Long time no post...

Thankfully, Rochelle has made up for my lack. We have both been very busy as of late. On the day before Thanksgiving, Rochelle called her mom to ask a question about what to buy one of her siblings. She and Marissa were there together, when they found out that Rochelle's Grandma had passed. Needless to say, they were both very sad, and tears were shed. I met them for lunch just a little while later, and we decided then, that it would be best if the three of us took off and drove to Oregon for the viewing and funeral. I went back to work for a few hours, came home and got the car ready for any emergency, and we took off. We drove into the night, slept for a few hours in a Hotel 8, and took off again in the morning. Weather on the way there was mostly good. There was a little ice on the roads, but not much, and it was mostly safe going. We got there just in time for Thanksgiving dinner. We enjoyed the time we had with her family, and were grateful for the time we had with them. This will be Rochelle's first Christmas away from home, and it will likely be a while before we see her family again. Had we not gone up, it would have nearly been a year without seeing them. So we were happy to be there. We were also glad that we could be there for Rochelle's mom whom was obviously effected by the situation. But everyone seemed to handle it very well. The funeral was nice. I enjoyed hearing the talks about Grandma. I didn't know her very well, and so it was a good time to hear what she was like, and to learn more about the family. I played lots of ping-pong, chess, pool, foosball, cards, and just about any other game we could think of. I enjoy being a big brother. I tease everyone a lot and have fun teaching them how to do things. It is an experience that I have never had before. Well, after the funeral was over, we changed clothes and left for home straight away. The weather home wasn't nearly as good. We hit storms almost immediately, and I was definitely a white knuckle driver that night. Much of the night I was going 30-40 miles per hour feeling like I shouldn't be going over 20, but watching some cars around me go 50-60. It was scary. Several times I could feel the car loose traction and gain it again a moment later. I was grateful that we never lost control. We slept again that night at that same Motel 8, and started again in the morning. The weather on that day was much better... until we got into Salt Lake and Utah valleys. I felt like the last several miles of our freeway drive were as bad as any. Thank-goodness that's all over.

At work, I have become an man with many hats. Lately, I have been wearing the IT hat almost exclusively. We had a small room full of clunky old computers that did a great many things. We bought a bunch of nice new computers that would soon take their places. Oh boy, what a head-ache. As we have redone everything, it has left everyone very stressed and begging for answers, and they usually come to me. With my currently small amount of IT knowledge, I have been trying to fix everything, but everything takes me a lot of time to fix because of the learning curve. There are a lot of things I would do differently if I had to do it all again. Oh well. We are nearing the end of it now, and I may begin to program once again. I have been writing a task management program that is to be integrated in our internal software. It is mostly done, but I have left it alone for a while as we have a been working on these other things.

Oh man, will I sleep well tonight! Anyways, Love you all, and I hope you all have a fantastic night!

BJ