Entries this day: Lynda Return bedtime stateOfMyLife yippee

Lynda

12:03pm Sunday 11 February 2001

Today I stopped by Kroger on the way to work to get some breakfast at their deli. While I was in line to pay, I heard, "Hi Rob" behind me.

It was Lynda, my first girlfriend from high school! I haven't seen her since we happened to be at the laundry mat at the same time some year ago or so.

While I ate, we gave briefings of our latest news; her mom is likely to move into the apartment under her, and Lynda is about to celebrate 11th wedding anniversary with Chris.

So fun to see her doing so well!

- - -

I've been at work now for a while, and am documenting the exact state of the project so I can explain it to Kevin this afternoon, and explain it to myself when I get back into town.

Return

5:12 pm 11 February 2001

I have just exchanged my blue Handspring Visor for an ice (clear-ish) Handspring Visor at Best Buy. Had to stand in line for a pretty long time, but the exchange itself was quite painless.

Now I'm typing this entry with the keyboard as a good faith test that the Visor will work in a happy manner for me during the entire Australian expedition.

Everything seems to be working just fine. I'm thankful for that, and I actually kinda like the ice color. Nice.

bedtime

9:48pm Sunday 11 February 2001

Wende feels a bit nervous about leaving tomorrow. I still feel fine. We're about to determine our schedule for tomorrow so i can get my car to the shop and go to work.

We'll leave the house at 4pm.

We still need to pack.

Okay. I'm going to go to work from about 10am to noon for our weekly meeting. Then Wende will help me get Scott to the doctor and then we will finish packing and go to the airport!

stateOfMyLife

9:56pm Sunday 11 February 2001

State of My Life Address

1. Wende and I are leaving for Australia tomorrow! I've had my passport since Costa Rica in November 1998. Wende just got her passport last Thursday. I got our ETA (Electronic Ticket Authorities (visas)) on Friday night.

2. We've started beeper duty at work. I just had it for a week and will give it to Dave tomorrow morning. It was my first duty at this work and it was quite easy. I think there were only 2 errors and they were fixed by Patrick.

3. I just got my new (replacement) Handspring Visor. Its color is called "ice", and it's vaguely translucent. I'm using it and my Targus Stowaway Keyboard to type this entry.

   I replaced it because the other one was draining batteries ridiculously quickly.

4. I still have not determined exactly how many hours difference is between Houston and Melbourne. I want to know so I can have a dual time framework for my entries.

5. I'm youth advisor for Northwoods youth group. Their youth Sunday is this coming Sunday, and I will sadly miss it due to our trip. They said they will record it for me to watch though. :-)

6. At work I have been working on making the big big project generic so it can handle many different surveys at once, using the same compiled code.

   I have just given Kevin the overview of the Ritz project, which I have made generic and called the OG project. That code is already written so the same compiled code can run multiple projects. It will be great to see it work in production.

7. Wende and I have 3 cats: Spot, my cool cat, Tinkerbell, her white long hair princess kitty, and Peter, her gordo tabby.

   They are 5.5, 7, and 8 years old respectively.

8. I have collected some 71 snail mail addresses to send postcards to people from down under. I pulled a lot of the addresses from my old school address books entries, so I might not send cards to them all if it becomes too expensive. We'll just have to see.

9. I'm greatly looking forward to Silent Football with Bryn!

10. Wende and I are taking Spanish classes through Leisure Learning Unlimited each Tuesday night. We will miss the 5th class meeting due to our trip. (We were able to take the 4th class early because she's teaching a Monday night class as well, and they are a week ahead of us.)

11. The walls in our living room are still white (in our whole house actually), but we have picked up a bunch of color samples and will paint all kinds of wacky colors sometime in March.

12. At KTRU, I am sharing the Saturday night 7-9pm shift with Donna. I have met her now.

13. Wende and I might get new cell phones soon. Cingular is our current goal because they have unlimited customer to customer talkin'.

14. Tomorrow I'm taking Scott to the doctor to fix his leaky power steering, brakes, and air conditioner. The air conditioner has basically never worked since I got the car 3 years ago, and the power steering hasn't worked for a while. the brakes went bad after stupid Midas shop "fixed" them, but I never went back to complain because they still worked kinda and I didn't want to mess with it.

    It will be like having a whole new car!

15. Wende and I have outdoor christmas lights hanging from the rafters in our ceiling for a lovely basking glow instead of the super bright floodlights.

    We bought them from Melissa from Wende's work for $10

16. Wende and I are meeting with a marriage counselor to help us work out any issues before we actually got married.

17. Okay, according to my Visor, Melbourne is 17 hours ahead of us. So as I write this at 11:11pm Sunday here, it's 4:11pm Monday there.

yippee

12:25am Monday 12 February 2001

In about 24 hours we will be on a 747 in Los Angeles going, "oh my god! We're on a seven forty seven!!!"

I have just been using my new Handspring Visor after exchanging my old one for a new one because my old one was draining batteries at a ridiculously fast clip. My thankful intention is that I'll be able to write tons and tons of great stuff and move it to my website once I get home.

I will have internet access while in Melbourne, so I will probably write some directly to my site while I'm there. A great bulk of entries will be on my Visor though.

I'm kinda rambling; definitely in a weird state of bewildered excitement. I am SO Greatly looking forward to taking such a significant trip with Wende.

We're going to stay up somewhat late tonight to help us get on Melbourne schedule.