City Flats

I am writing tonight from City Flats Hotel in downtown Holland, Michigan. My work goes on a two day inservice twice a year. Since my job involves childcare for the staff kids, I get to come so that I can do my job! It's nice because I have a change of scenery and get to stay in some nice places that I'd probably never be able to stay in otherwise.

Had to get up early this morning to meet the moms at work. Winter driving in the dark is my least favorite kind of driving, especially early in the morning! But I made it, we loaded up the car and the kids, and off we went. I was wedged between the two car seats in the back, not the most comfortable trip but it wasn't all that long.

Arrived at the hotel, and there was a suite arranged for me and the kids. (That's another extra perk...I generally have one of the better rooms or suites so that there's room enough for the kids to spread out!)

This hotel is just a few years old, and is "green," which means environmentally sensitive. The suite has two couches and several chairs in the living area, and a balcony with a great view of downtown Holland. There is a kitchenette with microwave, refrig, and sink, countertop with high stools. Then the bathroom - large sink with countertop area, then a separate shower, large enough to put about six people into. The tub, rectangular but big enough for two! Dual-flush toilet. Bedroom - king size bed, 32" flat screen TV (another one in the living area) tastefully and beautifully decorated. Wow. Wish Steve could be here to share it.

We (the kids and I) spent the day together and had a good time. The baby had a portacrib, and the toddler slept in the middle of my bed surrounded by pillows (there's only six on the bed...)
We played trains much of the day, I brought Eric's old brio wooden train set as the toddler loves playing with the train table at work. I had the double stroller with us but it's been way too cold for small children to be outdoors today.

When the moms came about 4:45, I had about 45 minutes until I had to meet everyone for dinner. So of course I went caching. I could see the nearby parking garage from our balcony and there was a cache there. Quick find. Then on to a small park, no luck there. Found the third attempt, a nano on a park bench that has had a full log for at least six months.

Dinner with the entire staff after I returned to the hotel. Fancy hors d'oeuvres, then gourmet food. My choice was a gourmet mac n' cheese with truffle sauteed broccoli. Sounds sorta plain but it was really good. I could get used to this life. Chocolate tart for dessert. The diet needs to start soon.

Got back to the suite about 8:45. I had consulted previously with a caching friend who lives in Holland, and he said that the immediate area that I would be in would be safe enough to walk around at night. So I took another half-hour walk and found two more caches. The first was at a bus stop, the second at a large metal doghouse with a metal dog sculpture on top. Not sure what the story is, but the cache is named "Woof Woof."

Came back and logged my caches, then have spent the rest of the evening using the high speed and enjoying watching some shows that we don't get on DISH at home (this is DirecTV.)

Tomorrow - another day spent with the kids much like today has been, then the moms come back and we all go back to Grand Rapids. Then the weekend!

Oh yeah, and I get paid for 9 hours for today and probably the same tomorrow. That helps, since I usually don't get as many hours as I used to.

Netbooks and sons with girlfriends...

Well, readers, when we last met I had two concurrent themes going: whether or not my son has a girlfriend, and what in the heck is wrong with my netbook?

The girlfriend issue: yep, in his own facebook words: She's this great girl that I've been seeing for the past couple of weeks. I'm glad for him, and her.

The netbook issue doesn't have as happy of an ending. There was no change in status, so I ended up taking it to my favorite repair shop on Saturday. (favorite as it doesn't charge for diagnostics, and they'd sent me a 15% off coupon at Christmastime.) Their diagnosis was a failed motherboard. Not good. They spent some time looking for a new one without success.

But the good news is that they were able to save my data (so they say, I haven't seen it yet.) I bought an external hard drive that I'm going to have them transfer the data to, then start getting into the habit of regular backups. Some stuff was backed up but I would lost some important stuff had they not been able to retrieve my data.

Now what to do about the netbook itself. 8.9"ers are not being made anymore, so an exact replacement isn't gonna happen. After beginning to do some research, found that most new netbooks aren't even XP anymore, they come with Windows 7 starter edition. The barebones edition. I'm happy with XP and it works well for me. So lets stick with XP. Found what I was looking for on Amazon.com - long battery life, XP, and hey, it's even in red. So I saved the link and decided I wanted to check locally first so that my data could be transferred directly to the new netbook.

Went out today - first stop was Meijer. No, everything was 7 starter. Then down to Best Buy where the salesman tried his hardest to move me to an Asus. And they were all 7 starter as well. Moved on to Office Max where they did have some XP that were at the warehouse and could be ordered. But only the 3 cell battery. So let's move on.

Sam's Club - 7 starter, 3 cell battery. Costco - 7 starter and I'd have to renew my Costco membership which would add $50 to the cost. Staples - 7 starter. My hopes went up at Target when I saw what I was looking for, except 3 cell battery, on clearance for $239. But out of stock now.

So here I am at the library. Just went back to Amazon.com and placed the order for the 6 cell Acer, running XP, in red. Free shipping. So much for buying local.

So tomorrow I'll take my new external hard drive to the computer place and get the data from my old netbook. Not sure if the old battery will fit on the new computer, but it still has plenty of juice left in it so will probably try to sell it if it doesn't fit on the new computer.

And in a week or so I'll have a new netbook. Hope this one lasts longer than a year and a few months. If it doesn't it'll be the last Acer product I'll buy.

Wanting the best for your children, even when they are grown.

It's been an interesting few days of reading Facebook lately. Scott went to Amsterdam with a group of friends from the base, for New Years Eve. When he posted his pictures, turned out one of the friends was a girl. Just saw her in one group pix, didn't think much about it. A few days later, one of the other guys on the trip posted his pix, and Scott was tagged in a few of them so they showed up on his page.

