don't know anymore what the qualification for "old" is, but a number of the people for whom I have found myself offering condolences are younger than I. I don't think of myself as old, except when it leads to a discount, but certainly someone thirty-six or someone in their fifties is not old. All of the people to whom I refer were active, health conscious and did what they were told we are supposed to do in terms of exercise, eating, etc. Does this mean that I shouldn't worry about healthy living because, no matter what I do, something can come out of the sky and get me? I think that it tells me that I should only renew and intensify my efforts at healthy living. Some things you just can't do anything about, but you can at least minimize the risk factors. I feel bad for BJ, her husband Mike and their family, but they will survive. I saw that they had a lot of support and as BJ said, she wanted not to mourn his passing, but to celebrate his life.

Nothing Much New Here

They say that no news is good news, but on the selling of the house front, some news might be better than no news. We had an open house over the weekend and ten sets of people came, including the grandson of the original owner who had the house built in 1912. According to our realtor he was telling stories about the house and enchanting the assembled multitude. We were not at home for the festivities and we haven't heard anything since, except that the country is going to rack and ruin, the economy is in shambles and the stock market tanked. It's interesting that investors abandoned their stock and bought up every US treasury bond they could get their hands on, the very things that were downgraded. By the way, Standard & Poors has made some colossal blunders in the past. Remember Enron? They only have 100 analysts to cover over 100 countries. I wouldn't be a bit surprised if it turns out that someone, or some group, has figured out how to manipulate the market. Maybe it's all those tea drinkers. No, they're not smart enough.

The garage sale went well, although we still have a lot of stuff remaining. We got rid of a lot of bulky stuff. Anne took a load of books to Goodwill and we will get the Vets to pick up a lot of the other things. They seem willing to take about anything in good condition.

In anticipation of our move, I have been trying to figure out the best values in TV, internet and phone service. Anne's brother in Rochester uses a good old antenna and gets a nice selection of stations. Time Warner is the cable company there and Verizon apparently doesn't service our street yet. You can't find out on line what it costs for basic TV service, only all about bundled services. We cut back to basic here and I wanted to find out how much that service costs there. I guess I'll have to call them. Here we were paying over $80.00 a month for the TV part of our cable bill. They advertize the basic service for $10.14 a month, so I figured we would save around $70.00. Not so, we only save about $50.00 a month because we lose this discount, that discount and the other discount. That's why I'm thinking about using an antenna at the new house, except now, the geniuses in Congress want to sell off a lot of bandwidth to cell phone companies and make it harder to get anything over an antenna. You just simply can't win.

Got in a swim in the pool today before the rains came. It felt good and we need the rain, so all in all it was a good day, although it's not over yet. Hopefully, the best part is yet to come. I wonder what's for dinner.

The Pool Isn't Cool

It's been a bit warm here. Even getting into the pool doesn't provide much relief. The water was 91 degrees today. Okay, body temperature is about 98.6 (mine is usually slightly lower), but still, 91 doesn't feel very cool. I did take a cold shower tonight and it really felt good, once I got used to it. I guess it lowered my core temp. We had a garage sale scheduled for today, but after trying to set it up yesterday, we cancelled it. We'll do it in a couple of weeks when the atmosphere returns to normal. In the meantime, if anyone wants anything, come on by. All of my readers get a substantial discount and I'll even load the stuff into your cars. That's the least I can do if someone drives all the way from Florida, or the Carolinas, or even LBI. The Woodbridge reader already had a chance and she took what she wanted. We'll even provide a room for the night while your car is being loaded.

Still Waiting

The deal that we thought we had for the sale of our house fell through so it is on the market again. We lost a month and the best part of the selling season again. In the meantime we have been hauling our possessions to Rochester. I am almost thinking that maybe this wasn't a very good idea and that maybe we should sell the Rochester house and stay here. However, that would mean hauling all of our stuff back here which is not a happy thought. Someone should remind me of why we wanted to move up there in the first place.

Nothing much else is new or exciting enough to report.

I Should Say Something

A lot has been going on so I feel obliged to say something about it all, but where to start. First, the school year has ended and all grandchildren have advanced to the next grade. Several have made the honor roll and one has now advanced to high school. It is frightening and wonderful at the same time. I have a granddaughter who will be starting high school. Have I aged that much?

We have a contract on our house and had the house inspection today. Everyone seemed pleased when it was done, but we haven't seen the report yet so we don't know what the laundry list of things will be that they will want fixed. But, things are moving along. We had a mover come in yesterday to give an estimate. He didn't actually give an estimate, but took an electronic accounting of everything we want to ship. We will get a call from the company with the estimate when they have his data.

Roxana, Anthony and Alex came yesterday and stayed overnight. They headed to Englewood today to visit her family and will return here on Sunday and drive back to DC on Monday or Tuesday. On Sunday we will also celebrate Katie and Stephen's graduation / promotion. I guess we'll celebrate everyone else's promotion too.

Packing will now have to proceed at a brisker pace than has been observed for the past month. I was reluctant to pack too fast until I felt that we had a firm deal on the sale of our house. Now I must proceed briskly indeed since none of the stuff that I previously observed in closets has disappeared. The calendar days, however, are disappearing. I note, too, that we have reached the Summer solstice when the daytime is the longest. From now on until about December 22nd, the days become shorter and it seems to me that they become shorter very rapidly. I'm afraid that there is nothing I can do about it.

