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January 17, 2007 (2:27pm)
18º F, Sun & Wind, S wind 9 mph, 29 mph gusts.

Good afternoon,

For the past couple of months, we have been having a rang-itty-tang with the computer staying on line. Yesterday morning it came to a real tang! I could not get online for more than a few seconds at a time. I did manage to get an email through to ITOL, but didn’t get an answer until returning home. As long as we were heading to Green Bay after Bible study, I figured we could also just stop into their office. We did and the tech said it would be best to call them while sitting in front of the commuter. When we got home and unloaded, I was able to download the return email, indicating they had done some checking of our usage and the dropping, finding that 85% of the drops occurred some place between FISKLAND and ITOL - the phone lines - and I should call the phone company. I did and got a terrible connection. The gal on the phone had no problem deciding there was a real problem and promised to have someone here between 8:00 A.M. and noon today. The repair man showed up about 9:00 A.M., after checking the rest of the system to the main trunk. I knew he was as the phone rang and had a really strange sound on it when picked up. He then made some checks from this end of the line, confirming the system was working again. So far so good. It seems this same problem arises every 8-12 months, with the problem at the same place every time. Sure would be nice of them to put in DSL lines and hopefully we would have better usage. The serviceman didn’t think we would see it in our lifetimes.

We did get all of the paperwork for the house in the Netherlands signed and notarized, then into the postoffice to get it sent with a return receipt coming back again. The post master didn’t know how to handle the return receipt part. I figured that would be the case, so downloaded the instructions from the website to take along. Of course we forgot them! As it turned out, they will get there and we will get a receipt, but a different way and about twice the cost. Oh well. So .... now we wait until we see/hear something more.

Bible study was pretty good, even though we turned left several times. A couple of times I was the turner, without intending too. Seems sometimes things are taken out of contents that are said, or offered a dual meaning. Anywho, we have officially started a new unit. We didn’t have Bible study last week, which I found unusual. Turns out the quilt ladies, who normally meet after the study, decided to have a round-robin holiday party for most of the late morning and early afternoon. A problem developed though, as most of the folks who did go, got some kind of bug, allowing them to do the Bad River Two-step very often. A couple of the gals still had not fully recovered as of yesterday. Sure glad we didn’t go to it. Not the kind of holiday party we look forward too.

Today is really a beautiful day. The sun is bright, causing the snow to sparkle more then normal. Do wish the wind would die down some so I could burn the trash though (can’t have everything). There are a few more critter tracks in the snow and we saw a pretty good sized flock of wild turkeys too. Monday, on the way to the bank, one flew right over the van as we passed, just a couple of feet above it. Sure glad it was van broke! No calling cards. The weatherman at noon said this is the hump day for winter. From now on, the average daily temperatures begin to rise a little each day. It really doesn’t seem like winter this year - at all.

The price of crude oil has dropped to it’s lowest in 20 months. That is good news. Our gas stations also show it has dropped to $2.099/gallon yesterday. May have dropped more today, but have not been uptown. There is one station in Luxemburg which has gas at $1.999/gallon, but we didn’t find it yesterday when we went through.

We are considering going to the Camping Show and the Home Builder’s shows in Green Bay one of these next couple of days. We hope we can go to one, then the other in one trip, saving a bit of gasoline cost. The problem is the Builder’s show is not well advertised, so don’t know the hours it is open. Might miss one or the other, but we are hoping not.

Time to get a-going.

In Christ My Saviour,

Chris <><