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No longer on the river and, again, an empty nester. Back to living on Fleming Island and making some more friends!

Sunday, August 26, 2012

A non-pool day

Sundays, it seems, are often non-pool days this summer, and this was one of those. At one point, from my desk, I did see an area of blue sky, but the rest of the day was a yukky greyness. The wind was blowing most of the day, more than the usual breezy weather we are accustomed to on the river. At one point I suggested opening the doors and letting the wind in but Justin felt it was too warm out for that. Once he is gone, those doors go open, but I am in no real hurry to see him leave.

We had about six or seven people in Bible study this a.m. which had a different set-up. We were in the Fellowship Hall for the first time since early January, for the class. Pastor started it out and then switched teachers to Michael for the second half. It was Sunday school kick-off day so they had refreshments and such set up back in the classroom building for the parents and kids.

A new member was there for class, too. His name is Corey, who I believe is from MN. He serves in the Navy, stationed at the base in GA, and knows our member, Sterling. They were stationed together in Honolulu. His wife and two daughters are living in MN during his stint at Kings' Bay because he will be on deployment for long periods of time. A month or so ago we met the family, and one of the young ladies thanked Joe Z. for his service during 'the War'. I hugged her!

Since it was the kick-off for Sunday school, the service was themed on Christian education. The staff was installed for the coming school year and there was a full front pew for the 'children's sermon'. Two of the kids are from a family who visits us sporadically. I hope they come to Sunday school when it begins in two weeks.

Justin and I went to lunch with Terri T., with Judy being gone for the weekend. I switched up my order and got the sliders with onion strings, and tried the new appetizer of pretzel sticks. Oh my goodness, are they ever delicious!!! Like freshly baked bread delicious...A new favorite! 3 of my sliders came home with me because of enjoying the pretzel sticks.
                                                         
Last week Sunday my little laptop began acting up, did an emergency hard reset or something like that, entirely out of the blue. In fact, the screen went blue with strange-fonted text telling about this happening. My ever-patient in-house IT guy told me I must have done something (I HATE when he does that!) because, as I explained to him, I was in the midst of writing an e-mail when it happened. I touched nothing! Justin further explained that there might have been a virus hiding in the machine and it came out of hibernation to attack. Rats!

Ever since then, though, we (Justin and I) have not been able to make use of Google Chrome on this machine, my program of choice. I am using Internet Explorer now, which is less flexible and more exposed than Chrome. When I type, the words take a long time to catch up with me, and other sorts of similar 'problems' are happening.

My friend, Linda J., recently got herself an iPad primarily for downloading books but has more purposes than only reading. Knowing this machine is not long for this world, it seems, I began looking for a replacement.

iPads are twice as much as this netbook but I do not download books on this machine. Justin is always about the newest and best, but wondered if I would like the different style of keyboard. He reminded me of what Tatiana would tell Timmy, in her eastern European accent, 'curve fingers, curve fingers', during his piano lessons. To type on the iPad, one needs to have the tips only on the 'keys', like playing the piano. I couldn't resist telling Justin, "I type it the way I want it!", like his brother would tell his piano teacher. He told me I would have to resist making on-the-spot corrections in my typing, knowing full well that would make me even wackier. In the morning, when I wake up, I thank God for allowing men to create word processors so we don't have to use the old upright typewriters any more!

 That point is moot, though, because I got a wonderful offer via GroupOn today. While not immanently in need of a new computer, I bought one! This is SOOO not like me at all, but the price was fantastic! It was 53% off the price, larger monitor than the one I have, long-life on the battery, and the best thing of all, I would have Internet connectivity built into it. By some amazing fashion, I would be able to write e-mails and my blog when visiting my mother, from this new laptop! For less than half the price of an iPad, with tax and shipping, and less than this sized laptop in front of me, I have a new little laptop coming. Another plus---it will work on my lap desk, which the iPad may not have. Nice!

That was not all I bought today though, as Justin and I stopped at Winn Dixie on the way home from church/lunch. We were out of laundry soap so got that on a buy one/get one deal. We got two different scents because Justin thinks if one uses the same scent all the time, the nose gets used to it. I love shopping with him---he's a stitch! We also got some Drano as I had two drains needing some cleaning out, plus a few other things.
Justin had seen a recipe for raspberry pie so we bought the ingredients for making it. One of the items listed was orange liqueur which he felt I could get simply by posting on Facebook my need to borrow a tablespoonful of orange liqueur. Oh my!

Surely someone in my building would have this liqueur, or over at The Club. I reminded him that I had a strange bottle in my fridge (from Randy!) and we should look at that first. Sure enough, we had orange liqueur on hand! The pie, made in a graham cracker crust, was sort of like a cheese cake consistency, topped with a raspberry sauce he had to cook on the stove. Have I mentioned recently how much I will miss him when he moves out????