Yes, it’s been a while, and lot’s has happened.  The sand in the camera from the Kalaloch accident never got fixed, so a new camera was procured (prices really are going down — I found a great deal here).  We managed to spend a week at Rehoboth Beach without damaging the new camera, so that was an accomplishment.  Pictures from the trip are here.

Today is the first day of school for Alex and Leah - Alex is in 2nd grade and Leah starts Kindergarten!  They will both be together at Thornton Creek, actually across the hall from each other.  Leah is looking forward to class with Todd, and Alex is looking forward to showing Leah around, and playing on the playground with his friends again.  We haven’t found out what this years expedition is yet, but it should be fun/interesting as usual.

On personal notes, Noah is still consulting and just finished a project at Nordstrom IT, and Anne is looking forward to having more of her days available (now that school has started) to focus on the things that she wants/needs to.  Also, we bought a hot tub the other day (our first ever!), and are working with John to design/build a new deck out back to host it.  Should be a fun project…!

Other than that, we still have 2 dogs (sometimes 3 when Zoe Goodwin comes to visit), we got together with Emily and John and Mom VL for a bbq over the weekend, we’re planning on a yard sale soon (to get rid of all of our valuable junk), might squeeze in time for another camping trip this year, are looking forward to seeing the East Coast family over Thanksgiving, etc etc.  I promise to keep this more updated - not really for you, but for us - there’s so much that happens in life that keeping track of it is a fun exercise for the future.  Take care!

Categories: Family, Update
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Since it’s been a while since I’ve been here, a quick update might be in order:

• I resolved the HDD issues from the last post - turns out it was some bad sectors on the Maxtor drive. Not sure why, but after I used the Maxtor MaxBlast 4 utility (click on Software Downloads on the left) to do a low-level format, all seems to be okay.
• After I recovered my missing MP3 files, I mirrored them to an external HDD unit (basically a stock drive in an external USB enclosure - look for one here). After going through my ordeal, and helping my sister Helen with her troubles, I think that no one can afford to be without one of these. For the price, you can’t NOT have an extra drive to back stuff up to. Bob got a 200GB external drive for $65. Buy one, get a free copy of SyncBack (or something similiar), and you can set up a very easy way of automatically backing up your critical files (Word docs, Outlook files, MP3s, playlists, etc etc) to another drive. And, better yet, you can take the drive with you if you need to! Whee!!! (wow, sorry, got a bit carried away there…
• I bought a new camera, since our Canon S40’s screen bit the dust.
  Actually, not sure if it was the screen, since I bought and installed a replacement screen, and the same blank-ness kept happening. Wierd - maybe it was the fact that it got all wet while sitting on the kitchen counter… Nah!
  So, I got a GREAT deal on a Canon SD400 from Techbargains and a super-high-speed 1GB SD card from Newegg off of DealRam (thanks Bob!). Should be here soon - can’t wait! Mmmmm….Digic2…..
• I also had to get onto a new cell phone. Yeah, “had to”. Seriously. Working at Cingular with a T-Mobile phone…? Had to. I ended up getting the Audiovox SMT5600 that everyone else has (it seems). I got it via Slickdeals.net. Yeah, sounds like I’m a deal junkie, eh? Can’t argue with that… to paraprase DealNews’ slogan: “I’m going broke saving money…” That said, can’t wait for the new phone either…

That’s about it. Whoa - sure looks like a bunch of blatant consumerism…but…I love toys! Besides, it’s all about the kids…

Categories: Update
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