He's there and we're here

Right now Ian is probably somewhere at a base station preparing for his hike to the peak of Mt Whitney beginning at 4:30am west coast time tomorrow. If I understand correctly by leaving at that time he and his companions will return to the camp by days end. We hope to hear from him the next day. In the meantime my days off this week have been pretty much what I'd hoped for. Casual long breakfasts, worked out at the fitness center Monday and Wednesday mornings. Tuesday afternoon Carol and I went to a movie for the first time since Avatar came out. This time it was Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows, which I liked much more the first one. Today we went to LL Beans where I bought a new winter jacket, on sale. Afterwords we stopped at the The Cafe at Freeport Inn for lunch or breakfast if you please as Carol ordered brown sugar and maple French toast and myself with a hot Italian sausage and scrambled egg wrap, both meals very tasty, from the specials board. Spent most of the remainder of the afternoon shredding outdated financial documents. Been doing some reading, not as much as I'd like, mainly Harry Potter and the Deadly Hallows. Also on my Kindle app I'm reading Quarter Share by Nathan Lowell and on the side so to speak More Than One Universe: the collected short stores of Arthur C. Clark. I expect to finish the first two before retuning to work Tuesday. Another workout in the morning then more cleanup of stuff we don't need. Monday will be Christmas Part 3 of 3 with my sibling's families at Mom's.

Christmas Part 2 of 3 - There's no place like home

As in years past we become homebodies for Christmas Day, our gift exchange after breakfast, having lunch and supper buffet style and for the last couple of years a bit of a movie marathon. This year it was the Bourne series; The Bourne Identity before lunch followed by The Bourne Supremacy then after a coffee/snack break we snuck in The Bourne Ultimatum before supper. Previously the third movie was viewed after supper but this year the Green Bay Packers were on in the evening so that was must see TV last night. They won clinching home field advantage through the playoffs, Yeah! A little tie-in with that, one of my presents was one share of Green Bay Packers public stock from a recent offering of the only publicly held American major professional team given to me by Carol, Ian and Alie. So now I am part owner in my favorite team. Though it is a non-voting share I am entitled to attend annual stockholder meetings, definitely on my future things to do list.

From Carol's wish list a larger crock pot with a clamping lid, benefits - helps keeps me well fed.

Ian working his way through gift opening.

At the end of a terrific holiday together.

This morning Ian left for his Dover, NH residence to prepare to leave early tomorrow for a trip to California where he and some friends will hike up Mt. Whitney the tallest peak in the contiguous United States. He'll be back in Dover on Tuesday January 3rd.

Christmas season is underway

Welcome to Christmas 2011. We began with Carol's side of the family's get together last Sunday at Lois and Jim's for brunch and gift giving, also there were Ian and Alie, Elaine and Steve and Mark and Megan with their kids Brock and Lydia. Ian was put to work cooking Swedish pancakes and his cousin Mark cooked up a ton of bacon. Lois had made breaded cinnamon scrambled egg dish and other goodies. Elaine did a fruit soup and Megan brought her baked cheesy hash browns with corn flakes crumbled across the top made with lots of butter, mmmmm. None of us were watching our calories.

Ian and Alie with Lydia



Carol shows off one of her gifts, a sign that says "Welcome, where we don't keep things bottled up" next to a bottle of wine.

My sis-in-law Elaine and I imbibing glögg.

Coming up - Christmas at home, then Christmas with my side of the family on Monday, January 2nd, the earliest all my siblings could get together. The nieces and nephews with be hit and miss so we'll make do having whoever can make to my mother's house that day.

Change of address

Finally this small piece of turmoil is over - moved into my new cubicle location late yesterday afternoon. The partition crew was in early dismantling any cube who's occupant had left for the day.

My cube neighbor, Michelle, exposed trying to get some work done as the crew took down the three cubicles preceding hers.

My cube all cleaned out and ready to disappear once the crew gets to Michelle's.

Everything pretty much tossed in to the new digs. I'd tidied it up some and hooked up my computer before leaving for the weekend. More changes to come as my new neighbors begin to arrive.

