We know the weather is changing by the location of the cats.
Archive for October, 2009
Heat Seekers
Monday, October 26th, 2009Another Day, Another Postcard, Welcome to Idaho
Monday, October 26th, 2009I realize I post a sunrise ever week but we just can’t take too many. We’ll be looking at these very longingly over the winter.
Along Came a Spider
Monday, October 26th, 2009If you’ve visited this year you probably got to enjoy our new fire pit. I’m going to enlarge it a bit to accommodate a few more people. While removing the stones from around the pit I found a black spider. Curious, I flipped it over (I was wearing gloves) and sure enough, my first black widow. I could hardly wait to show Jenny but she was napping. So, I got a jar and put the spider into it.
In case you’re wondering, her name is Cleopatra. And we let her go among some nice safe rocks far far away from the house.
Observations of Small Town Living (OOSTL)
Monday, October 26th, 2009Scat! When you move to a rural town from a bigger city, there are things that life and your mother didn’t prepare you for. You learn to identify new dangers, new past times, new tools, and new toys. And then there’s the wild life. Much of which is nocturnal. The only way you know “something” has been on your property is foot or hoof prints and scat. So what does moose scat look like? These are the things one has to learn. Until someone points to something and say, that’s it, you’re not really sure. Better yet, when I asked a friend to identify what I though was some bear scat she emphatically says, “Oh no. That’s a constipated deer. I’ve seen that a lot near my house.” The funny part is that she had a picture of bear scat and didn’t hesitate to send me via email. So, if you’re wondering, here’s a picture. Just click to view it in detail.
Comment – You can tell when this picture might have been taken? – Looks like huckleberry season.
New Company Launch
Saturday, October 24th, 2009Earlier this month we finished negotiations to take on 120 new web hosting accounts from a competing company. On 10/23/09 we launched a new company — TLCWebHosting.com is on the air.
The process began earlier this months with a lot of prayer, preparation, planning, learning, research, more learning, over 500 emails, and a lot of patient consultant holding my hand. All culminating in a make it or break it move of all 120 websites, hundreds of email accounts, databases, and accounts to our new servers. At the end of the day I wrote a letter to a friend explaining how it went. I’ve saved this excerpt for myself to review as we’re planning on migrating about 100 clients to this new server by year’s end.
I can’t say is wasn’t without stress. (major understatement)
I got up around 3:30 A.M. (I over slept. set the timer for PM instead of AM). It was a tsunami from that point onward. At some point around 6:00 Jenny brought in a cup of coffee because I hadn’t left my chair except for bathroom breaks which I spent on the phone (don’t tell my clients) or praying (don’t tell God). I looked up a the clock to see what time it was already 9:00. It seemed like a short while later and it was lunch at 1:00 at my desk while on the phone fielding question. Things began to slow down around 3:00 P.M. and the 11 hour fire fight was coming to an end. It was a good thing because I really began to wear down and could hardly type at one point. Catnap failed, couldn’t sleep. Back to work after a few minutes. I took my shower at 5:15 PM. It was an emotionally challenging day.
God is Great. He gets the glory for the many victories of the day. I logged about 30 phone calls with clients, umteen other calls with consultants, service providers, and the seller. Dozens of emails. And was able to crank out a newsletter informing clients of the solutions to common problems that I’d seen all day.
So many prayers were answered today:
- Prayers were raised when I was too busy to breath. Thank you!
- The consultants hired came through 100% and helped me solve problems. Many of which I could not have figured out at all.
- The seller came through answer questions about clients and dealing with clients who couldn’t get through to me.
- The server is a real champ.
- Several service providers were able to field problems and help out.
- Jenny, the love of my life, kept the household glued together while I hunkered down.
- Clients were gracious even though they were frustrated at times. One of my clients had ocean liners waiting for me to fix email so they could unload cargo. I was schooled in the importance of email by this guy. Ouch. Yeah, tell the guy who’s livelihood depends on the internet how important email is.
- I confess, I lost my cool at least twice but thankfully it wasn’t at a client. Darn computers.
Well, I now have 120 new clients. http://TLCWebHosting.com is on the air.
Thank you for thinking of me. Thanks again for the prayers. They were answered.
I think I’ll post this on my blog. But first, I think sleep. The adrenaline is wearing offffffffffffffffff.
Thomas
1st Snow sighting & Frost
Thursday, October 8th, 2009Snow fell on Butler Mtn across the valley on Oct. 7th. We experienced our first frost on Oct. 8.
Sorry to bore you with this stuff, but I like to keep a record and look back each year.Â
Sunrises are coming later now
Friday, October 2nd, 2009Days are getting shorter. As the sun rises move south (to the right in this photo) it marks the days getting shorter. Beautiful sunrises are not that common, but we really appreciate them.
Harvest Celebration
Friday, October 2nd, 2009October 2nd, 2009. Our tomato harvest has been brought in from the fields. Here’s our first and only tomato that ripened. The rest are in a bag in the basement being punished until they ripen too. I heard on the radio that we had a long growing season this year — 90 days from planting to first frost. That’s a long growing season?
Observations of Small Town Living (OOSTL)
Friday, October 2nd, 2009It’s September and the holiday ads have already begun to tell you to buy a gift for the special girl in your life. Are you thinking of the correct holiday? Welcome to the holiday that lasts for months. Welcome to small town living where it’s hunting season. This ad was in the local paper.
Observations of Small Town Living (OOSTL)
Friday, October 2nd, 2009You know you’re in a small town when… Your electric company publishes it’s own magazine about rural life. Ours is called Ruralite.
Click to enlarge
The fun begins when you get to the end of the magazine and there are classified ads written by regular folks from small towns. Here are some examples:
