Family Reunion

For those of you who are not related to me (there are a couple!), we had a Ricks Family Reunion this June. We went to New Braunfels, Texas, which is near San Antonio. We stayed at a huge house. Besides smelling like mothballs, it was very cool. We went canoeing, saw deer running around, played family games and such. A lot of fun.

One day we went to Sea World. That was pretty cool, but I felt a little like I didn't know how to feel about the captive animals. I had some dream that they had an ocean sized, private, luxurious area for them to swim and be happy "off-set," but when I looked it up, that doesn't seem to be the case. I also found out that a baby orca had died two days before our visit. It was one of the first orcas to be raised completely in captivity and died mysteriously at the age of 2. Some of the trainers seemed kind of weird in the orca show and I thought that might be why.

Did that story depress you? If so, I apologize. It really was an awesome family reunion. It was very good to see the family. Christy did an awesome job of organizing it. Yay!

Click the dolphin for my Family Reunion Pictures.

What's up with my picture

So, I decided to put an actual picture of myself as my profile picture, but now I'm looking at it and wondering... what is up with my crazy asymetrical face?

So, it's been awhile

When I got back from my family reunion (mid-June), my computer was acting a little funny. Shortly thereafter it decided to get really messed up and wouldn't boot up at all (even in safe mode). I tried a few recovery things and looked up a few tricks to try to fix it (while I was at work). I finally got it to come up in safe mode, which gave me a chance to save my files. The cd burner wasn't working at all, so I had to go buy a couple of usb drives. I was mostly just glad to have a chance to save all my photos and my writing, including my silly drawings for the book I wrote for my nieces and nephews. Then, I went ahead and did the complete reinstall of Windows, which starts everything over like new. Unfortunately, that also meant I had to reinstall all my programs (including my internet and my antivirus stuff), plus the million billion updates Windows has put out since I bought this computer 6 or 7 years ago. I am now almost... almost... back to where I was before my computer decided to die on me. Todd still will not admit to doing anything weird to my computer while I was out of town. (j/k)

By now everyone else has posted all their photos from the reunion and from Greg's visit to Atlanta, but I'll post mine, anyway, sometime soon. Hey, things look different from slightly different angles. Also coming soon, for those of you who care about such things, updated plant pictures. Here's a teaser, they are all still alive!

I will leave you with a simple question. What color is this eye?