2016 Summer August 27 Saturday

2016 Summer August 27 Saturday

70 degrees this morning, no walk (at meeting).

Meeting today.  Drove up yesterday afternoon, good drive up. 

Only problem was in some little town almost at our destination, there was a horrible traffic tie-up due to an absentee train, meaning the barriers and lights would come down and then there wasn’t a train anywhere to be seen!

Occasionally it would come up for just a second than come back down again, almost like it was teasing everyone.  

Of course some motorists started driving thru the barriers.  Can’t say I blamed them.  

Actually my turn to drive through the barriers had just come up when the barriers lifted.  I can’t say what I would have done, but I expect peer pressure (and no train in sight) would have me driving through the barriers!  It was about the worst traffic tie-up in a small town I have ever seen.

Railroads are arrogant and like to boss others around and show their ability to not cooperate.  That is about the only reason I can see that they would create a traffic tie-up like that when it seems it would be easy to have an override that would prevent such situations.  

The meeting is at a “state lodge”, with a beautiful lake.  Just that lakes aren’t really my lifestyle so to speak.  Probably at least was partially built as a flood control measure.  

There are walking paths, horse stables, a golf course, etc., but since we drove up yesterday afternoon and are leaving as soon as the meeting is over today (with meeting activities right after we got here yesterday), we won’t have a lot of time to enjoy the amenities anyway.  The walking path might have been fun.  I’m not into horses at all, and haven’t tried to play golf for years.  I’m also don’t care for fishing, so we’re kind of like a fish out of water here so to speak!

As far as horses, I stay away from horses.  Many years ago, we rented some horses in “Garden of the Gods” in Colorado Springs.  I had a very “spirited” horse and was very nervous.  He (or she) actually turned around and “grinned” at me, obviously knowing exactly what it was doing!  I was very glad to get off and have never ridden (or gotten close to) a horse since!

At first I almost panicked when I thought they didn’t have wi fi, but I was able to piggyback off of the meeting room wifi.  Maybe the lack of wifi was deliberate, although it could be the wi fi is just called the meeting room wi fi.

Even then, without any wi fi, it would just have meant I only have phone and tablet cellular and it is actually fairly good service here.  However, I would have had  a difficult time without my laptop.    

I actually notice more and more that many people use their phone as  their “only” computer  (or internet connection) and don’t even use a computer or tablet.  They seem to get along fine with it, although i would feel pretty limited.  

A few years ago I was in an area without any phone service (for my carrier),but wi fi was available.  I can’t say which would make me feel more limited, probably no wi fi in my present life, back then, no phone service was probably more important.

I also have noticed that a lot of companies are using a iPad as a “sign in” device.  It automatically takes your picture and probably is backed up on a cloud server as a permanent record of who came in.  In today’s world, not a bad idea.  

I am hoping that the new “iPad Pro” upgrade will be a good one.  I have been diligently saving my  credit card “cash back” for either an iPad Pro or Apple Watch, or hopefully eventually both.  I thing the new iPad Pro upgrade will probably be more attractive to me this year  than an upgraded Apple Watch (as far as being useful), but I won’t know until I see the upgrades! 

That’s it for now, Saturday, August 27, 2016.