Catching Up...

Thursday, the 17th

Jack went back to Fargo for three days on business.  I was here alone all day Thursday, Thursday night and all day Friday.  I was kind of excited about that.  I could blog until the cows came home and on into the wee hours of the morning!   Jack even moved my laptop to the kitchen table so that I wouldn't have to scoot across the carpet in the office.

Unfortunately, I wasted most of Thursday morning trying to get the wireless connection to work.  Called our internet provider support number and spent a couple of hours on the telephone trying every possible solution in their repertoire to no avail.

I finally hauled the computer (per his instructions) back to the office.  Had to carry it on my lap while rolling across the floor, power cord dragging along the floor.  I reconnected the computer to the router and connected to the internet in a snap.

In the end the guy from computer support said the router was most likely the problem and he'd send out another.

By then I really didn't care one way or the other.  I rolled my way back to the living room, hauled myself onto the sofa with my leg propped up on a bunch of pillows and took a snooze.

I borrowed this cool image through the Creative Commons Share Alike program.  It's from Flickr photographer Don Fulano's photostream.   Thanks, Don!.
  
Friday, the 18th

After work Jennie came out from the Cities to stay with me until Sunday.  Guess what...she connected her computer to our wireless network in a snap!

I'm guessing it's something to do with my computer and has nothing to do with the wireless connection at all.  Gah!!!!

On another note, Jennie helped me organize a really scary collection of newspaper and magazine clippings of recipes, gardening pictures and home decor ideas.  I'm not kidding you...it was years of accumulation.  I should be embarrassed to admit that.

The idea was to place them in clear document protectors in binders...one for recipes, one for gardening, one for decorating ideas.

Jennie sorted everything into stacks...recipes, gardens, decorating...and I worked my way through the stacks throwing out dozens of articles and pictures and categorizing the things I want to keep.

That girl was ruthless!  Ruthless, I tell you!  She said, "I'll give you ten seconds to look at each item and you have to decide if it stays or goes."  Ten seconds???  Dawdling was not an option.

Before

After!

I pledged to do this months ago thinking that it would be a great winter project.  So far, I've got the recipes tucked away in their lovely orange binder.  The gardening stuff will go in a green binder and the home decor stuff will be filed neatly in a pretty purple binder.  It's going to take more time than I had hoped.  It's okay though...there is still a whole lot of winter left.

But it took a fractured ankle and a nose-to-the-grindstone school teacher to get me on the right track.  Would that be considered a "silver lining?"  I think so.