Nina and I are in Salt Lake City at the Hilton Hotel in downtown. We drove down this afternoon and met Ty, Heather, Daryl, and Jaelene for dinner. Jaelene flew up from Phoenix yesterday as a surprise for Heather’s birthday. The accompanying picture is looking south from our hotel room window. We’re on the 16th floor of the hotel and the view is pretty nice. I’d like a northerly view (as that’s the direction of the temple) but this will do. Our flight leaves tomorrow just before 10 a.m. and we’ll change planes in New York City before continuing on to Brussels. We’ll arrive in Brussels about 1:00 a.m. on Sunday morning Pocatello time.

Taking enough stuff without taking too much is a balance we haven’t yet achieved. We started out planning to take one big suitcase apiece. That didn’t work. We now both have one big suitcase and one small suitcase. Anything we buy will have to be shipped back home as there’s no room in the suitcases!! I’m really looking forward to this trip and will hopefully have reasonably good internet connection during the trip. If so, that’ll allow me to make regular posts to the weblog as we travel along. I might even be able to put together some pictures from time to time. So, Bon Voyage! We’re on our way!

The following short article was in today’s Idaho State Journal:

BOISE (AP) — A woman who was returning a rented minivan at the Boise Airport drove through the terminal.

A "confused senior citizen," whose name and age were not released, followed an outside "terminal access" sign Tuesday as she bumped the vehicle through a set of automatic-opening double-doors on the west end, airport spokeswoman Larissa Stouffer said.

She drove through the terminal, past the baggage claim area before coming to a stop.

"The lucky thing is she didn’t hit anything," Stouffer said.

There was no damage to the terminal building, no one was hurt and the out-of-town woman, who departed on a flight later Tuesday morning, was not cited.

Stouffer said the airport has had plans to install barriers to block the door.

We shouldn’t chuckle…. Some day that may be me!

I wonder if today will indeed go down in history along with such events as the Wright Brothers first flight, the first manned space flight by the Russians, or landing on the moon. I’ve just watched (again) the web cast of SpaceShipOne’s first of two planned flights to capture the Ansari X Prize for the first reusable civilian space craft to launch twice in 14 days and carry three people to the edge of space. For me this is a milestone date in history. It will soon be possible to buy a ride into space and not long after it will be possible to spend a night in a hotel circling the earth. I hope to live long enough to see it happen. Congratulations Burt Rutan, Scaled Composites, and astronaut Mike Melvill! It’s interesting to me that Mike is piloting this space craft at age 63 — three years older than what our stupid government will allow airline pilots to fly.

Many years ago, the first time I started to get my pilot’s license, we were living in Lafayette, Indiana. We received an unexpected tax return and I used that money to begin taking lessons. Most of the instructors out at the Purdue Airport were young kids with freshly minted instructor licenses trying to build flight time until they could get a job with one of the airlines. On my first flight, the kid who was my instructor (he was younger than I was!) didn’t pay close enough attention to where he was taxiing the airplane. He caught the right wingtip on the side of a hanger and the airplane swung like a pendulum right into the side of the hanger. Fortunately, he had just killed the engine before the wingtip hit the hanger, or there could have been some serious damage done to both of us. As it was, we both were able to climb out of the airplane and walk away. The instructor was fired on the spot (and he probably never got a job flying with the airlines with an accident on his record). I was pretty unnerved. I decided to go for age and wisdom rather than youth and exhuberance! I didn’t have enough money to go beyond solo that time, so getting a license had to wait another 15 years or so.

Eventually in the mid 1980’s I went back to get my pilot’s license at the Cuyahoga County Airport in Ohio. I looked around for the guy with the most white hair and hooked up with Jim Young. He had been a milk truck driver and flew on the side for recreation. He had learned to fly in the Air Force in one of their flying clubs and later got his instructor rating. He was an excellent instructor who stressed safety and prudent operation at every turn. "You really want to be down here wishing you were up there rather than being up there and wishing you were down here!" was something he repeated at least twice every lesson — once before and once after. He was also well past 60 and past the age that the FAA requires airline pilots to retire. Jim Young became one of my Heroes. I added another one today. Way to go, Mike Melvill! Age and wisdom will always prevail!

Today was a quick errand day during lunch. I went over to the County Courthouse to get the books needed to take my drivers tests (vehicle and motorcycle) and then went across the street where absentee voting was going on. I wanted to find out where to register to be able to vote in Idaho. I learned that I could register and vote there but needed proof of residence. So I’ll go back tomorrow with a paycheck stub and get registered and vote so that will be finished before we leave for Europe on Saturday. After that I went over to OfficeMax to pick up a couple of document frames so I could hang up the department mission statement and 4th quarter goals on my office wall. As I came out of there, I discovered that I’d only used up 15 minutes of my lunch time. Wendy’s was just across the street, it would be an easy drive-through and right on the way back to the office. I ordered, paid, and got my hamburger when my cell phone rang. It was my wife. “Hi Honey,” she said. “What are you doing?” Before I could say anything she said, “I’m right in front of you!” Sure enough. She was in the Toyota right in front of me!! I wasn’t paying any attention to who was in front of me, but she had spotted me in her rear view mirror. So, we pulled into adjacent parking places and took our take-out inside to eat-in. What a pleasant lunch surprise!

