Say What?

We're still waiting for our Forester to be fixed. The service department at Miller Hill Subaru originally said we could expect it to be done this past Thursday but the motorhead they received from the parts dealer had a warped valve-something-or-other and they couldn't use it. Christmas week isn't a good week for ordering anything and expecting it to be expedited. And so we wait. Hopefully, sometime this coming week we'll have our car back. We had our quietest Christmas ever in the more than 14 years we've been married. Tammy was working in her office while Rachel was at her dad's house. I threw my bike in the back of my truck and headed down to the river for a few hours of fun  on the trails. I fell so many times trying to establish new tracks in the 3 inches of snow we'd gotten Christmas Eve. They were easy falls that mostly happened because I couldn't unclip from my pedals fast enough to get a foot down to keep from falling. After trading notes with...

I've stumbled onto a fun design I've been playing with in the glassblowing studio. They're simple tealight candle holders with a thick clear bottom done in various colors. There's nothing particularly difficult about them unless I'm trying to make a few the same size, then it takes a little more skill. I've posted a couple photos of them on my Facebook page and received some nice comments leading me to think about doing a bunch more before changing my focus. Tammy has been working on perfecting her smaller bud-vases . She's been having fun with them. I encourage her to work a little larger but this is what she enjoys. Our Christmas cards won't be going out until Monday and for a few of you, that means they'll be a little late. In keeping with our tradition of doing something original in our cards most years, Rachel came up with a New York theme based on our trip to move her out there last August for a semester of school. Rachel did the drawing an...

I've had my Droid Maxx for 4 months and it continues to impress me, especially its battery life. I'm on my phone a fair amount in a typical day, playing games, surfing and editing photos. In the 4 months I've had the phone, I've yet to need to recharge it during the day. I typically put it in its dock at night with more than 50% power still remaining. It's impressive how much better this phone is than my previous Droid. With my last Droid, after a system update, the phone would be noticeably more sluggish. I've had one upgrade so far with my Maxx and I haven't noticed anything diminished about its performance. Also, I'd gotten in the habit of rebooting my Droid Bionic every day to help it run smoother. I find that I'm going weeks without restarting my Maxx. Like I said, impressive! Speaking of editing photos with my phone: I've installed and uninstalled several free photo editing apps in the last couple of weeks and kept a few. They do an okay ...

My fascination with Candy Crush Saga has come to a close after I would guess 5+ months of off-and-on play. I hadn't been playing the game much over the last month and when I did open it up recently I realized that it no longer held my interest at all. My avatar will forever remain positioned at level 257 on the Candy Crush highway. Winter weather settled in over much the country this last week. We're coping with double-digit below zero temps at night and temperatures that struggle to get much above zero during the day. Having this cold air descend on us after a wet snowfall didn't help because so many of the roads were left quite slick and unaffected by deicers. Not good for biking but of course I wasn't going to let that keep me down. We had a fun 3 hours in the studio on Friday morning. Traffic was backed up on our way there because of a multi-car collision. In our conversation to kill time the name  Herman Munster from The Munsters oddly enough came up. Tammy di...

We had a relaxing Thanksgiving weekend. Tammy had to work until 7:30 Thanksgiving night but she still managed to put together a delicious meal for the two of us. I'm not much of a cook but I hope to change that in retirement. Speaking of retirement. We were talking this past week about things we'd both like to do together when we reach that point. Tammy mentioned loaning out our services to elderly people to help them with cleaning and yard work. I think that's a really good idea and something I would enjoy doing. We've also talked about working with at-risk inner-city kids in whatever ways we could be used. We'll begin to narrow our focus once we get closer to actually making the leap. Pope Francis has my attention. I've never in my life been interested in anything the Popes have had to say over the years but this guy is different. I very much appreciate his mindset and his approach to life. But can his words change the strong convictions of those who disa...