Summertime and the Livin' Ain't Easy

We are now the proud owners of a house in Webster, NY, East of Rochester. According to New York State Tourism, we are in the Finger Lakes Region. The nearest Finger Lake is about an hour away. Lake Ontario is only about two miles away. I think it takes about seven minutes to get there. The closing went well in the sense that we paid the money and got the deed, but I don't like the way they do things up there. Everyone makes a concerted effort to see that the buyers and sellers never meet. The realtors claim that they can relay any questions between the parties. Yeah, sure. The sellers don't come to the walk through nor to the closing. The realtors don't even come to the closing. I was surprised that I wasn't told to just leave the check at the front desk and that they would mail the deed to us. I had some issues and questions and the sellers' paralegal said she didn't know if she could get in touch with them as they were in transit to Florida. That was the wrong thing to say to me. I told her that if she didn't get in touch with them I would be in transit back to New Jersey with my check. The burden is on the buyer to accept whatever conditions he finds or walk away. No one is at the closing who can answer any questions.

Anyway, we are happy with the house and we even met several neighbors who were very friendly and welcoming. Two couples were younger with children and one was a man who was retired and sixty one years old. Why do people care so much about age? I don't care how old he is. Anytime someone dies or gets their name in the paper there is a great need to tell how old the person was or is. Who cares? The only time age is important to me is when it comes to Scotch.

Yesterday I was Lawnmower Man. Today I was Pool Boy. We got the cover off the pool and I started on the chemical sequence. I went to Leslie's Pool Supplies to get the water tested. I made it in just in a nick of time because everyone else who wasn't driving to the shore came in right after. Tomorrow I have to clean the chairs, tables and grill in preparation for Sunday's Memorial Day parade past our house and our picnic. I thought that last year was going to be our last picnic here. I guess not. I hope this one is. As you can see, there is no rest for the wicked.

The Lawnmower Man

That's me, the lawnmower man. At least that's the way I feel about now. We closed on our new home in Webster, NY and I thought that we needed some way to keep the lawn mowed, like hire a lawn service until we moved there. We spoke to one of Anne's brothers and he volunteered to cut the grass for us. He has an older, spare, riding mower that he thought he would bring there even though the lawn is small. Ever since he fell off a barn roof several years ago, fractured both feet and the doctors told him he would never walk again, he finds walking long distance or standing for long periods irritating, so he likes his riding mowers. Before we went up there I had studied Consumers' Reports about electric cordless mowers and had a couple in mind that were rated good. The idea is to get away from the gas, oil and pull starting and to be more environmentally friendly. Anne's brother thought a small mower would be good for places he couldn't reach with the larger mower. So, we went out to the store and the next store and the next store and couldn't find the mowers I had selected. We did find a Worx mower, designed in Italy and made in China. In the store I had no way to check Consumers' Reports to see how it is rated, so I found the side of the box that had some English words and read all about it. We bought it and after one mowing, I'm pleased with it. I hope it is reliable over time.

We returned home last night and found that the lawn here had grown by leaps and bounds since we left on Sunday, so, today, I got out our thirteen year old, self propelled Craftsman and proceeded to get control of the grass. We pretty much need a self propelled model here because our grass is rather thick. I was proceeding along getting control when, all of a sudden, I heard a snap sound and the self propelled mower was being only propelled by me. I decided to finish the back yard the way it was and then have a look to see what was the matter. The matter was that the cable controlling the self propelled part broke. Oh great, now what to do. I didn't want to buy another mower for here that I wouldn't need for our new home (read the paragraph above, in case you missed the story of the lawnmower purchase for our new home). I thought about a lawn service, but the lawn really needed cutting and we do have the house listed for sale. Someone could possibly come to look at it. I thought about lugging it to a repair shop, but was afraid I wouldn't see it again until December. I went on line and found that Sears, in fact, stocked the part and could send it to me by priority shipping for Tuesday delivery. Then I read further that the part may be available at a local Sears store. I called the parts department in Middletown and, wonder of wonders, they had two in stock and the nice lady said she would put one aside for me. Taking the old part with me, I quickly made my way to Middletown, not that I thought that there would be a run on control cable assemblies for a thirteen year old mower, but, you never know. I got the thing. It was only $34.95, plus tax and it went on the mower as easy as pie (I don't really know what pie has to do with things being hard or easy, but people say that, so...).

Now you can understand why I am the lawnmower man. My back also hurts (from typing, I think), so I will stop now and report other adventures as they happen.

Good Friend Jim

Our good friend Jim Ciskowski died. We visited him in the hospital in New Brunswick on Wednesday. He was on a lot of pain medication to combat the effects of his pancreatic cancer. He had been diagnosed about a year ago. He packed a lot into his final year. He started finishing up projects that he started around the house, hauled a loads of his firewood to his son, cooked dinner for us one night with his wife, Alice, danced at his son's wedding and called us to go kayaking on the Navesink. He always had a smile on his face and never complained. When asked, he would say when things weren't going well, but took it all in stride.

