Curling has begun!

Another week has passed on the shore of Lake Superior in my hometown. The temperatures continue to drift lower but still no frost, and the vines in the school gardens across the street are still green! It has been a pretty normal week for us, except that Wendy’s barbershop practice was cancelled. I found a knife-sharpener, and got my chef’s knife reshaped and sharpened—a small piece had broken off while working on some frozen meat! The RV is now winterized and parked around back. The markets continue to roil with each new fulmination out of the Orange house. Oil has surged, and taken together with the tariffs, USA inflation is surging as well. Investors are starting to worry about the FED raising the interest rates further to fight inflation. In sports, my Oilers lost to Utah, but responded with a win over them tonight. Pens are on a western swing and finding the going tough. Leafs blew a 2 goal lead in the third period against Buffalo. The Riders lost in Montreal on Monday, but scored late to beat them today back in Regina. This clinched a playoff spot for the Riders. The World Series is shaping up as a battle of low budget teams. I picked Dodgers and Rays to contest it, but the Dodgers were swept away by the Brewers. Rays and Guardian continue their battle to join the final series. But, my big attention this week was on curling as the first Grand Slam event of the season is playing out in Victoria. It certainly was a lesson in how the world curling power has moved off shore. Only one Canadian team advanced to the playoffs on the women's side and it's my longtime favourite, Einarson. On the men's side, four of our teams made the playoffs, but my favourite, Kevin Koe, was not one of them. 

Erica writes, “We are back in PA this week. It almost didn’t happen for me. On Sunday, we had a scheduling issue that required me to stay up north for the week. But, early Monday morning, my boss called and advised that I could go home. It was a Thanksgiving Miracle! This weekend, Eric and I are heading down to help Liam bring his motorcycle back for the winter. Eric has supervision meetings this morning, so he’s playing the role of Lincoln therapist. I told him if he could make enough money doing this, I’d be happy to drive. Liam finished midterms and now he has a week break. Haaken reports everything’s great. All is well with Greg and Kiersten.”

Yummy!

Erin writes, “We had a really good Thanksgiving. We ended up doing chicken breasts with garlic, onion, paprika, parsley, broth, other seasonings, butter—tasted amazing! I had to make another batch the next day. Gravy didn’t make it into the picture. I had a good short week at work, and an old friend came into town Thursday and since I’m ahead for the month, I took the day off to hang out—extra short week for me! One of my team had a birthday so I took them out for lunch yesterday, a real nice time. Then, I got back to work and Ryan let me know another old friend we had worked with has gone into palliative care. He was diagnosed with cancer just over a year ago. So, went from super high to real low. Please pray for his family to feel comfort. I'm taking a quiet day today.” Kristian notes that he's been putting in more and more time managing the tires recently. Many folks responded to the first snowfall to get their winter tires on. 

Travis and Joanna drove down to Duluth on Monday to see the vet for Marigold. The report and the therapies all seem to be positive, now we wait to see her level of improvement. Jasmine visited over here while they were gone. Otherwise, they've continued with production on the Bucket Decal orders—good business there. 

And that's enough for this week. 

Thanksgiving!

Another week has passed on the shore of Lake Superior in my hometown. The temperatures continue to drift lower and we see single digits most nights, but no frost yet, and some very comfortable days. We're looking at 20° again today. Our week has been pretty standard. Wendy has her barbershop choir and related business. She is supposed to be out of the business end, but was still on the phone and on the laptop for hours and hours again this week. Thursday was our usual Silver Sound choir—lots of fun, and I got to try out my solo for the first time to an audience. I have completed the winterizing of the RV, and it's ready for moving around back at any time. I have also completed my first season of Starlink Mini usage. It ran for the first month at high speed, but I've reduced it to Stand By mode now. There's a difference between $75/month to $15/month, but there's also a monumental difference in performance as you can read in my other recent post, "My Starlink Mini Story" which is posted below. One neat thing we saw on our recent trip was a handicapped accessible picnic table in Marathon!

Very thoughtful!

