Voice Memo

I was fooling around with my iPod.  I found something called Voice Memo. I tried it out. I recorded a message to myself. I was then able to play it back.

I showed it to Barb. She was amazed. Then she found a way to email a Voice Memo.

So she emailed a Voice Memo to Sarah. Sarah freaked out when she heard Barb's voice on an email.

Barb also found out how to send a Voice Memo as a iMessage text attachment.

Barb sent a Voice Memo to her friend Debbie saying how much Debbie liked to hear Barb's voice. So now Debbie could save the Voice Memo on her IPhone.  Then she could play it any time she wants to hear Barb's voice.

When Debbie got the email the next day, she freaked out, she was so happy.

Amazing Memory

Last year Sarah had a professor who prided himself in being able to memorize the names of everyone in his class of 300 students by the end of the semester.

Most students like Sarah had never gone to him for help. So she had never spoken to him. However, somehow by looking up the student records, he was able to figure out everyone's name and match it to their face.

The students were really impressed when he went around on the last day of class as he went around and named everyone in the class.

This year Sarah didn't have this professor. 

However, one day she was walking down the hall of the school. The professor walked by her. He said, “Hello Sarah”. 

Sarah was amazed that he still remembered her name.

Confusing Customer Service

I forgot my slippers. I had earlier lost my sandals. So Barb went out to buy me some new slippers and sandals. There was a two-for-one sale at the store. So Barb got the sandals for free.

The slippers fit so well and looked so good, we thought I could go out wearing them. They were like boat shoes. However, Barb thought it would be too dirty outside to wear my indoor shoes. So she decided to go back to the store to buy another pair of boat shoes for wearing outdoors.

She talked to the lady at customer service. Barb talked her into refunding the money for the sandals. Then she bought the second pair of boat shoes using the two-for-one sale. Then she bought the sandals as well. This was a good deal because the sandals were cheaper than the boat shoes. So the two-for-one sale was worth more.

The customer service lady gave Barb some change. Barb asked her if this was correct. The lady said yes it was right.

When Barb got home she looked at her bill more closely. Not only had the lady given Barb the two-for-one deal, she had also given her her money back for the sandals. So she made money on the return.

Walking to Ride the Stationary Bike

I sometimes use the exercise room in Florida when it is too hot to walk in the afternoon. I bring my book. I like to read while I ride the stationary bike.

I walk down because it seems silly to drive the golf cart to exercise.

The first day that I walked down to the exercise room I arrived to find Joe just starting to use the stationary bike. If I had driven the golf cart, I would have arrived a few minutes earlier. Then I would have beaten Joe to the stationary bike.

I just turned around and walked home. I decided just in case Joe used the stationary bike regularly at the time of day,. I would walk down later in the afternoon.

Gate Pass Code

In Florida, we live in a gated community. The gate is open during the day. However, it closes at night. We have a pass code that we use to get in.

Barb was going out shopping soon after we arrived. She was going out in the daytime. However, she brought the pass code in case she got home late.

She did get home late. The gate was closed. She was happy that she had the pass code.

The only problem was it was dark. She couldn't see the touch pad to key in the pass code.

Fortunately, she had our little flashlight in the car. She was able to get in.

Phone Trouble

While we were in Canada our phone and internet in Florida was on vacation mode. So it was only necessary to phone the company a few days before we were supposed to arrive and they were flip a switch to turn it back on.

When we got to Florida, Barb checked the phone. It didn't work. We were a little upset because the company had told us it would be setup by the time we arrived.

We walked down to the community center and use the phone there to call the company. They said there must have been a problem but it would be working by 7 pm.

When we got home, Barb looked at the floor under the phone.  She noticed that the phone wasn't plugged in. When she plugged it in, the phone worked fine.

What a Bad Idea

The night before we were leaving for Florida. I was on my computer. I got a message saying that some of my software didn't work because I needed to upgrade my operating system.

I decided to do the upgrade then. What a bad idea. Something went wrong with the upgrade. I panicked and stopped the upgrade part way through. There was a warning that if I stopped the upgrade at this point my computer might not operate properly. However, there was nothing I could do. I had already stopped the upgrade.

When I turned on my computer again, it wouldn't boot up. I tried a so-called Recovery program. That didn't seem to work unless I reformatted my drive. I was stuck. So I reformatted my drive and lost all my files and programs.

I was up until 1 am the night before we were driving to Florida. We were leaving at 3 am. Of course, I couldn't get to sleep because I was so upset. So I took a sleeping pill. Barb was furious at me. She thought I would be asleep all the way to Florida.

The next day I was pretty useless. Barb had to drive most of the day by herself.

I then spent the first two or three weeks re-installing my operating systems, recovering my files and installing my programs.

Dog's Tail

I was packing the truck of the car the day before we were leaving for Florida. I wanted to use every little piece of the trunk. So when I got the suitcases into the trunk, there was a little bit of space behind them. I climbed into the trunk with a flashlight and pushed our shoes behind the suitcases.

Barb laughed at me climbing into the trunk.  Only my bum and my legs were showing. It was like those funny stuffed animals that you can stick to the back of your car that appear to show a dog's legs and tail when the dog has run into the back of the car.

Barb's Volunteer Honours

The President of the Barrhaven Tennis Club decided to take Barb out for dinner to thank her for her many years of service to the tennis club.

It was supposed to be a surprise. It wasn't really a surprise. However, Barb was surprised to see not only the other executive there but also some of the court attendants even showed up. It was not just the adults.

Barb was given a nice framed certificate from someone she didn't know in recognition of her years of volunteering.

Tennis Documents

Barb spent a great deal of time putting together all of the material for the Barrhaven Tennis Club duties for the incoming executive. Her final act on the executive was to email the files to the incoming executive lady.

She sent the email with the attached documents. 

Later that night she got an email from her friend Harry. He said that she probably didn't mean to send him the tennis documents. In fact, he didn't even have any software to open the files.

It turns out that Harry shares his email address with his wife. His wife's first name is the same as the lady on the incoming executive. Barb didn't know either lady's last name. So she emailed it to the first name that came up.

Hey Baby

Barb made a bed quilt as a wedding gift for her friend Debbie's daughter. Barb was getting picked up by Debbie. They were going over to the daughter's house to give it to her. Barb was looking forward to it.

Barb was waiting with me in the living room. Barb saw a car come in the driveway. She said goodbye to me. She ran out the door. She yelled “Hey Baby!”

Then she realized it wasn't Debbie. It was Julia coming home from work. Julia thought it was so nice that her mother would come running out of the house to meet her when she came home from work.

Master Gardener

Barb doesn't spend much time on the flowers at the front of the house. She cleans up the garden in the Spring and in the Fall. Otherwise it grows pretty much by itself. Except she puts in artificial flowers to add some colour. Many people have complimented her on the artificial flowers. Sometimes Barb tells them the flowers are artificial and sometimes she doesn't.

Barb was cleaning up the garden to prepare for winter and our trip to Florida. She noticed a lovely sunflower had grown in the garden all by itself. She came in and told me how amazing it was.  She had never noticed it before.

Our next door neighbour is a master gardener. Barb was outside a few days later was telling our neighbour about the sunflower. The neighbour smiled slyly. Barb said “What?” Our neighbour said that it was artificial. She had planted it in our garden a few days ago. It was a joke because she knew that Barb had artificial flowers in the garden all summer.

Congratulations Never Come Too Late

Barb got home to a message on the answering machine from a old friend and neighbour. The friend wanted to congratulate Barb for winning a medal in Pickleball. Barb had won the medal in August. However, her friend had only found out about it in October because Barb's name was in the local newspaper.

Our neighbour down the street also stopped Barb when she was going to the mailbox. He wanted to congratulate her too.