Jim was an avid gardener and was even talking about it with Anne three days before he died. He had a huge vegetable garden in his back yard, a couple of grills and a smoker. He even showed us how to pet bees. Jim was an inspiration on how to live with cancer and how to die with it. Godspeed Jim. You will be missed.

Dizzy Me

I know that some of my readers would not raise an eyebrow to hear that I was and am dizzy, but I raised an eyebrow. Last evening, Anne and I went to a play at the local Presbyterian church. She knows one of the men who was in it. The group is called Spotlight Players and they do a dessert show where you sit at tables and during intermission the have a very nice cake and coffee spread. Anyway, the place isn't very big and you get to sit very close. When I got up to go for the dessert I felt like I had had a couple of drinks and was unsteady on my feet. My first thought was that if anyone was looking at me they would think I was drunk. I made a pretty good effort to get my chocolate cake, whipped cream and strawberriesand get back to my seat without incident. When I woke up this morning I still felt an equilibrium problem. We remembered that our daughter had some sort of a similar problem a while ago and we found out from her that it was probably caused by allergies causing an infection in the inner ear. Taking allergy and seasickness medicine seemed to work for her. I took some allergy medicine this morning, but don't have any seasickness medicine on hand.

My mother had equilibrium problems, but I have nmever experienced anything like that before now. Anne looked up "dizziness" in one of her books and it said that it effected mainly elderly people. Well, I know that has nothing to do with me, so we'll stick with the allergy approach for now.

Let's see, what else is going on. Our Rochester closing was scheduled for May 20th with the sellers moving out on May 21st. I said, "No, that won't do at all." Now they are moving out on the weekend and we are closing on the 23rd. In New York the sellers don't attend the closing apparently and they're not there for the walk through either. You don't get to talk to them at all. I would much rather be able to talk with them and learn any things they can tell us after having built the house and lived there for thirty years. So, we'll see what happens. Still no activity on our buyers' house, so we are going to list with a realtor if there isn't some action by the time we close on the house up north.

Today is a gray day outside and there is a forecast of possible showers. I have to be doing something, so I had better get to work looking for things to pack or sort or something. Trouble is that I have taken the antihistamine which is beginning to make me feel drowsy.  I don't want to fall asleep on the job. Oh hum!

Resting in Peace

I have been to four funerals since December, four more than I would have like to have attended. It has got me thinking about the afterlife. I must warn the reader that there are no answers here. I have not figured out who goes where, where where is or even what where is. Leo Tolstoy spent a great deal of time railing against the church for deceiving people through the ages and scaring them into believing it's doctrines and, at the same time, paying money so that the hierarchy can get rich and against governments for threatening people with force to get them to do as the government wants. I'm simplifying things here, but he believed that the Kingdom of God is within each of us and each of us has the power within us to change the world and to bring to fruition the things Christ taught us.

All of the great religions of the world, of which I am aware, believe in some type of life after death. Some believe that we are reincarnated and that we keep going until we achieve a state of perfection. Some, like my Roman Catholic tradition, believe that we go to heaven (the good place) or hell (the bad place). Some say hell is a place of torture, others believe it is going out of existence so that we are in the same state as before we were born. But, wait. How do we know we weren't in existence before we were born? Maybe we were in another dimension, or another incarnation.

I was tempted to do a Google search for the afterlife, but then I thought how foolish that would be. I would get a zillion posts with two zillion opinions. I know, I don't believe, I know that it all has somehow to do with love. I don't know how it all works, but I think that we will end up all loving one another, but how? If we don't love one another here on earth, how will we, all of a sudden, become such great people after we die? Don't know. But, I believe Tolstoy is right. We have the power within us, each of us, to love, and to love not only those close to us, but to love every one of our neighbors in the world. It's not easy though. I can like people, but to truly love them is harder. Not that there is anything wrong with the people (except congress people this week), but there is something lacking in me. I have to change myself. Maybe then I can realize that the Kingdom of God is really within me and that I can help to make it come into being here on earth.

This is profound and I haven't even begun to write all that I think on this subject. It is difficult because we don't know what lies beyond this life and, let's face it, no matter how religious we are, or how much we say we accept that our reward will be in heaven, we don't really look forward to going anyplace. We don't want to die. We are afraid of what may be out there, oh we of little faith.

To be continued.

Congress Should Dissolve Itself

Congress, those lunkheads. How dare they threaten to close down our government. They get paid very well, both the house and the senate, to run the government, not to threaten to shut it down. They would close the national parks and monuments, OUR national parks and monuments. The President showed up at the Lincoln Memorial to greet visitors and told them that both sides had worked out their differences and therefore they could enjoy their visit. How dare he? They have no right to even think about shutting down our monuments, our parks, our country.  They would delay our tax refund checks and delay pay for countless soldiers and federal employees. Please note that the members of congress, house and senate, would not do without their own pay. How dare they, these arrogant people who only think about how to get re-elected so that they can take advantage of all of the perks that they get. And what about that guy, presiding in the house, who was caught on camera sitting there autographing pictures of himself while this is all going on. How dare they. The whole bunch of them, republicans, democrats, tea partyers, coffee drinkers, the whole pack of them, should get out and let us replace them. None of them should be eligible to run again. In each district every taxpayer's name should be put in a hat, a kindergarten child should be selected by lot who would then reach into the hat and pick out the next congressman or senator for that district. How much worse could it be? It would probably be a lot better. I'm disgusted with the whole lot of them. They waste or steal money. They can't seem to reject special interest groups. They think only of themselves. Get out. Get out you bums and let us have our country back.

