Summertime

Today was glorious, warm, sunny, and summery. It was so nice out when I got up, I went out to "flush" the backyard of canine detritus. That was quick as it had been done recently. This was prep for mowing. However, it looked like string line trimming needed to happen, so I grabbed my trusty B&D whacker and went to work... After cutting for a couple minutes, it dawned on me that 6am* might be a bit early for the fam and the neighbors... :^) So I set down the whacker and had some breakfast. But it does illustrate how glorious today was.

As I was eating breakfast, I noticed birds retrieving dog hair from the back deck welcome mat. I grabbed some video equipment to record this (as last summer there was quite a pecking order established between a few birds competing for materials that was hilarious.) Unfortunately, by the time the gear was gathered and aimed, the birds had given up.... Maybe tomorrow.

I did ultimately get five hours of yard work completed before lunch. And followed that up with a high school graduation (air conditioned!) And then a bit of tool shopping to replace the worn out string trimmer. I picked up another B&D trimmer. I went for battery operated this time so that we don't have to string power cords all over the yard. (I don't think gas-powered are all that good for the air.)

And now, blogging from the coffee shop during a thunderstorm. Northern Colorado, late May, delightful.....

*I regularly wake up before 5:30 a.m. to feed the spoiled rotten Shih Tzu.

Presidential Memorial Day Observance

I found this nugget:

[President] Obama is not retreating on Memorial Day. Instead of visiting Arlington cemetery, Obama and the first lady will participate in a Memorial Day ceremony at Abraham Lincoln National Cemetery in Elwood, Ill., about 50 miles south of Chicago. Moreover, not every president has spent Memorial Day at Arlington. In 1983, President Reagan was at a summit meeting, and the deputy secretary of defense -- not even the veep! -- placed the wreath. Nine years later, President George H.W. Bush passed off the wreath to Vice President Dan Quayle. And in 2007, Vice President Dick Cheney took on the wreath mission, while President George W. Bush was in Texas.

References:

http://www.cem.va.gov/cems/listcem.asp list of National Cemeteries (why not visit one near you?)

http://www.cem.va.gov/ includes the info on President Obama's visit to Lincoln National Cemetery

http://www.cem.va.gov/MemorialDayVisit.asp

Fort Logan National Cemetery
4400 W. Kenyon Avenue
Denver, CO 80236

Blog Post-A-Day, NaNoWriMo Redux

As anyone (anyone, please, throw me a bone, anyone?) who reads this blog knows, I epically failed at the "blog-a-day" for 30 consecutive days plan last November. However, the long days (sunshine from 5am to 9:30pm) are motivating me to blog again. No promises (or even plans at this point) on frequency, but hopefully MORE than once every half-year.

Middle of Nowhere Update

I went back to Albin over the weekend. Prior to that, I sent my son up there with a Cradlepoint router and a Verizon Wireless USB EVDO cell phone modem. This particular Cradlepoint has an external antenna. Once again it worked fine. And by worked fine, I mean if you were in the garage with it, you got a great WiFi signal from the Cradlepoint (and its MIMO rigging.) However, the garage is detached and 40+ yards away from the house. Within the house, the signal only penetrated 1/2 a room--so you had to be almost staring out the garage-facing window to use the WiFi-Cell router.

I had brought a Netgear wireless router and about 50' of Cat5E. However, the reason the Netgear was scrapped became obvious. Although the WiFi on it was working fine, the WAN port apparently was not. So, I got a nice signal from the Netgear but a signal to nowhere.

And on that note, I'm full circle--back to the middle of nowhere. I don't plan to return to the hinterlands for a while, so I've terminated the Verizon Wireless account. (As always, Verizon Customer service was quick, knowledgeable, and efficient--no joke.) There was at least one other bit of good news. There were many other folks at the family reunion, many sporting AT&T phones, mostly iPhones, and they were able to get a cell signal much of the time at the north end of the house.