Barb found the article in the newspaper. The title of the article was “Pair Wins Gold”. It didn't even mention pickleball in the title. You had to read the details in the small article to find out who and what they won. Barb was impressed with her neighbours' close reading of the local newspaper.

Like a Dog in the Car

I was living on the edge for many years with my glasses. I only had one pair. If they broke, I wouldn't be able to see. This was particularly dangerous in Florida.

So I was determined to get a new pair of glasses before we left for Florida this winter. I got my eyes checked They gave me a new prescription for trifocals. I also bought transitions.

When I picked up my glasses, they told me that even though the glasses were transitions, they might not become dark enough to drive with because of the tinted windows in the car. I might also need to buy sunglasses to put over them.

I went for a walk in the afternoon soon after I got the glasses. It was sunny outside. The transitions worked great. Everything was so clear. There was no squinting necessary.

Barb and I were driving a few days later. Barb noticed that the transitions were not very dark in the car. Barb told me to open the window and look out to see if the glasses would get dark. So I opened the window. I then stuck my head out the window like a dog. We were driving down the highway. Barb thought this was very funny.

Crystal Quilters

Barb was finally giving up the Barrhaven Tennis Club treasurer job after 15 years. So she had to give the treasurer's computer to the new treasurer.

We had been using the computer for quite a few years as a home computer. So Barb asked me to clean it up. To remove the personal files and the special programs that I had installed.

As I was uninstalling the programs, I noticed a program called Microsoft Works. I immediately remembered that Barb had received a file from a lady in Florida with the email addresses and phone numbers of all of the quilters at Crystal Lake where we live in Florida.

She could not open the file because it was written in Microsoft Works. Microsoft Works was incompatible with everything we had. I guess it was a special program that comes with the Microsoft Vista operating system.

I was able to finally open the file. I was able to re-save it as a Microsoft Word file. Barb was very happy to finally have the email addresses and phone numbers of the Crystal Quilters.

A Big Round Head

Barb knitted Sarah a beret for winter. Unfortunately, when she was finished it she thought it would be too small for Sarah's big round head.

However, Barb thought she could stretch it. She sprayed it with a little water. Then she got a volleyball. She stretched the beret over the volleyball for a day or two.

When Barb gave it to Sarah at Thanksgiving, it fit perfectly.

Sportsmanship Award Nomination

One of my fastball teams, nominated me for the sportsmanship award this season. I didn't win but I thought it was nice to be nominated.

Co-op Confusion

Sarah was very busy when she got back to school after Labour Day. She had all of the classes. She also had to look for a co-op job for the winter. She was sending out tons of resumes with individually written cover letters for each one.

Third year was so different from second year. She was getting all kinds of interviews. If she had to go to all these interviews, she would miss a lot of classes.

She had also just changed from Biological Engineering Co-op to Environmental Engineering Co-op. So she had a lot to do to arrange that too.

She had originally thought that the environmental engineers were all flakes. By third year, all of the flakes had dropped out. So that was no longer an issue. She didn't like biological engineering because all of the people in the program were interested in bio-medical work.  She wasn't.

One of her first interviews was with a lady from the Atomic Energy Canada Limited in Chalk River. Sarah didn't even say very much. The lady just talked about how great it would be to have her on the team with her biological background. They liked to have diverse teams. That was good because Sarah didn't know much about the job.

The next day she got an email from the lady saying that she was sorry.  Somehow she had not emailed Sarah the attachment with the information about the job that Sarah was supposed to use to prepare for the interview.

Sarah got the job. So now she doesn't have to look any more or go to any more interview. She was very happy.

It was neat because we know a lot of people from Deep River right next door to Chalk River.  They have winter places in the same park in Florida with us.

Who Am I Kidding?

My two fastball teams were in the playoffs. Both teams were in the semi-finals. One night both teams played on the same night and at the same time. However, one team was facing elimination and the other team was playing their first game of the series.