I guess you could say I'm disturbed by the current state of our governmental affairs.

An International Following

I discovered the heading "Stats" on my blog and found that I had over a thousand views of my posts since I began writing, or since last May, I'm not sure which. I was surprised to see that the viewers are from the same countries that also view my other blog and several others with which I am familiar. And here I thought that my two followers were coming back to read it again and again.

We are going to another wake tonight. Our friend, Jim Carr passed on to a better life. He had some type of cancer. I have been in more than my share of funeral homes lately, although, thankfully, I'm going in and out of my own accord.

Rite-Aid Redeemed

After the snafu with refilling my prescription with Rite-Aid, I decided to wait to order my next prescription from Shop-Rite until I finally had the one I ordered from Rite-Aid so that, hopefully, the doctor's office would send the right one to the right store. I got a call the other evening from Rite-Aid and I thought, "Oh no, they have the prescription order I phoned into Shop Rite." Instead it was the managing pharmacist calling to apologize for the mix up. He said he had a message from corporate that there had been a problem. That surprised me because I didn't contact corporate, or even really complain other than to tell the person who waited on me that I hadn't ordered drugs B and C, but drug A and that I didn't really understand how that could happen since I used their automated phone system. Anyway, they called up and I told them that all was right with the world and that I finally got the correct meds, but kudos to Rite-Aid for following up.

My Head Hurts / Drug Store

The two topics really don't have anything to do with each other, but I'll explain. First: My head hurts because I have spent the better part of the past two days dealing with computer issues. I had it in my mind that when we eventually move to our new house, I would like to somehow simplify how music is accessed in the various rooms where one might want to listen to it. We have this thing called a Netgear Stora, which is essentially an external hard drive which automatically backs up the contents of the computer hard drive. You can also use it as a server to store, share and play photos, videos and music. I have part of my music library on the Stora and part on my hard drive in iTunes. So, why not put it all on Stora and then access it somehow. There are devices that can do that and here is where part of the headache comes in. The DMA (Digital Media Adapter) must be compliant with UPnP-AV, DLNA or Windows Media Connect. Okay, all of this is geared for home use and in the home there is generally one of me, a u-hC (nts). That's a user-home consumer (non-tech savvy). So why do they write all of this lingo that can't be understood by one of me? I read somewhere in the on line documentation that if I signed up for the "premium" service for $20.00 a year, I could use an iPhone, which I guess also means an iPod Touch. I can sign up for a 30 trial of this service at no cost. I signed up. It thanked me for signing up, but then said I wasn't signed up and wouldn't I like to try it for 30 days.

The second part of the headache: I got a Word document by email that I was supposed to sign and send back. Well, since I don't have Word on my computer, I couldn't do anything but look at it. I thought I had avoided this problem by switching from a Mac to a PC. Apparently not. I have Open Office which does most of the things that Micrsoft Office does and I thought it would open the document so that I could print it. Apparently not. I then read how if I downloaded Internet Explorer 9, I could edit Word docs right in my email, even if I don't have Word on my computer. I downloaded Internet Explorer 9. You would think that since it is a Microsoft product it would have preserved my home page (MSN) and my Hotmail sign in. But no. I now had a Google home page and was signed in with my Gmail account. My favorites, which used to be on the left of my screen are now hidden on the right side. A yellow star in the upper right corner of the screen doesn't get me to them and seems to do nothing. there were also a series of buttons at the top of my screen which have now vanished. Do people in companies actually get paid to sit around and try to figure out how to screw up your life by changing everything all around for no apparent reason? At least I was able to get the document to wake up and to allow itself to be printed, but what a pain it all was. So that's why my head hurts.

Now, on to drug stores, Rite-Aid in particular. Last week I called, using their automated phone systen, to order a refill on a prescription. A few days later I got a call that it was ready. I got in my car and drove there, about 10 minutes away, to find that they didn't have the drug I had wanted, but two other drugs (I order the other drugs through Shop Rite where they are cheaper). They said that my doctor had sent the two drugs, but that it was not a problem that they could put them back. Where's my other drug, the one that I ordered? They didn't have approval for that yet. I would have thought (silly me) that if I order drug "A" and approval comes in for drugs "B" and "C" someone would say, "This isn't what he ordered. Why don't we check and see what's wrong." What they said instead was, "He ordered a refill on drug "A" but he got "B" and "C" instead. Let's call him up and make him come over here for the wrong drugs. His blood pressure might soar and then we can sell him more drugs."

That's the news from here, where it is cold and rainy and computers, their drives, accessories and software are out of favor.

I Have Been Admonished

I have actually been admonished twice in the past week for not writing more on my blog, so I guess I had better write something. See? I wrote something, now leave me along.

Okay, okay, I'll write some more. We have been kind of busy lately. We bought a house in Webster, NY. (Mosey on over to the right side of the blog to click on to my link to Flickr where there are pictures posted.) We signed a contract. The closing won't be until sometime in May. Now we wish our buyers would get their house sold so that they can buy our house. We don't want to be real estate moguls for very long.