The Orange turmoil continues to roil the entire world's economic story, and his new found support for Russia has intensified action against Ukraine! Terrible! The whipsawing market is not serving me well. The World Series continues to move toward the culmination. Dodgers/Brewers are engaged in a series to determine the National League champion, while Rays/Guardians series will choose the American League pennant holders. Early results in the NHL have been rewarding for the Oilers, Pens and Leafs, and they all won tonight! In football, we're closing in on the playoffs and we could get many positions clinched this Thanksgiving weekend. Riders play against first place, Montreal, on Monday. 

Erica writes, "Eric and I are up north for another week—Eric’s in Fond du Lac and I’m in Stony Rapids/Black Lake. I was just getting used to sharing my housing unit with him and he leaves! Eric has been having his own adventure looking for a blanket. Apparently, there wasn’t one in the housing he was assigned for the weekend and finding one was a challenge! Other than that, I think he had a good week. This weekend is Thanksgiving for those of us who recognize it at the proper time. Eric and I will join up and fly back home on Monday and celebrate Thanksgiving by eating out. Liam has been enjoying his bike and is making the most of the warm October weather. We plan to pick it up and store it before the end of the month. We haven’t heard much from Haaken, Greg & Kiersten, but we trust they are still out there!" 

Erin writes, "I submitted financial statements yesterday morning—a new record for me! And, I might be staying at VW. Finding someone for my position isn’t working so, they’re going to start broadening the search and looking for someone even higher up for over at Toyota. I actually felt relieved when they asked me what I thought—not as stressed." Kristian has been teasing us with the prospect of a surprise, but we're still waiting. He has been cat sitting for the neighbour in addition to his regular work. 

Travis & Joanna keep very joyfully busy with their work and their dogs. They took time to join us for Thanksgiving dinner this evening, yes, including the boys! Andrew and Rosie joined in the festivities—thankfulness fails to cover how much we enjoy everyone coming by. Wendy prepared Pepsi Ribs for the occasion and we all enjoyed that! 

And that's enough for this week. 

My Starlink Mini Story

We like to travel. We look forward to each summer’s trip, and also look to make trips during the rest of the year. I have long agonized over access to the world while we drive around North America. I am supposedly running a stock market business, so I need to check the markets at least once each day. With the purchase of an RV this concern has been accentuated. Driving in our SUV has usually been city to city with the minor annoyance of the loss of contact and missing our music, but in the RV, we’re more likely to drive off the main highways and park well off the grid! Prolonged absence from cellular data sometimes caused us to lose our map apps as well—we didn't know where we were, or what was the way forward! Surely, we can’t be expected to resort to paper maps, or to the business pages of the newspaper!

Anyway, our children noticed my laments, and generously provided funding to get a Starlink Mini. Since there are multiple listed suppliers, that seemed a straightforward transaction—it was not. It seems that Musk is undercutting his "suppliers" with various cheaper deals on-line, and with the same two to three week expected delivery date. Since we were travelling at the time, it was hard to nail down that window to a particular location, so I ordered it online to be shipped to Thunder Bay. Given the shipping window, we should be home about then. To my chagrin, I got a notification from Starlink that my delivery date was being adjusted to two to three days!! Whoa! That's a problem! Starlink has a practice of activating the dish no later than seven days after delivery! While we don't plan to be home for many weeks yet! So, I chatted in with customer support and Grok assured me that they wouldn't activate until I was home and chose to activate! Okay then... not so okay then, as I soon (too soon) received a notification that my account was activated! No, no, that's a problem, but only for me, apparently! I chatted back in with Grok, which clearly does not have access to what it promised me last time!! No, it assured me, Starlink always activates a maximum of seven days after delivery! No argument would sway Grok, but I finally got it to pass me along to a human, who confirmed that, yes, the policy is to activate only a maximum of seven days after delivery. And no, there was nothing that could be done about, the computer already had activated the account. Now, if there's anything that rouses my stubborn, it's being told that computers cannot be changed! A couple of passes up the food chain got me a person who promised me that, of course, they were the ones who told computers, not the other way around. A day later, they were back to the other story—activation dates COULD NOT be changed! And, once again, a few moves up the authority levels, got me back to the answer I wanted. Moving forward a couple of days and I got an email from the support folks telling me there had been a mistake—the activation COULD NOT be changed, sigh! Back to the phone, which concluded with me informing them, "You can either have me as a happy customer, or an ex-customer!" Two days later, I was informed that my account was no longer activated, and that I could activate it whenever I wished! VICTORY! Maybe you will decide to try satellite internet. If you do, please connect with my referral link Starlink Referral URL  as I earn a bonus credit to my account, and they say you get a better deal, too! 

