Roland K. Smith’s Weblog

We’re having a very quiet Sunday evening after a fairly hectic day today and yesterday. We’re in New Wilmington, PA at our daughter Dawnmarie’s house. The event was granddaughter Jillian’s baptism.

We arrived last Tuesday evening. We drove down to Heather’s house in North Salt Lake on Monday evening and boarded a flight for Houston, Texas early Tuesday morning. After a short layover in Houston (which included a gate change to a rather distant gate) we continued on to Cleveland. Very uneventful flights. The car rental place at the Cleveland Hopkins Airport is quite a ways away from the terminal. Hopefully I’ll be able to find it without much difficulty tomorrow evening. We rented a Chevy Alero and drove to Dawnmarie’s place where we’ve been since then.

We’ve had a great time visiting with the family. Granddaughter Kate is the lead actress in a children’s playhouse adaptation of Hans Christian Anderson’s “The Snow Queen”. We attended one of her seven performances and were literally blown away by how well she performs. She’s quite the natural actress!

Our son Daryl drove over from Downingtown in eastern PA on Thursday. Our oldest son James drove up from Covington, KY on Saturday, so we had a good family contingent here for the baptism today. It started snowing yesterday and looked like it might yield bad roads this morning, but fortunately the snow has been a non-event. Both Daryl and Jim drove back home this afternoon after the baptism and I’m happy that weather didn’t play a role in their travels.

The baptism this afternoon after Church was delightful. Jillian looked rather angelic in the traditional baptismal dress. All of her sisters have worn the same dress at their baptism. There’s one more daughter Olivia to be baptized in a couple of years.

Tomorrow morning after the grandkids go off to school, we’ll pack up and go over the Kirtland to visit with Nina’s sister Pam for the day. We’ll probably stop over at the Kirtland Visitors Center to see their nativity display and visit with an elderly woman Nina has been corresponding with. Then we’ll turn the rental car in, spend Monday night at a hotel near the Cleveland airport, and catch a very early flight on Tuesday morning headed back home. Just in time for the next round of family visiting over Christmas.

Ta Ta For Now

Fall arrived in style. The trees in our neighborhood have definitely put on their colors. Last night was the first hard freeze of the season. I see the motor homes headed south on the freeway and understand completely their motivation to go south. I’m already tired of being cold!

One interesting thing has happened, though. Nina’s body temperature has dropped! For most of our married life she’s been the “hot” one … as in, it’s too warm, turn down the thermostat. She’s actually encouraged me to turn up the thermostat a couple of times! Will that last? Only the shadow knows….

I’ve made a couple of trips to Salt Lake to the Veterans Administration Hospital for tests. There’s no particular reason (that I know about, anyway) other than my VA doctor here in Pocatello is putting together a complete baseline. He’s a good doctor! In my last visit with him he spent 45 minutes with me going over a whole bunch of things. I can’t remember ever having a doctor spend that much time with me on a routine visit. I’m definitely impressed.

The VA Hospital in Salt Lake is very well equipped. It’s a large facility (and growing larger as there’s a major construction project underway there). There are a lot of veterans working at the hospital, many Korean War veterans and a few Vietnam veterans. They are all interested in helping out, giving directions, and being of assistance. While not all VA facilities are the same, I’ve been very well treated both at our clinic in Pocatello and at the hospital in Salt Lake City. I’ve got one more trip to make in a couple of weeks for an upper GI series and then I think all the tests will be finished.

I’m still working at the Idaho National Laboratory in Idaho Falls. I’m managing a huge project to replace their old email system with a new set of applications. It’s a lot of fun, I work with a group of very intelligent people, and the project is very interesting. After the extremely sour taste in my my mouth from how my time at AMI Semiconductor ended, this is a delightful experience. The only downside is the long commute each way. I get up at 4:45 am and leave the house at 5:45 am to drive to the north side of Pocatello where I join a van pool for the drive to Idaho Falls. I get to my office about 7 am. The van pool leaves at 4:30 pm and I get home about 5:45 pm … a full 12 hour day. Today that has felt like a very long day! They pay me very well and it really is worth it. The project I’m managing should wrap up around May of next year and I’ll decide then how much longer I’ll continue working. Being debt free would be an excellent thing!

Ta Ta for Now!

I subscribe to the Caribou County Sun, a weekly newspaper published each Wednesday in Soda Springs, Idaho, the little town in southeastern Idaho where I grew up. A while back I posted about my name being in that newspaper. Today’s edition in the Pages From the Past section had this paragraph:

50 Years Ago — Sept. 14, 1961

The Soda Springs High School Marching Band under the direction of Brent Covington, band director, journeyed to Blackfoot on Tuesday, September 12th [1961] to participate in the Eastern Idaho State Fair Parade which was held down the streets of Blackfoot.

Approximately 40 members of the band attended and were sharply dressed in the new band uniforms. There were 105 entries in the parade, 19 of which were bands.

I remember that trip … now that it has been called back to my memory. I was a junior in 1961. We did indeed have new band uniforms, a product of light bulb sales the previous two years. The band members went door to door through the entire city of Soda Springs selling light bulbs. That became our annual fund raiser for the rest of my high school career. My first sales job: door to door selling light bulbs.

The uniforms were a bright Cardinal red (after the school mascot) and were made from wool. Very hot, very sweaty, very dehydrating wool. The parade seemed to be very long. I played the bass drum, which was a new, quite large drum attached to a rotating spindle in the middle of my chest (another product of the light bulb sales). I could spin the drum by the way I hit it with the drum sticks, which were on leather straps so I could twirl them in the air. For the first few blocks of the parade, I felt pretty spiffy: new uniform, new spinning drum. The last few blocks of the parade I was sure I was going to pass out and die, or something. The drum section consisted of two snare drums and me … and we three had to beat on those drums the entire distance.

