Wednesday, April 30, 2003

April 2003

Pictures



We've been off the air since our Christmas newsletter. Thanks for all the email - we've missed you, too!



Just to catch you up on the weather... We had near record cold this past winter. A little snow is kind of fun, but the bitter cold gets old real fast, and the truth is that this place wasn't designed for 19 degree weather - we're built for hurricanes, not ice storms! After a couple of days of below freezing lows, we discovered a broken water pipe running over the garage and out to a spigot. We caught it quickly and shut off the water. The flooding was confined to the garage so it wasn't anywhere near as bad as it might have been. Naturally, this transpired on a Friday afternoon around 5pm so it was impossible to get a plumber. Fortunately for us, we have some neighbors who know a thing or two about copper pipes. We found the break, cut out the bad section, and capped it off so that we could turn the water back on. (By we, I mean mostly Art who has the tools and practical knowledge that your typical software engineer sadly lacks.) We weren't the only ones with problems so we patiently waited a few days for the plumbers to come around and repair the damage. Fast forward to April, and now we're talking torrential rain, leading to minor flooding on the golf course. No earthquakes, tornadoes or hurricanes, so we shouldn't complain.



As our loyal readers undoubtedly already know, Lisa has been studying horticulture and landscape design at Brunswick Community College since last autumn. She's still doing well in school and enjoying fields trips to the local greenhouses, farms and the world famous Green Swamp (an excellent place to observe venus flytraps in their native environment). She finished the Spring semester recently and doesn't have to go back until August.



Steve continues to telecommute to Apple, with frequent in-person visits back to the Bay Area. Apple has made some news recently with new iPods and an online AppleMusic.com store where you can download songs for 99 cents a piece. Behind the scenes, Steve's software runs the online music store so he's now part of that whole Rock Star scene. It's not as glamorous as you might think.



Now, it wouldn't be a Miner Update without some travel news. For our pre-New Year's celebration we spent a couple of nights in Charleston, South Carolina. It's become our weekend getaway place, especially since we found a good martini bar. For Lisa's Spring Break (remember, she's a college kid), we took a trip to Fort Lauderdale. I never made it to Florida when I was in college, but I do remember hearing about it. People still think of MTV beach parties and Girls Gone Wild videos, but things seem to have changed. For some odd reason, millionaires in waterfront mansions with magnificent yachts didn't like having millions of teenage college coeds descending on their beaches every Spring so they've tried to change the tone of the area a bit. More money, less wild, but still fun for the over-forty tourist crowd. MTV and the college kids have moved on to other parts of Florida.



For some computer fun, do a google search for Bertram Wooster. OK, I'll do it for you... That's my boy!



Cheers, Steve and Lisa