So, while the story was a bit bumpy, I did activate on the date I planned for, and have enjoyed a month of service here at home and in the RV. We have a large tree in our front yard which is the natural direction for Starlink, so I set it up in the back yard facing south. We travel with it on a velcro mount in the front dash of the RV. There have been occasional signal losses due to over hanging trees, but it has performed very well. When parking, I take care to line up with some open sky, although I sometimes have to move the dish around in the windshield or out on a picnic table to get great service. To power the dish, I can plug into regular household current, or use the 12V power plugs in the RV. I bought a specialized 12V adapter that powers the dish, and offers two USB powered options as well. The dish is a bit picky about power levels, so don't be fooled by lower specification adapters that fail to up the voltage and may leave your dish powerless! In my case, I also wanted Starlink to provide data to my iPhone for Apple CarPlay, so I needed a direct connection from the dish to my phone. That came via the ethernet port on the dish, and required an adapter to bring ethernet into my phone. If you have a newer iPhone, or some other cell phone, you will need a different adapter. Maybe you don't choose to use internet data for travelling, but if you do, you'll need the ethernet data connection. 

Cost for my initial plan was $75/month, but now that I've dropped back to standby, the cost is $15/month. This reduces the satellite bandwidth to minimal, and I'll be experimenting to see just what it allows me to do. As you can see the difference in bandwidth is monumental—let's see what it can do. 

And it still performed all of what I need, and most of what I've been using. I was even able to play Netflix and Disney+ movies, but not Prime. I could play YouTube (else how could I problem-solve?). There was noticeable delay loading pages, but it did the job! 

Two caveats: 1. Starlink is renowned for changing their plans without notice—watch out for that. 

2. Other companies are jumping into the internet via satellite game. This will provide more options, and should also get Starlink to improve their offerings! 

I can't believe it's October!

Another week has passed on the shore of Lake Superior in my hometown. The temperatures continue to drift lower and we are seeing single digits most nights. It's October so that is expected, and we can expect our first frost any day. Wendy had plenty of busyness between the two choirs, multiple evening meetings, and a choir workshop yesterday and today. I got an unexpected honour at our Thursday choir practice as I was asked to sing a solo in one of our Christmas concert songs.

We made it!

On Wednesday, we took part in the Honouring our Children 5K event. I had a massage session on Tuesday, My back has been bothering for several months now, so I've given up on it just getting better on its own! September markets closed as another red month. Baseball has moved to the league semi-final playoffs. I'm expecting Dodgers, Padres to advance in the National League while Rays and White Sox prevail in the American. The NHL season has begun and I'm following Oilers, Pens and Leafs once again. 

Erica writes, "Eric and I are back up north this week. It is quiet and peaceful up here and I get lots of sleep which has been good for healing. Eric flew out Friday night to go to Moira’s funeral. Liam went to the wake on Friday and said there were a lot of great stories about Moira. The ceremony was on Saturday, which I watched on line. It was a wonderful tribute to a wonderful woman. I’m sorry that she is gone and I know we will all miss her. During all this, Eric was asked to go to Fond de Lac next week, so, he will go straight there on the Monday charter. We will meet again on the 12th back in PA. We have both been continuing to heal, and reminding ourselves to not push it. That is kind of hard…" 

Erin writes, "A regular week for me, other than nursing a sore eye. We're not sure what the problem is. The doctor says there's no infection, no scratch, just inflamed. Aches in my face bones though so it’s nice to have a weekend.  I have a sore like a stye on the other eye that hasn’t gone away for a long time so I went in and also due for a regular checkup. She sold me an eye mask to do hot compresses because, apparently, I have extra oil buildup in my eyelids. The morning after I did the first eye mask treatment my good eye was red and sore! So, I went back. She couldn’t say for sure, but I’m glad it’s not infection. No pus, just sore and achy. Good news is my vision hasn’t changed enough to need new glasses yet!" Kristian adds, "Nothing new for me until tomorrow; it’ll be a surprise, I’ve also been babysitting Riggs, our neighbour's cat."

