Scattered Thoughts . . .

We had a really nice time with friends this weekend! We knew we were heading to Tom and Karen's for a floating party and we knew it would be hot in the sun so I prepared my health by loading up on extra medications in the preceding days. Fortunately, that worked fairly well. My biggest problem was fighting overwhelming fatigue... I could not keep my eyes open! Overall, however, I have no complaints. It was a really nice weekend spent with Sheila and friends. We had missed Tom and Karen's wedding last month because my health wouldn't cooperate so it was nice to be able to spend some time with them this weekend. Plus, this was our first opportunity to be  able to give them their wedding gift... finally! Their wedding gift had been sitting on our mantle in our living since June. The weather was quite warm on Saturday and, as many readers here already know, typically I do not do well in any environments warmer than about 80 degrees. Tom and Karen's backyard on That

Microsoft Surface 3 with keyboard and mouse... I've had a couple of days to play with my new Microsoft Surface computer. This laptop/tablet combo is really nice! I've loaded most of the software I will be using on this computer including Adobe Photoshop. I tried it out... not only is this Surface far better than my two year old HP laptop which had better specs but it is, without a doubt, the best laptop I have ever used. I'm quite impressed! Sheila played with it for a bit last night while I was cooking dinner... she loved it as well and was left feeling as though her Kindle Fire tablet is feeling a bit old and clunky by comparison. To be honest, I don't think my Kindle Fire tablet feels old and clunky (I have the same Kindle Fire tablet as Sheila) ... the Fire is just as light and nimble as my new Surface 3. Sheila may feel this way simply because she has a crappy screen protector (and it is scuffed up a bit too) on her Kindle Fire which cuts down on clarity.

Whenever I go through periods of poor health, I struggle with finding ways to feel productive, useful and even nonburdensome to those around me. As any chronically ill patient will attest, far too often I'm feeling too lousy to accomplish enough to stave off feelings of inadequacy during these periods and it is incredibly difficult to find ways to feel productive. Physically, during these periods, you are fighting off pain and a complex and constantly changing myriad of debilitating symptoms. Mentally, you are fighting off being bored to the point of tears because whenever you are feeling lousy, you are sort of in a vacuum getting nothing accomplished. Emotionally, you are fighting feelings of inadequacy, being a burden and being unproductive... you struggle with not having a purpose... you even struggle with the grief of losing the healthy, strong and pain-free body you once had, the active life you once had, the career you once had... let's just say that struggling with gri

As I wrote a few days ago, my not quite two year old HP X360 laptop bit the dust during a thunderstorm over the weekend. It crackled and sizzled loud enough for Sheila to hear it in another room. It was fried and about as dead as dead could be. This HP X360 model could be flipped around so it could be used as a tablet which came in handy for certain situations. This HP model allowed me to handle photos and video while on the road and also allowed me to backup all my photos and video. I did, however, have problems with this laptop as well as some regrets. Before I get into the history of how I got to this point, let me quickly say that my new laptop of choice (for my specific needs) is a new Microsoft Surface 3. Here is a short promo video for the Surface Pro 3... the non-Pro version I bought is slightly smaller at my preferred 11 inches, full HD resolution, and significantly less expensive yet with few compromises... So, let's go back to some boring info about how I got

Lukey and I were running some trains in the train room on Saturday when I spotted one of Sheila's old photo albums sitting on a shelf in the corner of the room under some trains I have displayed. This album was one of Sheila's old albums which is home to all her old photos of Disney vacations with her children going back about 15 years... a time when Liza, Lukey and Kenzie's mommy, was a young child herself... I thought to myself, "Hmmmm... they might like looking at this..." I quickly realized that Lukey and Kenzie probably would have difficulty picking out their mom in these ancient photos as well as a young Uncle Adam so I pulled the album down off the shelf and handed it to Lukey. I explained that these are Gee's photos and he should not play with this book alone and, as I carefully handed Lukey the album, I added, "Here... bring this out to Gee and ask her to show you and Kenzie what is in here..." I believe all three of them enjoyed paging

While we were driving back home after visiting The Christmas Loft, we were discussing dinner and dessert with Lukey and Kenzie. We had decided on dinner options and then asked Kenzie if she wanted to make cupcakes for dessert... she immediately asked, "For real?"  Gee assured her that they would be making  real cupcakes... and reassured her after every followup question about whether we were talking about real cupcakes or imaginary, over and over, until we had all the ingredients in our shopping cart at Hannaford's. Kenzie did a great job and the cupcakes were the best we've had in a very long while!  Very moist chocolate fudge cake with a butter cream frosting... Now I want another cupcake!

Lukey and Kenzie have been getting ready for their first day of school in the past few weeks. Gee ordered backpacks of their choice... Lukey's arrived but, unfortunately, Kenzie's backpack was on backorder. Kenzie reluctantly chose a different backpack this past Saturday and Gee picked up the phone to cancel the first backpack and order the new choice. Gee and Kenzie explained their dilemma and the LL Bean customer service rep decided to see if she could find what Kenzie wanted... she put Gee and Kenzie on hold... She came back on the phone after a few minutes and said that she found the backpack Kenzie originally wanted in a store in Ohio and she is having it shipped to our house immediately. Kenzie happily thanked her and was all smiles! The other day, Lukey asked me to cut his hair for school so, after Kenzie finished making cupcakes with Gee (more on that in another blog entry) , we put aside the trains and converted the kitchen to a little barbershop. We did a nice n