That’s the only time I remember that we went to Blackfoot for the State Fair as a band. I did go one other time a year earlier to play the snare drum for the drill team as they marched in the parade. That time I didn’t wear the band uniform (we didn’t have any uniforms, yet) but a pair of slacks and a white T-shirt. Much better. Plus we stayed overnight. One guy (me), a couple dozen girls, and some adults. Nothing happened at all. I was too shy. Or maybe it was the lecture from mother, followed by one from dad…. My memory isn’t all that clear.

I have a mobile ham radio in my car which is capable of receiving the Idaho State Patrol radio communications. Last evening on my way home I heard this exchange:

Control: Traffic complaint, southbound I-15 at the 69. Child endangerment and speeding. Gold colored van, license plate xxxxxxxx. RP (reporting person) is following.

ISP 531: 531 in the median at 67. Have the vehicle in sight.

Control: 531 … 17:40

A few minutes later:

ISP 531: Control, this is 531. Vehicle operating normally and in control. What was the child endangerment?

Control: 531 … just a minute.

Control: 531, RP states the driver was breastfeeding an infant while driving.

ISP 531: Breastfeeding isn’t an offense. Is the RP certified for speed measurement? 531.

Control: 531 … Just a minute.

Control: 531, RP isn’t certified. She’s quite upset.

ISP 531: I’ll pull over at mile marker 58 and can talk with the RP.

Control: 531 … I’ll let her know. 17:52

A few minutes later…

ISP 531: Control, clear with the RP.

Control: 531 … 18:05

I love what I hear occasionally on the radio. Reality is always better than television! They can’t make these things up.

Today is the annual Salt Lake WordCamp being held on the University of Utah campus in Salt Lake City. The event is all about the software called WordPress. Originally built as a robust blogging platform, it is now a robust content management system and a robust blogging system.

The conference started at 9:15 this morning, so I left home about 5:45 to drive down. The annual Logan, Utah to Jackson Hole, Wyoming bicycle race was also happening today. The ham radio community provides the communications support for the race, so I was able to listen in to the start of the race and the first hour of the race itself. There was also a mountain race going on somewhere else (I actually don’t know where) on a different frequency. My mobile radio in my car can receive two frequencies at a time and I enjoyed listening to the two events on the drive down. I’m sure the radio will be much quieter on the way home.

The conference (so far … it’s got two more hours) has been very interesting. It’s been nice to meet up with some folks in the WordPress community I’ve known for several years and learn what’s going on in their lives. The sessions have been well presented and interesting. It’s been good to be here. There is a vibrant tech community here in northern Utah, something that is completely missing in the Pocatello area.

Ta Ta For Now!

Twitter this evening has lots of traffic about Republican Presidential Hopefuls debating somewhere. It’s on some channel on TV. The television is off at this house. I’m singularly not interested. If I were king for a day I’d decree that presidential election campaigns can be a maximum of six weeks long. The Brits definitely have the better electioneering process.

The best Twitter quote I’ve seen is from @BorowitzReport: I don’t blame Bachman for not believing in evolution. It’s really let her down.

Nina’s up at the women’s prison this evening. She’s got a new assignment (in addition to all her other assignments) to assist in the Institute class on Wednesday evenings. The course of study is the Book of Mormon and she goes up two Wednesday evenings a month. Sometimes she’s the teacher, sometimes she’s the roll taker, and sometimes she’s in charge of the evening.

Life is good. Ta Ta For Now!

When I made the flight reservations we had no information about the travel plans for any of Nina’s family. They all live (relatively) close and would all be driving to Erlanger, Kentucky. We would be the only ones flying. As a result, I made the reservations for an early flight from Salt Lake City on Friday morning and a late flight back on Monday evening to make sure we were here for the “full family experience.” So, here we are waiting at the Cincinnati / Northern Kentucky airport with about three hours before we board our flight. Delta charges $150 per ticket to change the flight schedule (unless the change is their fault or because of weather), consequently changing to a different, earlier flight is not a real option.

We’re sitting in the food court. There’s a reasonable selection available including McDonalds, Chic-fil-A, Sbarros, and even an Outback Steakhouse. The big question of the moment is how to plan food for the rest of the day. We can have something now, then buy something to take with us on the airplane for later. We can wait and have a bigger meal and let that suffice for the day. We also can get something here and then something in the Salt Lake area when we get there. It’s another example of the “tyranny of choice.” Too many choices cause decision paralysis. Here we have 7 reasonable food choices and three possibilities of consumption. If my math hasn’t failed me, that yields 20 possible known choices with an almost unlimited number of unknown choices. It’s the unknowns that get us. I’m very often giving up a current choice in the possibility of a better choice in the future just to find that the future choice options are suboptimal. So, I’ll let Nina choose.

She’s checking out the bookstore here on Concourse B at the airport. Our son James flew in and out of this airport many times and probably can describe in detail everything available here in the center of the concourse. I’ve flown through here several times as well and my impression is of how much the airport has grown over the years. There was a time I avoided the Cincinnati Airport from October through May because ice storms would shut this airport down for days at a time. That hasn’t happened in a number of years so either they’re much better at handling the ice or the rumored climate change is happening.

People watching is fun, though. Lots of interesting people wander (and sometimes run) through airports. Some are arriving, most are leaving. The only choice out of the Pocatello Airport is to fly to Salt Lake City. The ticket data shows that 96% of the people who board the airplane in Pocatello get on another airplane out of Salt Lake City within two hours of arriving in Salt Lake from Pocatello. I wonder what the statistics are for this airport?

Ta ta for now!