Saturday, January 31, 2009

Tomorrow morning the 'fun' begins! I'm going to be part of a "Creative Team" competition over at www.DigiTownSquare.com. I'll be on the Hula Girls team (sure hope I don't have to wear a 'real' hula skirt ... yikes! ROTLOL!)

All teams will get one assignment per week. Then the general public votes on our galleries and the team with the highest number of votes will win (I don't really know WHAT we win, but hey...who cares ... we WIN! LOL!)

I'll try to stop back with any exciting news!

Wednesday, January 14, 2009

Lawn Ornaments - Iowa Style!

So, this morning I wake-up to the sound of a semi-truck approaching our acreage on the county road, then ... silence. Hum. That's odd. Normally that sound is followed by the sound of the semi disappearing on the other side of the big hill. Up & At 'Em!!!

Outside our picture window there lays a semi ... on it's side ... across the entrance to our drive and the ditch area on either side of the drive! So much for anyone 'going anywhere' today!

This is going to be an adventure ... it's one of those severe, ice cold, winter days in Iowa. The good news is that the driver was fine. His load was beans (thankfully NOT turkeys, pigs, or cattle as so many of the trucks that drive by carry).

Bruce happened to be AT the end of the drive getting our trash cans in place for Wednesday pickup. He saw the semi coming up the hill from the west and a snowplow climbing the east side of the hill ... stood there for a few seconds and decided he'd best high-tail it out of there when the semi began to move toward the shoulder hoping to avoid hitting that snowplow! Good choice dear! Those garbage cans ended up under the semi's cab!

I've posted a slideshow with photos taken of the process required to extract a fallen semi from a snow-filled ditch and back on the road HERE. If your browser has trouble with the slideshow, HERE is a link to the gallery.

Monday, January 05, 2009

It's another New Year ... and next time around it will be the end of the first decade of the first century of this millinium ... who'da thought? The year's do seem to fly by don't they? ... Wow!

Christmas has come & gone. We are still enjoying the warm glow left behind by Paul & Andrea and the two dogs ... what a wonderful visit we had. Not one of those action-packed visits, nope. This was a slow-paced, quiet, and thoroughly enjoyable visit! We had time to catch up on all their news, play with the pups and learn more about 2009 dreams for their family. (oops! the back porch wasn't 'supposed' to be featured on our blog! teehee!)

I did my best to get a family greeting sent out this year ... as always, it's the details that give me the biggest challenge. Designing the greetings was the fun part. Then I got bogged down while getting the mailing list up-to-date (if I had a dollar for every time I've entered addresses into a program of one sort or another I could buy a house I think!). My effort grew into a project that included the making of a mailing list for my mother too (that's not just more family, but friends as well!). I just keep thinking, "Maybe when the technology outstrips my cognitive skills someday there will be a child somewhere in my family that will be happy to do this for me." Anyone? Anyone? Anyone?

True to form ... the computer analyst in me kicked in! My mailing list update has turned into a full-scale IT Project! Once the addresses were being collected, it only seemed natural to expand the scope and collect/record birthdays and anniversaries. Weeks later, I wondered, "Why not get all that data published somewhere online so any family member can access it? Someplace that allows subscriptions that can then be posted to their Google Calendar or iCal!" Oh yeah! I'm goin' there (... with Paul's help of course)!

With my MacBookPro in tow ... iCal linked to AddressBook ... all published to GoogleDocs/Cal ... I'm jumping into 2009! So, my big question is ...

Will there be more time to play Photoshop now?