Yesterday afternoon Daryl called from Malad, Idaho to see what we were up to. He and his friend (they’ve been seeing each other off and on since High School) had gone to Malad for an open house associated with his friend’s work. Now I’m not very sure how to spell his friend’s name — it may be Randi or Randie or something that is spelled very differently but sounds like "Randy". So I apologize for the spelling…. Since they were only about 45 minutes away, Nina "persuaded" them to drive the rest of the way here and visit for a while. We had a very delightful visit and it was good to catch up on what was happening in their lives. They stayed until about 9 p.m. and then drove back to Ogden (to drop off Randy) and then on to Salt Lake City (where Daryl lives). I’ve deliberately not used the word girlfriend — perhaps a better connotation is a friend that is a girl. They seem quite comfortable around each other and we think highly of Randy. She’s very bright and fun to talk with. They can come and visit (together or separately) any time they wish. Thanks, Daryl, for the visit!

The fence is now up on the yard. I’ve three pictures of the fence also to add to this post and hopefully enough text so that everything lines up reasonably well. The first picture was taken from the deck looking towards the southwest corner of the yard. I set the self timer and hustled back towards the corner to try and get a better perspective. The fence is about six feet tall and covers most of the backyard. It is set twenty-five feet back from the road on the north to accommodate local ordinances. Never-the-less, the yard is very large with plenty of potential. Just behind where I’m standing we’d like to put in a pond with a waterfall (or two) with bushes and shrubs around. Just what to do with the rest of the yard is still open for discussion. We’ve invited a landscaping company to draw up a couple of plans and suggestions and discuss them with us. Whatever we do won’t happen before next Spring anyhow. We’d like to have a nice garden area that is a complete change from the outside world. We’d also like a BBQ pit with a picnic area. Nina would like to have a garden.

The second image is looking towards the northeast corner of the fence. The clouds hanging over the mountain are visible in the distance. The day I took these pictures was very overcast with occasional showers. One of those showers had ended a few minutes before I went out to take the pictures before it got too dark. You see, Dawnmarie wanted to know why we hadn’t posted any pictures of the fence on the internet! So, Dawnmarie, thanks for the encouragement and here are the pictures. Of course, they’ll probably take a half-hour to download to your computer….

The yard slopes towards the north and the slope is fairly significant. I’m quite curious to see what the landscaping company recommends. Since I fully expect to be here for many more years, it will be a nice way to spend some money to have a pretty and inviting back yard.

The final picture is looking towards the south from the fence line on the north. So far all we have is grass, weeds, a deck, and a hot tub in the backyard. On the south side of the house big machines have been in moving dirt for the past several weeks. They are probably now ready to pave the roadways for an additional 17 houses to be built in this new development section. However, the machines have been digging and moving dirt — the wind has been blowing — and we have dust EVERYWHERE. The fine dust gets into the house, regardless of whether or not all the windows are closed. Keeping the dust under control has been a huge problem and I’m getting tired of having dust and dirt all over everything. It’ll be a big relief to have the pavement done so that all the major earthwork will be finished. That should finally result in a significant reduction of dust.

Another effect of the dust is on the hot tub. The dust and dirt seeps in the seams and muddies up the water. As soon as we return from Europe, I’ll need to drain the tub, clean it out, wash the filters, and replace the water. It is not currently very usable.

Today is Sunday, the last Sunday that we’ll be in Pocatello for the next month. After church we loaded up the car and took Sunday dinner with us to Soda Springs where we visited with mom and dad and had dinner with them before driving back to Pocatello. We enjoy these afternoons and the visiting. They enjoy the company and the food. It means that occasionally mother doesn’t have to cook dinner for her and dad. Dad has almost completed the building of his workshop in the backyard. This week should finish off all the remaining work, which isn’t much. Then he can get his tools and machines set up the way he wants and get on with his woodworking hobby — making lamps. It is a very nice shop! I think he’s going to enjoy working out there as soon as he figures out how to get heat into the building.

No 6 a.m. meetings this week! The earliest meeting is at 7:00 a.m. on Tuesday. Otherwise, I will be going into work at a much more human hour of 8:00 a.m. That will be pleasant! The day is almost finished and I am as well. I’ll read few e-mails and then get ready for bed. Pleasant Dreams!

For the past three days I’ve had a work meeting starting at 6 a.m. Two of
the three meetings have been video conferences, meaning that the meeting
setup starts 15 minutes earlier.

