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Today I was up in Wetaskiwin - spending some time w/ John and his family. The real reason for going North was to bring Corrie home - as she needed to drop off her car there before leaving. I took a spin on the new quad, then cut up a tree that had fallen into the field (well, truth be know, John cut it down and it fell the wrong direction.) After cleaning that up, John and I got his air seeder checked out and ready for planting. I checked the air pressure, wheel bearings and hose clamps. We did need to go to town to get a bearing for the poly-packers, which Nut and Bolt had one in stock. That was good, as it allowed us to get the thing back together before I had to leave (3:30 - but turned into 4:15, and it wasn't my fault this time.) Drove Corrie home, and then at the Kary's we had a going away party for her. Sarah, Julie, Mitch, Miss, Mandy, Jim, Les, Trevor, Esther, John, Janice, Norm (and his wife), Paul, myself, Andrew and Corrie were there. Hamburgers with cheese in them (or so it was before cooking.) Tuesday, May 2, 2006 Back in the office today. I was supposed to go through the DVD from Houston w/ JRC, but he had to take Corrie to the airport this morning. Finished off burning discs for the Korean translation of The Stranger DVD. Hope to get those in the mail soon. Wednesday, May 3, 2006 Worked with JRC on the video - finalizing that. Went to JRC's house for supper and a movie. Thursday, May 4, 2006 Continued on the video. Got 3 of 4 done. Will have to do the other later and send a copy up for proofing. Friday, May 5, 2006 09:00 I met with Laurie at the college. It was good to catch up on old times, as well as receive some instruction on my climbing techniques. New equipment on the horizon! At least bought another book to help out with all that. Back at the office, I helped stuff Gleanings. At 2:00, I headed north, stopping in Red Deere to drop off a box at a church along the way. John was seeding wheat at Little Popular's field (on the reservation.)
I hung out for about an hour waiting for him to finish, then we
brought the equipment to Bill's place. I just shuttled him back
to get each piece of equipment (2 grain trucks.) Saturday, May 6, 2006 The day started out for me by fixing a blown rad hose on Old Blue. Not a big job, but included a trip to town for a new hose and some antifreeze. Once done, I brought that over to Bill's field and started harrowing. I harrowed until it rained. Putting canola (or anything really) in tall wheat stubble can be a challenge. Harrowing breaks up the straw so the air seeder doesn't get plugged up with piles of straw. I did the field close to 3 times trying to break it all up. (You need a hot, dry day to do the best job, and today was sunny at first, then overcast, but not too hot.) Once it started sprinkling, that shut me down. Since we were down a little, back home we continued looking for a car. Found a 03 Jetta TDI Wagon just in town, so we took a drive to have a look-see. The owner wanted $24K CDN ($21.5k US) for one with 90k km (55k miles). Sure seems too much. In fact, buying new wasn't much more. So, off to Edmonton we went. The wagon (new 06) was $32k CDN. Alright, well, what else is available with that kind of money? Shopping cars in Canada is harder, because they use the imperial gallon to determine miles per gallon. That means, that to me - an American - 16 mpg is the same to them as 20 mpg. So when you see a car that gets 40 mpg, it really doesn't in my terms. On the way up to Edm, we were passed by an Oriental fellow in a minivan - on a double yellow with on-coming traffic. We got his license plate - because it's the same guy that passed people with John's mom going the other direction -- at the same time! Sunday, May 7, 2006 Went to church this morning. It was so good to see everyone up there again. They asked me to give a quick update, so I talked about the visa situation and the video I'm working on right now. Then we went 4 wheeling - with quads. John, Justin, Bill had quads, I had the trike. We had fun, though we didn't get too carried away. I dumped it crossing the creek (going up the bank on the other side) and just tweaked my wrist. Not too bad - noting broken - for that I'm thankful. With rain on the way, John finished putting the canola in on field. I drove Blue to town to get a load of fertilizer. We just hung out this evening. Good relaxing time. Monday, May 8, 2006 Drove down in the morning, arriving before lunch. Supper at the Kary's. Was in the office in the morning finishing up some last bit stuff, and headed out by 09:30. The drive south was grand. Tailwind pushing me the whole way it seemed. I didn't even have to fill up on the whole 9 hour trip! Upon arriving in CDA, I stopped at Parkland to try out what they had. I drove a Corolla with an auto. I liked that - it was a nice, small, well built car. At the time I'm thinking about something with more cargo space, but just not settled on the other options. Wednesday, May 10, 2006 Trying to get settled in again. Have to set up my computers and all that. The thought of trying to find the right car is still a concern, too. Went to Parkland Toyota this morning to check something out - but forgot what it was. Worked in the office this morning. After lunch, BI and I went to look at the Honda Fit. We drove that - (engineering was good - good design on the interior cargo space, etc. They just forgot to engineer one thing - the suspension.) After the Fit, I drove a Kia, that was comparable. The ride of this was so much nicer than the Fit. 2.0 l engine (poorer economy, better performance.) Not good enough mileage for me for a small car. Then I drove the Matrix with an automatic. Not for me - the way this one shifted was enough to give an old man pause. After supper, BI and I went to Spokane Appleway Toyota. I drove the Corolla with a standard. Nice car - it'll do. But I don't like being treated like a kid, so we kept looking. We asked them for the best price - that they needed to sharpen their pencil. Their first reply was MSRP! I couldn't believe it. Should have walked out just then. Thursday, May 11, 2006 Finished up the video today (at least ready to have it checked by the director.) Did spend some time looking for a car today too-- We got the web site moved over to the new server. I wasn't real thoughtful in doing this, so the site may be down a day or so while it gets put together. Friday, May 12, 2006 Well, a search revealed a '03 Corolla just 10 miles away. The asking price was $13.5k, but when it was all said and done, Barney and I got it down to $11.8k. Still a lot of money, and could have gone lower, but it's the best thing going around. After work, I cut down Tom's telephone pole (the tree that I topped a few weeks earlier.) The neighbor had a trunk that needed to be cut up, so I went over there after to do that. Got most of it done, but it got dark so I thought it best to quit. What's the best way to test out a car? Road trip!! Drove to Mount Vernon, WA - just a short trip - to visit some old friends from Bible School - Gene and Rose. We go a long ways back, and it was good to see them again. The car did around 40-42 mpg (the differenceis because of the difference between the speedometer and the GPS Odometer.) Left Gene's place at about 9:30, and headed West. Drove down 20 to 525. Took a ferry back to the mainland, then down to Federal Way to see another set of old friends- Dan and Joan. We had a good time - made a quick trip to the beach before heading home, leaving at around 5:00. It was a long drive home, making it by 11:00. The car didn't do as well, about 38 mpg driving 70 pretty much the whole way. Monday, May 15, 2006 Back in the office today, and on phones. It wasn't too bad, and it's good to brush up on those people skills. (And I needed a lot of brushing - but I blamed it on the lack of coffee, which usually pacified the callers.) Just one thing to do on the video to make it better, and ready for the finalizing. During the day, I was able to get the captioning done for the short 8 min video. There's still 2 hours yet to do (1 hour has been typed in and started timing, but not finished.) My hope is to get them all done this week. It's a lot, but we'll see. Here's the 8 min. clip. (Quicktime needed) To be in keeping with family tradition (the Leger's, that is) I had to be home by 9:00 to watch 24. So here I go! Tuesday - Friday, May 16-19, 2006 All the time was in the office. Finished the tree next door one evening. If I remember what I did these days, I'll have to add it in sometime. But looks like it was mostly office work stuff. Well, since just about everything is ready, I decided to head out. I left at 06:53 PT, and drove 13:45 hours to arrive at Bismarck, ND. Only 931 miles, averaging 68 mph (it's 75 most of the way.) MAP From Bismarck to Cataract. 597 miles, 09:16 hours. Left 06:47 MT, arriving 17:04 CT. After arriving, Phyllis and Jed were out tending the fire, and Jake came out of the garage. We all hung out by the fire, roasting bratts (sp?) as well as polish sausage, hot dogs and marshmallows. It sure was nice to be able to hang out like that! Eldon, Phyllis' brother and his family was out as well. MAP Left Jake and Phyllis' house at 9:14 CT. It was a good day for a drive, and things worked well. Arrived at Joe's at 12:38. We hung out a bit, and went for the endless bowl of pasta for lunch. After a bit, I decided to continue on to Andy and Marie's for the night. It was another 4 hours (or so I thought) down the road, so I started out, knowing that I would be in Chicago at the wrong time. So, I left at 3:02 CT to be in the thick of things in an hour and a half. It was a little crazy down there, but once I made it to the Skyway (90 toll road) it wasn't too bad. There is still a lot of construction to drive through to get to that point, but it all worked out well. Pulling in at 9:21 ET, to see that they now have a new horse! That'll give Mackenzie some added joy and responsibility. We hung out to 11:00, but I didn't really realize that it was that late, because I never knew what time zone they were in (as the county didn't change their clocks for Savings Time - but now they are on Eastern Time, and will change for Daylight Savings for the record.) Map of the day's journey. Part 1 (192 miles, 03:33 hours) - Part 2 (229 miles, 05:14 hours) Woke up at 6:20 (ET), to see Andy off, before hopping a shower and heading off (7:09 ET). On the way, I called Al to see if it was ok to go down to DC for a visit. It was ok, so there's where I'm going. But, looking at the map, it sure seems that it would be smart
to take a short cut between OH and WV. On paper, it looks like
a good deal. But - it turned into the ULTIMATE SHORTCUT. The drive took me through a pass that has been cut, to reveal
an interesting rock formation. There are several layers, but they
are bent in a direction that is opposite what one would expect.