Moving on... over

It's time to move to another cubicle. With all the changes in the office the row of window cubicles I'm located in are being taken down to be replaced by walled offices of which I am not invited to occupy. Most everybody on this side of the floor are moving up two stories but me. I'll move around to the other side of a walled corner office that in the near future will be occupied by my manager. Here's the trick, I cannot move until the present occupant finishes packing tomorrow (Friday) afternoon maybe by 4pm when everyone but me has to vacate the building as the work crew arrive to move people's stuff to their new location and then start taking down the cubes to use elsewhere while I in some haste move my stuff across to the the new space. As I wrote last December I was quite happy with the renovations of the cubes spaces then and of course I liked my particular location and view of strange things that happen out that side of the building.

Packing crates were delivered at the first of the week, one wise guy rolled the a stack in front of his manager's office, while he was in it. It wasn't a problem since he didn't want to be disturbed anyway. I'll be moving from the cube on the left to the cube on the right. Another window, another view. I'll share it next week.

Life marching on

Work
The company I work for which was acquired by a large global company is still going through a heavy duty integration, locally and nationally. At my location we are combining with two smaller offices that were already part of the global company as a buyout a couple of years ago. After adding an additional floor to our lease they are moving into our building later this month. This will almost double the size of the staff here and we have gradually been involving each other in projects and proposals. The same is going on in many offices across the country that have redundant offices because of the acquisition. So far no layoffs and nothing to indicate that there may be some planned. We’ve been rolled into other benefit and retirements plans beginning January 1st and we get a steady flow of company news updates from all regions and countries we’re located in. It’s been interesting and also a bit overwhelming. Besides the drama during the changes in the office in the last couple of months my workload has increased both in project and intensity. Doesn’t leave me with much energy by the end of a day or a weekend to write a blog now and then.

House Renovation
Part of what we’ve been doing with a financial advisor was refinancing our debt at lower interest and shorter terms. This included money for some home improvement work. We started with having the roof cleaned of lichen, moss and mold. Quite the salad. Looks almost like new.

We followed that up with re-siding the house with vinyl. Excellent job by the contractor. With the remaining funds we’re looking at how we can remodel the main bathroom next.
Holiday
Thanksgiving Day dinner at my brother’s was a great time. My sister-in-law Debbie worked on the dinner beginning the previous day and it showed. All the fixings, appetizers, pies and other assorted goodies. A good turnout on both sides of the families. Bonus, watched the Green Bay Packers beat the Detroit Lions handily.
Ikea
Last weekend Carol and I made the trip south of Boston to Ikea. Had lunch, picked up a few items and looked at things we’d like to use for remodeling the bathroom. Nice to get away on a sunny warm day for a drive.

Thanksgiving Day

With yesterday's snow cleanup out of the way and Thanksgiving Day upon us I'm looking forward to a holiday family gathering at my brother Dennis and his wife Deb's house. Ian is home for the day so with Carol the three of us will make the short drive there. It will be a combination of both Dennis and Deb's families. Of course there will be absences of several members but all told there will be about 20 attending. Thankful for family and good health and also taking a day to step back from a very busy time at work and around the house - all for the good.

Great news ',',',',',',',',',',',',',',',','

More snow before Thanksgiving even gets here. At least the snowblower is gassed up and aimed at the garage door for the first foray up the driveway as Carol heads out to run a morning errand. Around noontime for her to make an appointment, if it isn't cancel first. And just a little later for Ian to arrive for the Thanksgiving Day holiday. I'm just hoping we don't get as much as that October storm. Can only say "just a little is enough!"

Final Jeopardy answer is "leaves"

Which of the following doesn't belong with the other two, snow, snowblower, leaves?

So we couldn't even make it to end of October without a northeaster coming though. Depending where you measured we had a foot to a foot and a half of snow overnight. With the temperatures averaging well over the freezing mark the snow will be gone soon enough but any snow this time of year is little to just a little too much.

A bit early for snow pictures and me complaining
about it but hey, it's my blog.

The camper had to beat a hasty retreat to
winter storage a day earlier than I'd planned.

Sunny skies and cooler walking...

... a couple of the better things about this time of year, of course it comes with less daylight. Leaving for work usually a little after 6am is pitch black with clear skies or a morning like today with rain and fog leaves a lot to be desired. There will be a bit of relief in a couple of weeks when we set the clocks back and as I've lamented here before we reset the progression to A.M. darkness. Occasionally on my lunchtime strolls around downtown Portland I get a taste of my admiration for well constructed scaffolding and Monday's wanderings brought me upon a fine specimen of exterior skeletal order and stability on Park Street shown in the photo. I have no desire to clamber about the structure towering above the brick walkway though as a child jungle gyms provoked a fascination that I was seldom able to partake in so I admit there is some connection.