Travis and Joanna keep very busy. Bucket Decals is getting orders from all over North America as hockey ramps up for the new season. Trav took some time off and came over to watch the hockey games with me tonight. That was great! And, the Pens and Oilers both won their games, so we were happy over that! 

And that's enough for this week. 

Pebble Beach

Another week has passed on the shore of Lake Superior in my hometown, and we have been exploring more of that shoreline. With Starlink now fully installed, we left, on Wednesday, for a short camping trip. It has not been straight forward getting Starlink, and even more effort to get it to work the way I need it to, but now, I think we’re fully operational. Thank you, my children, for this thoughtful gift. Unless we are under a canopy of trees, we now find ourselves able to connect to the world wherever we are—and that includes being able to find out wherever we are! As we ventured eastward along Superior, we frequently found ourselves sans cellular signal, so it has been more than a comfort to have satellite connections. We enjoyed Wednesday and Thursday with Travis & Joanna and Andrew, including exhausting hiking, fine dining and evening fire pits with marshmallows for roasting and s’mores to eat, but they headed back to Thunder Bay on Friday. We continued eastward visiting Red Rock and Nipigon before arriving at my nighttime choice—the trailhead for Mazukama Falls. However, the description of the hike scared us away! We checked a few other possibilities, and settled for the night 33 km east along the lake. It was in a gravel pit, also along the train tracks. Wendy thinks she counted eight trains through the night! They were all loud! Finally, after the traditional Saturday morning pancake breakfast, we completed the drive to Marathon and our ultimate destination, Pebble Beach.

It was pretty amazing to think of the wave action grinding those rocks smooth and pushing them up the beach this far. I was reminded of the dunes on the west coast of Denmark, pushed up by the North Sea. But, these rocks, mostly 4 to 6 inches in diameter had only been pushed up 10-12 feet. I was thinking of staying overnight in Marathon, but it was only a mall parking lot, and Wendy opted for another try at a lakeshore setting. I found three near Rossport, but after seeing the first two, she had her choice made! Maybe we'll check out #3 as we leave tomorrow. Or maybe we'll stay there tomorrow night! Elsewhere in the world, things are not going so swimmingly and I only have three trading days left in the month, so they'll need to be good ones if I'm going to make quota. My teams are not doing swimmingly either. The Jays have been eliminated from the playoffs. The Riders lost in BC last night. And the Sooners got pounded in college football. But hey, the NHL is in presason, so hope remains! 

Erica wrote, "Eric and I have returned to PA and spent the week in bed. We were diagnosed with bronchitis which is particularly bad for Eric. We both have a round of antibiotics to help and Eric has some extra steroids. We are starting to feel more ourselves though the cough lingers. We had planned to visit Eric’s cousin Moira Koops upon our return, but with our being sick, and her immunocompromised state, we stayed away. She has been fighting cancer for the past six months. Earlier this week she moved to palliative care and on Thursday we received news of her passing. Her attitude and courage has been inspiring to us and we will miss her. We had calls with Haaken and Liam who are also mourning her loss."

Erin enjoyed another quiet and productive week at work. Kristian has begun his work on tire inventory at Toyota. He seems to have picked up the procedures well. 

Travis and Joanna are keeping very busy with BucketDecals. Even as we were out at the lake on Wednesday and Thursday, Trav was able to access business via our new Starlink, so that was helpful to see! Anyway, they got a bit of a break, and managed to walk the legs mostly off of us! Win-win! 

And that's enough for this week. 

Summer is Ending!