We also went to a funeral earlier this week for Scott, the husband of a former co-worker, Laura. He was 60 and had prostate cancer. Way too young to die. I feel badly for her. They were so happy together.

I also had two doctor appointments this week, one with my GP and one with my cardiologist. Both pronounced me in fine fettle although I got an A- for my cholesterol. It seems my LDL (bad) is 85 and the Doc wants it to be 77 or lower. So, it looks like I have to cut back on eating cholesterol. After that I had a nice lunch with a good friend and I don't think I ate too many LDLs then.

In the meantime we have been sorting through more stuff and packing. Didn't I say this before? Well, it never ends. Our house doesn't look cluttered, but when you go to put the things in boxes, it seems like we have way too much. It has been suggested that we try Craig's List to sell some things. Not being a child of the modern era, I am somewhat hesitant to try to sell things over the internet. I guess I should check it out because it has been reported to us that people sell all sorts of things on it, even cars.

Today is Anne's birthday. The weather certainly was magnificent. This afternoon we went for a walk on the Boardwalk in Point Pleasant with friends Angela and Bob and had dinner with them at the Wharfside. Many people had the same idea to walk on the Boardwalk and when we arrived at the restaurant we thought that they also decided to have dinner there judging by the number of cars. But, not so. I don't know where they all were, but we were seated right away and had an enjoyable meal.

Tomorrow is Saturday. For some reason I thought this past Thursday was Saturday. [Don't say anything.] Well, I mean I don't have to know what day it is unless it's Wednesday when I have to put out the trash, or Friday when I have to put out recycling, or Sunday when we go to church. The other days are fairly interchangeable. That was one advantage of going to work. I usually knew what day it was and I didn't show up on Saturday or Sunday. It's funny how my mind still thinks of Monday as the end of the weekend and looks forward to Friday as the beginning of the weekend. Now that we are well into the weekend I will have plenty to do until Monday arrives and I have plenty more to do.

Enough Already

I envy people like my friend MJ (I'll call her MJ in case she doesn't want publicity or her true identity revealed in association with this blog) who just up and moved to a new house, in Florida no less and by all accounts seems to be doing well in her new abode. I, on the other hand, am still at the starting line. I opened my email the other day and what to my wondering eyes should appear, but an email from our seller in Rochester. You remember him, the one who never answered a phone message or email. Well, it seems that his estranged wife still can't decide whether or not to move, even after she said she was ready, so he said he was really sorry that we couldn't make a deal and wished us luck finding a home. We had pretty much written off that house anyway so I guess this was pretty much the final nail in the door jamb.

We are scheduling a trip up north in the near future and have a number of houses to look at, but who knows what the weather may be. Will we be able to go, or not? Will they have snow up there, or not? Will we have more snow here? Don't they need this snow someplace else, like in Sweden or Russia or someplace?

So, we have our list of houses. Our buyers have lowered the price on their house by $20,000, so we are hoping for more activity on that front. In the meantime we are still getting rid of stuff that has accumulated through the years. That process takes longer than you might think because we are now down to stuff that requires a little more careful examination before it is relegated to the trash pile. That is where things stand and I will now go and find more things that require careful examination.

Oh Boy, Oh Boy

Someday, hopefully, I will no longer be writing about moving or buying a house, but not yet. We had the idea last week to go look at active adult communities nearby. I had the idea that moving to Rochester would put us too far from our children and grandchildren. I asked Anne not to tell our children about this for fear that they would arrange to have people come here and take us away for evaluation and/or confinement, but she told anyway. So far, people haven't come to get us, but, you never know.

We went to look at K. Hovnanian's Four Seasons at Metedeconk Lakes and Four Seasons at South Knolls, mostly South Knolls. I didn't go there because I used to work for them, but because they were relatively close by. They either put something in the coffee that they gave us or something sprays on you when you walk into a model home. The models are seductive. Every detail has been thought out by a team of decorators to make you want to go back to the office and buy one right away. I haven't been in many adult communities so I don't know what others are like, but these homes are very, very nice. Buying a home gets you a clubhouse too where there is an indoor pool, an outdoor pool, a fitness center, billiard room, library, craft room, rooms to play cards and on and on. They mow your lawn, shovel your snow and guard the gated entrance. All of this is not without a price and pricey the models are. We liked a two bedroom, two bath model that has a den, living/dining room, family room, kitchen, of course, breakfast nook and two car garage. The master bedroom is huge. The base price is $300,000., about in the middle range of the model prices. You can upgrade. Oh, you want doorknobs? A faucet? Everything costs, so that the average buyer spends another $50,000 or $60,000 on upgrades. Then there are restrictions. You can't have holiday lights outside your house, or plant anything, or do anything without the approval of a committee. Not exactly the way we're used to living. Daughter, Christine thought we wouldn't be happy there. Son, Peter, called yesterday and started out by saying the we must be out of our minds. I thought he had found out about our excursion, but he thought we are out of our minds for thinking about moving to Rochester. He just got back to Florida from D.C. to be with his family for the Super Bowl and gave a litany of reasons why it would be better to live there; how you wear more comfortable clothes there; how you eat better there because you don't eat such heavy foods; how the evenings are nice, even in the heat of the summer; how it rarely gets to 100 degrees there. So, oh boy, oh boy, what to do.