Assault on the attic

Now with the weather cooling down Carol and I are making a push at clearing out our attic which is over the garage, we also needed to reopen some space for the deck furniture and the screen room to be stored for the winter. In as we don't have a basement the attic was built as a full second floor, about 26 feet long and maybe 16 feet wide. There is plenty of room for a lot of stuff much of which we could get along without quite nicely thank you. How to make that stuff disappear is the real trick. So far we've managed to sort out most of it. Some goes to curbside trash and the recycling, trash that doesn't go that way needs to be trucked to the transfer station the next town over. Good stuff we don't need goes to the Salvation Army's store across town. This coming Saturday there's a electronics recycling drop off in another town nearby. What all this will gain us is space to figure out the next steps - what to do with what we keep and re-evaluate what else we can be rid of. All this sorting amounted to staging the various goods in one of the two bays of the garage - motivation to finish the job soon or I'll be clearing snow off the truck before going anywhere.

Sign of the season, close up the camp

Yeah, Columbus Day weekend, time to batten down the hatches at the camp. Not quite a nautical situation but things must be dealt with before the onset of winter. I accompanied Lois and Jim up to my mother-in-law's where we spent Friday and Saturday nights for a visit and then a couple of hours Saturday morning taking care of business at the lake. Jim drained the plumbing system added some RV anti-freeze to the pipes and retrieved the waterline from the lake with Lois and I carrying up the concrete blocks used to hold down the line on the lake bottom. Then the three of us lift the lower two ramp sections and stack them on the upper most ramp.

The weather this weekend was unusually warm, temperatures got into the 80s!


Here the ramps are stacked safely away from the shore.

While Jim worked on the pipes Lois and I brought in the folding picnic table and the swing seat then cleaned out the wood shed.

Buttoned up and ready for winter - more than I'll be!

Where would we be?

Steve Jobs, RIP October 5th, 2011

Back in 1988 I barely ever had my hands on computer that I could make do stuff. By the end of 1988 I was all over Apple's Macintosh SE and this 30 year old drafter became a graphic designer and hasn't looked back since. Granted by 1994 at work I was on a Microsoft Windows computer I was on my second Mac at home and eventually on a PC there as well but I always coveted getting back to a Mac and still may someday. Mac was struggling it's way through the mid 90s when Steve Jobs returned to Apple and had thereafter inspired the push to what many of our day-to-day devices have become. From computers to music players and smartphones their competitors have been pressed to keep up with the ideas and production of products conceived by Jobs and his prodigies.

57 Chevy I'm not

Beginning today I am 57 years old though. Sneaking through my 50s and still having juvenile moments that eventually will be considered my senior moments. If it wasn't for aches and pains I'd have problems identifying myself as 57. Now that Carol and I have begun getting serious about preparing for retirement by getting in cahoots with a financial adviser I'm kind of looking forward to when that time comes, getting tired of working for a living. If the present government would stop screwing around with the economy maybe there'd be enough left of my savings to retire at 62. That's what I like, a 5-year plan.

September 9th, 2001 - Never forgotten

Thoughts and prayers to the family and friends of those who died by the tragic actions of the terrorists of 9-11. Also prayers to those who gave their lives or health to help in the aftermath.
God bless them all.

It's that time of year

Football, NFL at that. The only thing that curtails lamenting about the end of summer. The season began on Thursday night with my World Champion Green Bay Packers hosting the previous champion New Orleans Saints and winning the game on a potential game tying play at the goal line with no time left on the clock. The fun continued today with three games available to me this afternoon and one soon to start this evening. Two more tomorrow night. Crazy but this will dominant my random thoughts through to the Superbowl in February - then I'll awaken to the remainder of the long cold winter...

Can never get enough of Mt Desert Island

We returned from another Labor Day Weekend at Mt. Desert Island. Over the last several years we've been spending LDW or Memorial Day weekend there every other year or so and in spite of all the tourists, present company included, it's just a nice place to be. Lots to do or finding places you can sit quietly and enjoy the scenery. we managed to do some of both. Together with Lois and Jim we stayed at "Smugglers Den Campground" in Southwest Harbor.