Unfortunately, video conferencing is still too primative and always adds
significant technical issues to the meeting. Getting everything set up and
working correctly for the video conferences has caused both of these
meetings to start about 15 minutes late — meaning that it took a half hour
to get video conferencing set up and working. The result is a meeting that
finally starts with the meeting technology being the initial subject rather
than the real purpose of the meeting.

My view is that video adds no appreciable value to the meeting but rather
detracts significantly from the meeting. Our European conference rooms are
set up so the camera zooms in on the person speaking. During a lively
discussion the camera jumps all over the place and never gets focused. The
result is a very blurry and pixelated picture. Further, the sound volume
coming from the speaker when some other location is talking causes the
camera in Europe to focus on the wall!

Our technology today is only marginally useful for these meetings. At least
half the time when someone starts talking, they will stop and ask, “Can you
hear me?”. This is because the camera response is too slow and that the
fine facial detail does not pick up on the camera. Meetings just go better
without video conferencing. It’s just not worth getting up at 4:30 a.m. to
to hassle with a video conference!

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Sent from my BlackBerry Wireless Handheld

Overnight the weather changed rather dramatically. There was LOTS of high wind and plenty of dust and dirt blowing around. We’ve had rain showers off and on all day today with a high in the low 50’s. The wind was so strong that it blew open the new gate in front of the motorhome, breaking some of the boards and bending the gate. The fence guy will need to come back and fix the gate, probably even installing something to keep it from being able to blow open.

We drove over to Soda Springs this afternoon after church to visit with mom and dad. We really enjoy the visit and they seemed to really enjoy it as well. We took over dinner (meatloaf, potatoes, carrots, apple crisp, and vanilla ice cream). It was very tasty and we had a delightful time. As we were nearing Soda Springs on our way over, two Caribou County sheriff vehicles passed going the other direction at high speed with lights flashing. When we left town after dinner (about three hours later) and got to the intersection for the road to Grace, the road over Fish Creek was blocked off and we were sent by way of Bancroft. The fellow directing traffic said the problem was a truck accident. We drove to Bancroft, then went back south to Lund to intersect the Fish Creek road. We could see some flashing lights in the distance towards Soda Springs, so that must have been where the accident occurred. There wasn’t much else to be seen. We arrived home in Pocatello without further "excitement". We’ll probably go back over next Sunday afternoon. After that we’ll be in Europe for three weeks — one week in Belgium on business and two weeks on a river boat cruise from Budapest to Amsterdam.

My boss from Belgium was here for three days this week. We invited him along with another visiting colleague over for dinner on Thursday evening. We had a very nice evening. My boss is a very intelligent and well-rounded person. The conversation was very lively and covered a number of international topics. There was plenty to discuss without having to resort to talking business. He flew back to Belgium with an early flight out on Friday morning, so I’m sure he was right ready to sleep on the airplane! I enjoy working for him and it was nice to get to know him a little bit outside of the office. He and his wife are headed to Turkey the day after we arrive in Belgium, so I won’t see much of him the week that we’re in Belgium.

Meanwhile, getting a hotel room in Budapest at a reasonable rate is turning out to be somewhat of a challenge. I’m willing to spend more on a hotel than our travelling companions want to spend, making the challenge a bit more difficult. I’ll need to get our travel agent much more engaged in the process tomorrow. I’d sure like to know where we’ll be staying when we get there!

The weather is forecast to be cool, cloudy, and showery for the next couple of days. Suits me just fine! I’ve a meeting tomorrow at 8 a.m. and on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday at 6:00 a.m. I think I won’t be needing much outdoors time. Meanwhile, it’s time to wrap up here and head for bed.

It’s getting late on a Saturday evening. BYU is being thoroughly beaten by USC — as expected. I’m tired and it’s about time to head for bed. But, before retiring, I should note a couple of updates that have taken place. First, I’ve uploaded some additional pictures from my trip to Belgium at the end of August. I’ve built a process that will help me upload pictures in a batch when I’m travelling and only have small windows of time available to make the connection and put pictures on the website. The new pictures are from Kasteel Solhof where I stayed for a couple of nights and from Antwerp where I had dinner on my last Thursday in Belgium.

Today we spent shopping. There is only two weeks left before we head to Europe. We both needed to pick up some clothes to take with us on the trip. So, we went to Idaho Falls shopping. What a difference between Idaho Falls and Pocatello for shopping!! Every store that we could want is available in Idaho Falls either on 17th South or 25th East. Most of them are not available in Pocatello: Target, Fashion Bug, Sams Club, Best Buy, Circuit City, and Petco. Further, the Home Depot, JC Penney, and Sears stores are much larger and much better outfitted in Idaho Falls. It looks like we’ll be making the trek to Idaho Falls more often to go shopping. The differences between these two towns continues to amaze both of us.