We had much discussion about all of this and decided that the Rochester option was still probably the best course for us to follow. What we save by not buying in an adult community can be put toward travel to Florida, Mexico, Arizona, Tijuana, or anyplace and to stay in those places for a while each winter.

I did more packing of cellar stuff today. I don't want to pack too much yet because if our current deal falls apart, I will have all of these boxes lying around and I don't want to lug them all up to the attic, otherwise I'll be in need of a mortician before I'm in need of a realtor.

The Super Bowl will soon be over (I can't bear to watch too much with a son a Green Bay fan and another one a Steelers fan) and that will start the Spring real estate season, according to our realtor. Things will be popping soon, or not.

A Day Off

I took the day off today. "Took off from what?" you are asking. I know I'm retired so it gets difficult to define just what a day off means. This day off means that I decided not to shovel snow or do any physical labor. I didn't really decide, my body decided. Wednesday I shoveled and horsed the snow blower around to get the area in front of our garages cleared and yesterday I shoveled some more to clear up the front sidewalk to make an opening to the street. Anne shoveled too, but she's more sensible and stops when she feels tired. I have no such sense and just keep on going. Anyway, today my body was telling me that it was time to take a rest. So I did, until a little while ago when I got the shovel and cleared up some ice on the walks.

I always like to clear a path to the street, but it is difficult when the plows leave three feet of the edge of the street unplowed until hours after the snow stops and then come by once again. This is, of course, after everyone has cleared their walks.

We were without telephone, Internet and TV all day yesterday because our cable wire came loose from the house and was dangling low over the street when a snow plow hit it and took it out all the way. Cablevision showed up after dark and was ready to fix it, but the police wouldn't let them do it in the dark. They were here before 9:30 this morning and got it all back up running. I was impressed by the service. Last March, when we had another major snow storm, the cable wire came down and they got here the next day and fixed it.

So, while we were in the dark ages, Anne and I had to actually talk to each other and listen to radio to stay informed. For you younger folks, radio is like television, but it doesn't have any pictures. All you get is the sound. I know, primitive. It got me to thinking about what people did before Internet and television. My parents had neither. We got a television when I was in the third grade and I remember that there wasn't all day programming, but mostly a few shows on in the evening and only in black and white, if you can believe.We had a phone, but only one in the house and we had a private line. Many other people we knew had party lines. That was where one, or two, or even three families shared one phone line. These were people you didn't know and the idea was that if you were on the phone and you heard a click meaning that one of the other parties was trying to make a call, the custom was for you to hang up and let the other person do so. If you were the one trying to make the call and you picked up two or more times and the line was still busy, you could say that you needed to make a call and the other party usually hung up. You could also eavesdrop on another party's call but, in polite society, that wasn't done. We didn't have any of these problems because we had our very own private line. I remember playing with toys, building things with Lincoln logs and blocks and something resembling Lego. I played outside a lot with friends or went to various friends house to play there. My mother liked to sew, make delicious meals and putter around the yard in the summer. My father liked to work in his shop and kept busy with house maintenance in nice weather.

Yesterday we listened to the radio some and I read. I find that I don't watch television all that much and I use the computer mainly for reading emails and finding out what's going on. That doesn't take much time at all. Most of the emails I get are ads for something. But, it feels like without the Internet and television we are somehow not properly connected to the world. We didn't have our regular phone either, of course, but we were able to communicate with a cell phone. We have become so reliant on being able to connect with the whole world. Why, you can even take classes on the Internet and get legitimate credit at a scholastic institution. I understand that some of the teachers of these classes are quite good. You only realize how connected we have become when you become unconnected. Anne was trying to find a particular radio station, but wasn't sure of the frequency. We couldn't look on the Internet. The newspaper no longer lists radio stations and the phone book only lists two radio stations, neither of which were local.

So, how do we stay connected when a storm disrupts our communications? In this instance it was only for one day, but what if it were for a longer period? Do we all really need to be that connected? Do we all need cell phones and wi-fi hot spots in addition to our home based links? When we go off on vacation we are usually happy to be without these facilities. Has the Internet become an essential tool in our modern society? I think it is becoming more so every day. There are more and more links to things that are only available over the Internet. Messages, coupons, notices of this and that, emails and on and on. It was not that long ago that the Internet was unknown to most people who are now thoroughly ensnared in its web. I don't have an answer and I don't even know if there is a question, but these are some of the things I have been thinking about. I need to get back to my book.

Music, Music, Music and some Wolves

I am still hard at it. Sorting, disassembling my train layout and trying to figure out whether or not to convert my LPs. My neighbor, who was helping me to try to figure out how to get photos to sync to my iPod (still no answer to that yet, but I've moved on), let me borrow a portable hard drive that he has with 100 GB of music on it from a DJ that gave it to him. It has all sorts of music from the 40s through the 90s, the kind that would be played at weddings, parties, etc. I copied a whole lot of it, but not all. I'm really not into hip-hop or rap or some of the other genres of today. I copied in batches and it took probably a total of nine or ten hours to do that. It's amazing; I just clicked "copy" and then "paste" and the computer did the rest.