I went to play in the elimination game. Our best pitcher wasn't there. So we were in trouble. We had three pitchers try to get the other team out.  None of them were any good. We lost the game 19-13. I thought that when you score 13 runs in a game you shouldn't lose. But we did. And we were eliminated.

The next day I had off. I checked my email when I got up.  There was an email from the captain of the team that was still playing. He said that they won the first game but our pitcher hurt himself in the rundown play. He asked me if I would be at the game. He said I would have to pitch. 

I replied that he must be kidding. He said no it was true.

We had won the first game of the best of three series. So the game was not an elimination game. The captain thought that the pitcher might be better by the next game.

When I told Barb that I would have to pitch. She was furious. She said that I was going to get the ball hit back at me. I wouldn't be able to get out the way.  I would be killed. She said it wasn't worth it. We were going to lose anyway. We should just forfeit the game.

Later in the day, I got a phone call from the pitcher. He told me about his injury. He tried to talk it up. He said that if we can score enough runs, we could win the game. I might be okay.

As I was leaving for the game, She asked me if I was really going to pitch. Barb said it was nice knowing me.

 

As I was driving to the game, I thought to myself. Who am I kidding? I am going to get killed. It was stupid to be pitching. These guys were good hitters. Barb was right.

When I got to the game, the teams who had played earlier cheered me on. They called me Ivan "The Terminator" Taylor.

We scored a run in the top of the first inning.

I got the first batter out. Then the second batter hit a triple. The third batter hit a line drive to the second baseman. The second baseman threw to third base to catch the runner off base. But he threw wild. The runner tried to go home. The third baseman fired a strike to the catcher.  The catcher got the runner at home for a double play.  We got out the inning with no runs scored against us.

From then on we never looked back. We scored at least one run in every inning. I walked a lot of batters but we almost always got out of the inning without them scoring. Just one time they hit a based loaded triple and scored three runs.

We won the game 9-3 and were headed to the finals. The guys thought this was the greatest thing they had ever seen.

When I got home Barb said she was surprised to see me.  She was even more surprised when I told her I had won the game.

The president of the league who was watching the game said the next day in an email to the executive that he kept saying to himself that I might get through the batting order once but eventually they would adjust and then poor old Ivan would get hammered. But it never happened.

Our pitcher was back for the finals and we won easily.  We were the league champs.

Pretty in Pink

Sarah volunteered at the Run for Breast Cancer. She worked at a station handing out drinks to the runners. 

Most of the runners were married ladies. Sarah got a sore hand from giving high fives to the runners as they went buy. The ladies' wedding rings hit her hand.

Sarah got her picture in the Guelph newspaper in the pink beret that Barb knit for her. She posted the picture on her Facebook page.

A Costly Mistaken Identity

Sarah has been selling her used textbooks online. She had found a buyer for her Statistics textbook who was willing to pay a good price of $100. So she arranged to meet him at the elevators of one of her engineering buildings.

When she got to the elevators, there was a guy sitting in a chair and a guy standing. She went up to the guy standing and asked him if he was the guy who wanted to buy her Statistics book. He looked at the book and said yes it looked good. He got out his wallet and gave her $20 then got on the elevator and quickly left. Sarah was confused because the deal was for $100. However, this guy had taken her book and given only $20. There was no way to find him now that he was gone.

She later found out that the guy sitting was the guy who wanted to buy her Statistics book for $100. The guy who took her book was just a random guy waiting for the elevator.

How Can You Not Know Where You Live?

Since my Dad died, my sister and I have been busy handling his estate. Although my sister and my Dad had made everything very easy, we still had the difficulty of selling the family house.

There were many phone call, emails and negotiations. I had to run out a number of times to a real estate office and lawyer's office in Barrhaven to sign papers from Burlington.

This was all happening around my birthday.

I wanted to get a package of new recordings of The News for Lake Wobegon by Garrison Keillor for my birthday. So I ordered it on line.