We began Friday night with me grilling up some sausages to set the tone of what kind of meals we'd be imbibing and emptying several bottles of wine in the process. It just so happened that my brother David, wife Carolyn and son Danny were staying at the same campground with Friday being the last night of their visit to MDI so we were able to spend time with them. In the morning the four of us headed for Seal Cove Auto Museum, a wonderful special collection of vehicles of the Brass Era of automobiles. If you're interested visit the link for the complete collection list and I've provided a few of my own pictures here.

1927 Bugatti

1913 Stearns-Knight

1913 Peugeot

After visiting the auto museum we drove south to the Bass Harbor Head Lighthouse with it's great public access to the rocky coast line that surrounds it.

Later that afternoon we payed a visit to Carol and Lois' cousin John and wife Linda. John is a lobsterman and Linda a shop owner in Bar Harbor so of course supper there was a lobster bake with corn on the cob.

The view from John and Linda's lower deck as sunset approaches.

Linda, John and Jim dig in.

Sunday morning Lois and Jim got up and left at 4:20 am to go out on John's Lobster boat. After the returned we all meet up with John and Linda at the "Thirsty Whale" in Bar Harbor for lunch where they serve up some great fish sandwiches at a very reasonable price. Mine was the Blackened Haddock Sandwich with fries, wash down with a Guinness – life is good. Afterwards we stopped at Bar Harbor Cellars and after a little wine tasting we bought three bottles of wine then returned to the campground. Before settling down for the remainder of the day Carol and I took a bit of a bike ride to nearby Southwest Harbor

As usual time few by, a couple more days in the region would have been sweet but there's always more to do at another time.

Goodbye Irene

About two hours after posting the "Hello Irene" blog ta-da, the electricity went out – three days and 10 gallons of gas later we're back on the grid. I hate to think what's going to happen when the big solar plasma storm the scientists expect hits. It's nice to have a generator in this situation but the insistence sound of the motor at a constant roar on our deck doesn't take long to get to you. I shut it down at night though a couple of our neighbors have a regular backup system that starts up when needed and shuts down when the power returns. They were just far enough away to not disturb a nights sleep. Relatively not much damage in our yard, a lot of leaf and stick material scattered about. The wind did sent the propane grill off the deck, the cover must have acted as a parachute and gave it some lift. Now that the power is back on I told Carol I feel as though I have a touch of Stockholm Syndrome, I miss the dominance of the generator... oh, there, its passed. I wonder if there's a cold brew in the fridge?

Hello Irene

Moving quickly former hurricane now tropical storm Irene is moving into my region of the storm path and should max out here late afternoon through midnight or so. Already awash in waves of rain and gusting winds I took a walk around the yard and up the driveway down which water running like a brook. At the roadside I have a 4" PVC buried perpendicularly on the high of the driveway entrance that diverts rainwater and snow melt that runs down the road shoulder from spewing down my pavement. Recently it's been clogged up so I took a spade, cleared and bermed the dirt sending runoff into the pipe again. Not like it was a big deal but I'd been meaning to do it and not like this there was a lot else I could do in this weather. The wind and rain has kicked up again just now, if it gets worst that this later it could be more likely that we'll have some power outages. Tomorrow's forecast, sunny and breezy.

Another lake vacation flys by

Must be something about getting older because even though I came home a day earlier than usual the days my mother and I were there still seemed to be just a blink of the eye when all is said and done. It's not like we hurried through anything, a lot of reading, basking in the terrific weather for the final two days, Wednesday was particularly perfect. I did mow the grass and some string trimming in the afternoon. Earlier I'd planted a hydrangea at Margaret's that Lois sent up. Mom was invited by Margaret to attend the monthly senior citizen appreciation dinner at the local American Legion hall.

Patches always knows how to kick back at the camp, he too enjoys looking out across the lake.

Thursday morning begins with a peaceful calm.

Though not a clear sunset that evening it definitely was an interesting one with some pretty weird swirls and such, part of the reason I watch and photograph it each evening.




Patches can't be bothered by the sunsets, a little sensitive about being color blind.


Friday morning brought out a sculler. Later after running an errand into town I took Mom on a tour along the camp road to see the other camps, we don't have a boat. As a bonus there were two yard sales along the way, a favorite activity of Mom's. She picked up some good stuff at both places – I even bought the T-shirt I'm wearing in the next photo, from Wales no less... the one in Great Britain, not in central Maine, "Cymru" for you old school types.

The truck is loaded, camp tidied up Mom and I are ready to head home.