Another week has passed on the shore of Lake superior in my hometown, bringing with it a change in the seasons. Some nights have even dipped into single digits, so we know that summer is ending. Wendy has been busy with her landlady assignment: Eanok has left, and Amanda is moving into the basement suite. So, she has conducted a thorough cleaning down there, and now Amanda has moved in. She also keeps busy with work on her two choirs, well actually mainly busy with work on the one choir that I’m hoping she will quit.  The Silver Sound choir is mostly just fun and learning the new music. Today, I went with her to a choir presentation. It was at a local museum and we enjoyed going through the exhibits afterwards. Tonight, we had the crew over for a pizza supper— good times! The pressure of fuel and diesel prices, along with the widespread economic damage he is causing may be finally getting Trump‘s attention. Our best hope is that he will declare victory and leave the Middle East. But it could be that he will expand the war by attaching the Houthis—sigh! The Riders have the week off and the Blue Jays look to be taking the post-season off! Come on Jays it’s not too late yet, although with seven games left... Yikes! 

Glacier!

From somewhere in the north Pacific, Eric writes, "We have been at sea for a week. We enjoyed the first couple of days, even seeing a glacier up close from a smaller boat. Since day 3 or 4 we have been sick and hiding in our room. Each day, we pull into a new harbour, and each day, we look out our window to enjoy it." But they did get to watch a glacial calving!

Erin enjoyed a quiet week at work, and enjoyed celebrating Kristian's 21st birthday. Kristian enjoyed that, too. He is transitioning into a new area at work which involves moving tires for seasonal tire changes, and includes a raise in wages! Good job, man! 

Travis and Joanna have put together an itinerary for a camping outing next week, so, we're looking forward to that. This evening they came over for pizza supper and further planning on the campout. Andrew and Rosie also dropped by, and I was privileged to have Rosie give me a massage treatment on my back—thanks! I hope that gets me on the way back to normal! Jonas and Gemma got a replacement car, a 2017 VW Golf. 

And that's enough for this week. 

Settling In!

Another week has passed on the shore of Lake Superior in my hometown. We have been getting back into the routines here at home all the while planning another excursion later this month. Wendy has been unpacking the RV, doing up the laundry, and catching up on rest! I have been doing a little bit of yard cleanup, and some of the upgrade projects in the RV. We started the week with Rich & Sue, Travis & Joanna also came over to make it a full party—good times! Rich & Sue headed west on Monday. On Thursday, we began our fall series of choir practice—nine new pieces of Christmas music. With the Orange war, the trade war and surging inflation the markets are doing terribly, but we did get respite on Friday. The Blue Jays have fallen out of a playoff position for now, c’mon man! The Riders won the Labour Day classic on Sunday, but fell to the Bombers in the return engagement Banjo Bowl today! 

Erica writes, "We finished up another stint in Black Lake/Stony Rapids. We flew back early—on a Friday—as we are leaving for our cruise on Sunday morning. Yay! This is our first cruise experience and we hope it is fun. We got the news that we are upgraded to a cabin with a balcony, so that is awesome! There will be much more to report on this next week. Liam has been experiencing his new classes. The business classes require using a different part of his brain and so he is adjusting to that. He’s enjoying the motorcycle and gets out for rides often. He caught up with his cousins, Victoria, Moira and Arwen for a few visits. We haven’t heard much yet from the others, but a few snippets here and there confirm they are alive! :)"

I sent Erin & Kristian on a wild goose chase to find some tools I have misplaced somewhere! No luck so far! Otherwise, Erin reports, "We had a pile of rain so I decided to unhook the backyard irrigation. I won’t turn it back on since we’re not getting much more production anyway. It’s getting colder out—the end of summer, sad! Even though I was born and bred in the north, I don’t like the cold. Other than that, it was a good week. I worked extra hours to finish month end and submitted financial statements early Friday, so I took the rest of that day off. Kristian’s turning 21 this week." Kristian noted that, "I went for the drive today to burn the soot out of my diesel. I also started my first week by myself going to the gym."

Bouquet!

Travis & Joanna presented Wendy with a lovely bouquet, and also increased her joy by coming by for some visits. Then, Joanna and Wendy went for a pedicure on Tuesday, and a bike ride on Wednesday!

2013 Honda, sigh!

On the alarming news front, Jonas & Gemma were in a car accident in Osoyoos. The other vehicle ran a red light, and totalled Jonas's car. They've been checked out, deemed healthy, and have now returned to Vancouver to search for a replacement vehicle! We are relieved that they're mostly unscathed by the incident. 

And that's enough for this week!