Very interesting. The trip went well, and was a good trip. Arriving at 8:15 ET. Al and I just hung around till about 10:00. Slept in to 8:45, and boy was that nice. King size bed, cool basement and all! Al had somewhere to go from 10:00 to noon, as I caught up on some pagan TV trying to explain away the rock layers (couple of shows on geology.) Then I took a shower and Al came home. We hung out a bit, and then we took a fellow to the Metro. On the way home we stopped at Ihop. After getting back (now about 3:00 pm) I headed to trim a tree out back behind the house. Some branches were hanging in front of the neighbor's windows, and over the deck here. It turned into a bigger job, as there was a lot of dead branches in there, as well as other branches that were overlapping others that needed to be trimmed. After a shower, we went to the local synagogue, where a lady who was a Baptist (even through divinity school) who converted to Judaism. It was interesting, but sad to hear the talk that was so far out. My questions were like, "Where does sin come into the picture." They were downplaying Jesus, and didn't believe in the resurrection. Also, there was a lot of talk of a Messiah, but no real reason for needing one. But it did help me to think about how to answer someone from this background. map of driving around DC a little. Thursday, May 25, 2006 Hung around and talked with Al till about 10:00, then drove to Philadelphia. On the way, I called to see if it would be ok to stop in and see Rich and Ricka, as well as Jim and Sally - and of course Dick and Mildred. I did manage to see 4 of the 6 - for about 4 hours. After hanging around, I headed home to CT, arriving at Friday, May 26, 2006 Hey, I'm home. Just got situated in my room for a bit, and then headed down to get measured to fit my tux. After that, I sent to Home Despot, then Lowe's to get some things for mom - light bulbs and a new burner for the stove. After getting home, I donned the climbing equipment and cut down the blue spruce that has decorated our front yard for over 40 years. It was getting rather odd looking. Most of the lower branches were cut away, and wasn't nice anymore. Dunk came over to help, which was nice because I don't have my truck here. He and I hauled it all out back behind the house, and used the pile to hide the old Toyota truck and used tire lot we have out back. Saturday - Monday, May 27-29 - Memorial Day Weekend. I spent the time at the conference at church, in which Ron Merryman was the main speaker. He spoke on "The End of Evil." Needless to say, it was an encouraging weekend, if for no other reason. But there was other things going. Saturday afternoon I went over to Sam and Jen's to trim a tree. Just about when we got started, it down poured. So Sam, Ethan and I sat on the front porch and just let it rain. Afterwards, Sam climbed up and trimmed the tree instead. Not a problem. Sunday I went over to Fred's to look at the roof that needed to be re-shingled. 416 square feet (just a dormer roof this time.) Not a big job you say. And I concur. Except for the 4 large solar panels in the way. We'll have to figure out how to make that disappear so we can single underneath them. Monday afternoon, Jarry and I went to look at some trees that he has a job removing. Only 5, not too big, but very tall. But they do look do-able. Tuesday, May 30, 2006 Up to meet Jeb in Mystic at a job he's working. He has a couple trees that he needed help on getting down - one was leaning over a barn, the other over the fence into the neighbor's yard. With a little rope, pulleys and willpower, we had them down safely in 1.5 hours. That was all he wanted me to do, so I headed home. Here I climbed 3 trees in the back yard that needed some trimming. At 3:00, Jarry called and was done with work for the day, and so we went to cut the 5 trees we looked at the day before. Not a bad job - especially since I had my big-shot. By anchoring the rope high in the tree, we had plenty of torque to put them where we wanted. 2.5 hours later, we left - all five trees down, Jarry with a full load of logs, and the rest to pick up tomorrow. Wednesday, May 31, 2006 Off to Fred's. I must say it did take us a while to get things going. We first started on moving the solar panels. We put rollers (2" PVC pipe) under them, and rolled it up and over the peak (not over-over - just over.) Then we went shopping for a shingle shovel and other assorted things needed for the job (one of which was a couple cases of Coke.) For shingle removal, we rigged up the bed liner from his truck on the lower roof (to act as a funnel) and the spent shingles landed on the back porch. Once that was up and ready, I started ripping shingles off, while Fred fixed his little trailer. I had my singles off by the time his trailer was done, then we went to town to get the shingles. Fred then worked on rigging up a way to winch up the shingles to the roof - which I was a little skeptical that we could make something in short-order, but in the end was thankful I didn't have to run them all up the ladder (because it's hard to ask the 62 year old to do such a thing.) When the light was gone, we had 6 rows of shingles on, and ready
for another day.
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