When I looked at my receipt, I realized I had mistakenly written the shipping address as 705 Maple Avenue, my family home. I panicked. Barb couldn't believe I could make such a silly mistake. I had to phone the company a number of times to get the shipping address changed.

I was relieved when the CD package finally arrived before my birthday.

When the GPS Fails You

We have a GPS now.

 

Barb has found it indispensable when we are in Florida.

 

It will always get you to your destination but sometimes not the easiest way.

 

One of the things that Barb can never understand is why it will take us on one route going there and on a different route coming home. I tried to explain to her the subtleties of the mathematical concept of the “greedy algorithm” but that didn't seem to help.

The Truth Doesn't Hurt

I was riding my stationary bike in the basement. Julia and Dillon came downstairs to get some hot dogs for dinner. Dillon wanted to say 'hi' to me. So he came into my study. We talked for a long time about many things because he jumps from topic to topic quickly. He was just leaving but he wanted to tell me about his latest success story.

Apparently, a non-government organization that produces data for policy makers wrote a report about the positive impact they were having. I immediately thought of all the times that my organization at work had tried to justify their existence and the many times that I had tried to aggrandize my work for my Personnel Evaluation Report.

In this organization's report, they referenced people who had used their data. Dillon was proud of the fact that the first report they referred to was one he had written. I said in an off-handed way “They must have been desperate”. 

Julia was shocked that I would say such a mean thing but she thought it was very funny. She couldn't believe that I would put down Dillon so blatantly.

I immediately felt bad that I had insulted Dillon. Julia said that he wouldn't be offended. She asked him later about it and said that I felt bad. He said that he wasn't offended.

 

I guess for Dillon the truth doesn't hurt.

Unusual Family Rituals

We visited Barb's friend Barb Dankelson in Indiana for the August long weekend. 

On Sunday night, we had a big family dinner with her son and daughter and two grand children as well as Barb, Sarah and I.  Barb D. made her famous spare ribs and corn on the cob. 

The spare ribs were ready before the corn on the cob.  So Barb's son brought out the spare ribs.  He said we should start serving it up.  So I picked out a few ribs and started eating.  Barb's son said that he meant serve it up not eat it up.

When Barb D. finally arrived with the corn on the cob, we served that up too.  Then we all held hands in a big circle to say a prayer before we could started eating.

I am not used to these types of pre-meal ritual.

Out of Retirement

This year I played for the best team in the Glen Cairn Men's Fastball League. The team has the best pitcher in the league. We are not a good team but with him pitching we win all of our games. He is a big guy and an older fellow.

 

In the league tournament, we played one game on Friday night.  We were scheduled to play two more games in the round robin on Saturday.  Then the playoffs would be on Sunday.  We would need to play two playoff games to win the championship.

We won the first two games and were assured a playoff spot in the A Division.  Unfortunately, the afternoon game on Saturday was rained out. It was rescheduled for 8 am on Sunday morning. That would mean that to win the championship we would need to play three games on Sunday.

When I arrived to the ball park on Sunday morning, our pitcher came up to me and told me that I would be pitching.  It was a meaningless game in the round robin.  So he wanted to save himself for the playoffs later in the day. 

I had only pitched one game in the last two years. So I wasn't very excited about the prospect of trying to get people out.  I didn't even think that I would be able to throw strikes.

The first batter I faced hit a long home run. I walked a few batters.  They scored a few more runs in the first inning.

 

The outfielders were happy though.  Our regular pitcher strikes everyone out. So they never get to field the ball. They had to run around like crazy to field the balls the other team hit off me.

That same player who hit the home run in the first inning hit two more home runs off me in his next two at bats.

 

He came up for a fourth time in the last inning.  He hit a ball out of the park again.  It would have been a home run but it went foul. Eventually I walked him so that he didn't hit four home runs off of me.

We lost the game 9-5.

 

Then we lost the semi-final game in the A Division playoffs. We were eliminated from the tournament.