Well, one of those pix was of Scott and the same girl, and Scott has his arm around her. Hmmm.... The girl now has that pix as her profile pix, and has been posting on Scott's page, even calling him Scotty in one post.

I haven't yet had the nerve to ask him whats up...don't want to come across as a meddling mom, but I'm sure curious about the situation. Our pastor posted on Scott's page, "Who's Victoria?" and the posting got deleted, I assume by Scott.

Eric and Steve don't think I can last very long without knowing and asking. They're probably right but so far I've been good.

I hope they're in a relationship. Doesn't have to even be a serious one. Just nice to know that he's moving into a wonderful stage of life (if he is.) It's a mom thing, I guess. Wanting the best for your children, even when they are grown.

And if by some off chance Scott reads this, I will try not to stick my nose in too far. Love you!

Panic Mode

I'm at the library right now and in panic mode. My netbook worked just fine last night. This morning, at the library, nothing. The light goes on and you can hear whirring but it never boots up. I have roundtable tonight so will have to wait to see if I can get it working at home with the power cord.

No, no, no...................

De-constructing Christmas

Christmas is (almost) de-constructed. On Wednesday, I had to wait for a FedEx delivery that I needed to sign for. Which didn't come because of "bad back roads." Whole different story.

Anyway, since I needed to stay upstairs so I could hear the truck home (FedEx is notorious for not giving you much time to get to the door IF they knock or ring the doorbell) I decided it was time for Christmas to get put away.

Started at the octagonal table between the couch and one recliner. I had set up our fireplace scene there. Almost anyway. It was the last thing I set up, and I think I ran out of steam towards the end because I didn't end up decorating the miniature tree. The ornaments and such were on the table next to the tree, but I never ended up putting them on. Oh well. Made it easier to put away, I guess.

Then the tree. Took all the ornaments down and put them into the recliner. Then went to the basement for the ornament tote. I'm glad that I'd made individual styrofoam cups inside the dividers, it made putting it away a lot easier this time around. Got everything back into place. Found an interesting little piece about Christmas is over, Easter will be here soon. Check my facebook page for the entire text, I don't have it with me right now. Took down the garland, remembering how Eric used to call it "garlic" when he was little. The lights stay with the tree so next brought up the tree box and disassembled the tree and somehow got it into the box.

Next the nativity. We used Steve's family set again this year. I love my family's set which my paternal grandparents made, but it's a little too big for the way we have the room set up right now. Put the barn into the box first, then wrapped each piece and fit it around the barn.

Next to gather all the various little decorations into one place. The N-O-E-L letters (which actually spelled out Noel for once, not Leon or other phrases) and Christmas card holder were on top of the curved china cabinet. Little knit mittens on the knob of Steve's car cabinet. Grandma's bell, which plays "Jingle Bells" when you pull the string, down from the dining room chandelier chain. Grandma's jiggling Santa and the Advent Calendar ornament from the speaker, along with the collage picture of the boys at Christmas when they were babies. The sleigh full of elves from the stereo. The fat Santa from atop the TV. Ok from the floor in front of the TV when it was moved when Steve put in his new HDTV. The angel tray with gold Christmas trees from the coffee table. The Christmas placemats, washed and ready to put away.

Have to say that's where it all is right now. Still needs to be taken down to the basement, then arranged under the basement stairs. Gotta get to that today, I hope. Then I can truly say that Christmas has been de-constructed for another year.

It was good.

Happy New Year!

First blog of 2010, three days into the new year. New Years Eve was quite uneventful. Steve and I went over to his dad's for a quiet celebration. I made oyster stew for them, we visited and had munchies just before midnight, watched the ball drop, toasted with sparkling grape juice, then cleaned up and were home by 12:30.

We got up the next morning and watched the Rose Parade. Me once, Steve twice. When NBC's broadcast was finished, Steve found a repeat on the Hallmark Channel and watched it. He said it was better coverage of everything without the running smart-aleck commentary. If Hallmark does it again next year, we'll watch it instead of NBC.

Spent time in the basement, starting the big cleanup that has been sorely needed for a long time. First cleaned out the area around our old hide-a-bed couch, which was designated "garage sale central" (items headed for one anyway) but other stuff had just been thrown there. Then to the area where much of my craft and scouting items have been put. Much more organized and unnecessary stuff thrown out now. There's still a long way to go but it's a start anyway.

Yesterday, I had a Wood Badge executive board meeting, which was at a restaurant on Alpine Avenue. Many of the scouters at the meeting came from the lakeshore, so Alpine Ave in Grand Rapids is about as central as it can be for everyone. The meeting was long - 4 hours before we left. I spent the next three hours geocaching - a new winter series of 25 caches was put out by Just Below Freezing. About half were in the Alpine Ave. area and the other half are all pretty close to home. Got all of the Alpine Ave. area caches and hope to get the ones closer to home later this week. One of the caches turned out to be my #2300 milestone. And that's the only one where I ran into other cachers so they took my picture.

Last night, Eric baked a (frozen) cherry pie and I thought I'd take that opportunity to run a self-cleaning cycle on the oven as some olive oil had spilled over last week. Not a good idea as the oil ignited inside the oven (several little fires, not at the same time.) Needless to say I turned off the self-cleaning cycle and did NOT open the oven door. Still, we had a fair amount of smoke in the kitchen and had to open the windows to air things out. We're surprised we didn't set off the smoke detector.

Two degrees this morning as I headed for church, we are definitely in a cold spell. But it's winter in Michigan, what can you say?

Headed back to a more "normal" routine tomorrow - the holidays are over. Haven't taken down the tree yet. May do it yet today or save it for later in the week.