I have a lot of classical LPs also that I have been agonizing over whether or not to convert them. Today I decided to look over our CD collection. I was surprised that we have about a foot's worth of CDs of classical music. Where it all came from, I am not sure, but I went straight to the cellar and, no longer feeling guilty, removed about six boxed sets of Beethoven LPs from the shelves. It was hard because I realized that quite a few of these records had probably never been played. Why did I feel guilty? If I hadn't played them in thirty years, well, duh!

I seem to have things that most people don't have and maybe don't want to have. As I was sorting through LPs, I came across one titled "The Language and Music of the Wolves." On one side, Robert Redford narrates about wolves. On the other side there are tracks of wolf sounds. Here is the list:

Band 1 - Opening Howl
Band 2 - First Growls of Wolf Pups Inside the Den
Band 3 - Pup Howls - Spring and Fall - Contrasted with Adult
Band 4 - Barking
Band 5 - Series of 3 Adjacent Single Howls
Band 6 - Comparative Difference in Howls
Band 7 - Single Howls Joined to Give Illusion of Pack Howl
Band 8 - Combined Sounds of the Wolf
Band 9 - Distant and Close-up Howling Ending in Group Howl
Band 10 - Series of Group Howls
Band 11 - Joint Group Howl

I'm not making any of this up. Who could make such stuff up? Okay, maybe Stephen King. But this is the truth. Do you think I have to be more aggressive in throwing out records? I bet you can't imagine how many happy and relaxing hours I have spent through the years sitting in a comfy chair with a glass of Scotch and a good book (Jack London, probably) listening to my wolf howls. Actually, I may end up converting this one. I can see a great deal of entertainment value if, by chance, we buy the house next to my brother-in-law. Ah, I see it now. A cold winter night; a loud speaker set in our yard facing his house, but the volume not set too loud. We go over to visit and sit by the fire. Everyone is relaxed. Suddenly, a bone chilling howl fills the air outside, followed by Distant and Close-up Howling Ending in a Group Howl. I think I will hang onto this LP. It most assuredly has possibilities.

Busy Days

I've been busy, which is good because I like to be busy. I have been disassembling my train layout for one thing. I am amazed by how much work this involves. I guess I shouldn't be surprised when I think about how long it took to get it together. Did I really put all those wires under there? Did I really wire all those control units under the layout? How did I manage to crawl around under there? Well, I guess it was me because I don't remember seeing anyone else under there. So, I now have all the trains, cars, people, vehicles, buildings, track, switches and landscaping packed away. I have pulled out all of the wiring and need to decide what to do with the control boxes attached to a panel under the layout. I was thinking of leaving them attached and just removing the panel, but it would save a lot of space to pack the controls separately. Besides, I don't know where they might go on an entirely new layout. I have to figure that out.

While I'm doing all of this demolition I am multi-tasking. I am listening to old LPs (phonograph records). The idea is to decide on which ones to keep and record onto my computer with the idea of discarding the LP once it is digitized. I am finding that the discard pile is growing bigger than I thought it would. It seems that my tastes have changed over the years. I hope that they haven't just changed for the day that I'm listening. I would hate to make a mistake and throw out music that I want to listen to again someday. Some of these records are old, but not as old as the 78 rpm records I still have somewhere. This is what it says on the back of one LP. The tile is "The Fabulous Four Hands of Frankie Carle." Frankie Carle was a piano player and the album features some blues on a grand piano and some old time songs on an upright honky-tonk piano, hence the album title. This is what it says:

This is a "New Orthophonic" High Fidelity recording,
designed for the phonograph of today or tomorrow. Played
on your present machine, it gives you the finest quality of
reproduction. Played on a "Stereophonic" machine, it gives
even more brilliant true-to-life fidelity. You can buy today
without fear of obsolescence in the future.

The LP is copyrighted by Radio Corporation of America in 1961. I wonder if any of the engineers of that time had any idea of how we would listen to music fifty years later. And I'm thinking, "WHAT, I remember this record. I used to listen to it, but IT'S FIFTY YEARS OLD!!! You can see how this is traumatizing me.

So, I am choosing the records that I enjoy listening to and that have superior sound quality for processing. There is so much music available to us today. Back in 1961, I'm told (it's a little before my time), you had records, tapes and radio. Radio was very local, except at night when you could pick up signals from all across the country. Now we have Internet radio, satellite and the ability to download any kind of music from anywhere, anytime. With cable TV, we also have music of any type available 24 hours a day. How much time do I want to spend recording old LPs when it takes about 45 minutes, give or take a few, to get each record digitized including typing in the names of all the tracks?

In the meantime, I am still trying to get my iPod Touch to sync photos from my computer. I called in my neighbor who knows almost anything to do with computers. He spent over a half hour here yesterday and about an hour or more today and he is baffled by it. He has been searching the Internet for some kind of answer and while some folks have similar problems, none of them has found a solution. We will eventually figure it out, but at least I don't feel so bad that I couldn't figure it out myself. By the way, speaking of music, my neighbor lent me a hard drive with 100 GB of music on it and told me to copy whatever I want. The hard drive has all kinds of music, the kind a DJ would use for a wedding or party.

When I get done with all of this multi-tasking I will have to post some new pictures on this blog. Also, I have not forgotten about my novel that I am writing. I'll get to these things. I should probably listen to some music, but there is so much to choose from. Decisions, decisions.

