Scattered Thoughts . . .

W hile my thumb continues to heal (which is going well), I've been working on the seemingly never-ending process of setting up my new computer and sorting through all the photos and videos from our trip.   Each day, I install more software that I use regularly on the new computer.  Just setting up and updating Windows 11 required a couple of days then I needed to personalize the operating system to my tastes... which I'm still doing.  I have some new licenses to purchase for some of my software too so I still have a few more days of software setup to do.   I'm also waiting on another large hard drive to arrive too.  Since I have the room in the new hard drive enclosure, I decided to add a 22tb hard drive to store all my older archived photos so I will have easy access to all my photos.  Anyway, I've been busy with the new computer.  I can't do much with my thumb in its mangled condition so sitting around waiting for software to install seems ...

W hen we traveled to Manhattan from Vermont, we were supposed to arrive in Penn Station on Amtrak and the kids (mostly Lukey) were really looking forward to pulling into this station and riding the escalator up to the new main train hall.  Unfortunately, our Amtrak train was cancelled altogether due to flooding in Vermont so we had to drive down to Manhattan instead which meant that the kids missed out on their train ride on Amtrak as well as seeing Penn Station, especially the new train hall at Penn Station. On our second day in Manhattan, we found that even the Manhattan subway system was trying to recover from flooding.  This caused some transportation issues for us. We had a reservation for a visit at a specific time at the Museum of Natural History but we couldn't get there in time due to these subway problems.  On our way up to the museum, we only got as far as Columbus Circle (59th Street) but we had only minutes left to get to our reservation at the museum (81st S...