Monday

So the road was not all that conducive to the blog.  Sorry about that.

I received another lesson in advance-planning oversights on Friday when I sadly underestimated my travel time from Galena, Illinois to Woodbury.  In my mind, I had done an approximation that said that I had already driven over an hour North, so the balance of the trip to Harvest Path should be no more than between four and four and a half hours.  Wrong-o, Bucko!  My situation was exacerbated by a later-than-anticipated presentation time at my meeting in Galena, and an overly optimistic appraisal of my time situation that allowed for a sit-down lunch at Mickey D's in Galena.

I took a gander at Google Maps at lunch, and the system produced a projected travel time of over five hours.  I was sure that it was out-of-whack.  Again, Wrong-o, Bucko! What ensued was a very tedious 5+ hour drive, mostly along scenic Route 61 on both the Wisconsin and then Minnesota sides of the Mississippi.  I didn't have the chance to take my own pics, but this one off the Internet gives you the idea of the view.  The road was consistently quite a bit above and away from the river, affording dramatic riverscapes at times.

Add in to the mis-read on the distance with lots of two-lane road, through-town routes, and Friday afternoon traffic, and you get the idea that it wasn't the best trip.  It was a strong argument for the less-direct, four-lane Interstate option that we normally take to Woodbury.

The weekend went quickly.  Sketchy weather, so even though I packed the bike, it never made it out of the car.  But there was plenty of entertainment provided by 1.01 and 1.02.  We also did get to see cousins Sue and Ryan on Saturday night, meeting for dinner near the Mall of America.  They were in town for a bball tourney that Ryan's Iowa Attack was entered.  Sounds to me like Ryan may have some track in her future.  Good luck, Kiddo.  And thanks to Sue for taking the time to meet us.

Not to be morbid, but I had another death in my client group late last week that gave me more pause to evaluate how I spend my time.  This was a 56 year old gal in Arizona whom I have worked with for over 25 years.  She was the CFO for a very successful business in the Scottsdale area, and had elected to use our firm for tax and retirement plan services over all the local choices that she had in the desert.  That client group would have to be a near Top Ten customer in our firm's history.  Brain aneurysm.  She never came out of the coma.  Stunning reality for all.

To 4, yes, my weekly letter concept came from Grandpa.  He wrote a brief note, almost every week when I started at ND, and included a $5 bill.  His hand-writing was worse than mine!  Like me, he never said much in the letter, but that five bucks was always a welcome sight in the mailbox.  I remember being surprised with the first letters, because I had never known him to write to anyone.  Mother was always into letters, but not him.  That said, I do remember letters that they received from my brother and sisters always staying on a table or somewhere close for re-reading. 

Lots to do in the next couple of days.  The IRS is back tomorrow, and I am in C-town for a conference on Thursday-Friday.  I'll try to jump back on here later today.

NOW LATER....

I had purposely waited to get home to load that pic of 1.01 and 1.02, and it became a semi-major project.  The memory card in the "good", big camera is pretty old, and my computer at the office was trying to upload the entire card.  So when I got home, I pulled the card from the camera, inserted it in the laptop, and...nothing.  After a couple of re-insertions, and similar negative results, I went to Plan B, which is a little card reader unit that is then slipped into a USB port (which was my Plan A before the arrival of the new laptop).

It took only one insertion to prove that Plan B was also a bust.

I was beginning to get a little PO'd, and not a little worried about whether those pics on the card were salvageable.  While most were in other files elsewhere on one of my machines, any since Christmas were only on the card.

Fortunately, there was a Plan C without having to call in the CSI lab.  The camera itself could read the card as you could work the viewfinder through all of the shots.  Then I remembered that the camera originally came with a cord that had a fitting at one end for one of those hidden slots on the camera, and a USB fitting on the other.  And it was actually in the zipper pocket of the camera case (where it was supposed to be).  And it worked!  Mission accomplished.

(Sorry to go through this tedium, but it was a bit fulfilling to get the pics loaded after the initial setbacks.  I'm not saying that I am a member of the Geek Squad, but I got some skills!)

OK.  Now done.  Thanks for reading.
BCOT