Crossing Over

I bet you think I'm going to write something about dying and going to the Great Train Layout in the sky, but that's not what I mean with the title. I'll explain.

This may be long and drawn out, but I want to write it and you can stop reading if it gets boring. I have a 3rd generation iPod Nano which I use for my music. It is only 8GB and it is just about filled . I mentioned this to Anne who has an iPod Nano and an iPod touch, the last generation. She said she doesn't really use it and that I could have it. I said, being generous and kind, that, if she wanted, I would get her a new iPod touch that has a camera in it and can wash the dishes and set the table. She thought that would be nice. Anyway, I took her iPod touch and proceeded to sync my music onto it. I thought that since it is an iPod touch, I would also sync some photos and my contacts and calendar. I did that on my old Nano before it got too crowded. Previously I had used a Mac computer to do that. We're getting to the "crossing over" part. Now I am using a PC (a Windows based machine). I cannot get it to sync my photos from Windows Live Photo Gallery to the iPod Touch, nor will it sync my contacts or calendar. It's supposed to be easy, but there is some funny language in the online instruction manual (they don't give you one with the product anymore) that seems to imply that you should use Adobe Photoshop Elements 8 or later, but it should work using folders on your computer, so it says. Once again, I have learned that, despite what they all tell you and how easy all the commercials make it seem, it is never easy crossing over from one platform (Mac) to another (Windows) or the other way around. Mac stuff all works very well if you stick to Mac stuff, but as soon as you start mucking around with Windows and Mac, things get sticky.

I have been using Steve Jobs' (CEO of Apple) philosophy of technology, or my version of it, which says that before long, everything will be internet based and we won't be using CDs or DVDs. All music, photos, video, etc. will be on a hard drive or on the internet. I believe that he is correct and that this is already happening in Europe, Asia and the Middle East. We are far behind, but we are going in that direction. But, if machines don't talk to each other, how can any of this be accomplished?

I did find a work around. I discovered that when on the iPod Touch, I could go to my pictures on Flickr, click on a picture and it would give me the option to save it. I found this out by accident. I didn't know where it would be saved or why I would want to since the picture is already on Flickr. I clicked save and didn't think anything else of it until I realized that the "saved" pictures were now on my iPod Touch without having to sync anything. You can view all of my Flickr photos by going to the clink (my word for a link that you click) on the right side of this blog. Somewhere there it says "Bill's pictures" or something. If you have any trouble with that, please let me know so I can spend another three or four hours trying to figure it out. I realized that I am almost a year behind in posting pictures to Flickr, so please forgive me. I am trying to get caught up. By the way, Windows makes it very easy to get pictures from Windows Live Photo Gallery to Flickr. I think it's easier than from Apple's iPhoto. I am also in the midst of disassembling and packing my train layout in anticipation of a move to somewhere, sometime in the future. There I am also far behind SOME people who have managed to make a move to a nice warm place just in time to avoid the thirty inches of snow at Christmas time. Sigh!

The Year 2011

As you all know by now the new year has come. I had nothing to do with it as I proved by sleeping through its birth. On New Years Day we had our traditional party with two other families of friends. I think we started this almost thirty years ago and now the number of attendees has increased substantially. We all (well, most of us) gathered and had a great time.

Roxana and the boys had to be at LaGuardia at 5:00 p.m. for their flight back to Florida. Had she known what was going to happen, she could have come to the party. They boarded their American Airlines flight and it took off on time, but after about one-half hour of flight the pilot announced that they were diverting to Kennedy Airport for an emergency landing because of engine problems. When they got on the ground they were directed to a nearby gate. After a while the were boarded on a second plane, but after being on there for about one-half hour they were told that they couldn't fly because the flight crew had exceeded its hours. They had to stand in line to get vouchers for a hotel where they stayed overnight.

They were told that the flight was at 8:00 a.m. the next morning, so they got up to get a 5:30 a.m. shuttle to the airport. It got to be 8:00 o'clock and no one was at the counter at the boarding gate. Finally someone showed up and Alex, yes Alex, went up and asked why their plane was delayed and when they were going to leave. The people were nice to him and they found out that the flight was at 10:00 a.m. and not 8:00.

When they boarded the plane, Anthony and Alex were invited into the cockpit and allowed to sit in the pilot's and copilot's seats. Roxana cautioned Alex not to touch anything fearing that he might decide that he had waited long enough and try to fly the plane.

Pete and his family had a nice hotel room and choice seats in Times Square for the ball drop on New Years Eve courtesy of NYPD. As they were escorted through the crowds, people cheered them and tried to give high fives. Pete said the people didn't have anything to do and probably thought they were celebrities. I guess they were in a way. Commissioner Kelly came over to talk to them and shook hands with Anthony and Alex. This was all the result of some courtesies Peter had extended to the Commissioner when he visited Haiti.

So, I started to dismantle my train layout today. I realize that this will take some time as I survey the mass of stuff that has been accumulated through the years. While I'm at it, I'm trying out some of the engines to make sure they still work and I'm trying to organize things because I know that the minute I put a cover on a box I will forget what's in it. I want to pack things carefully so that nothing gets damaged when we move. I'm not sure how I will transport these trains, but I can decide that once we have a place to move them to.