Lifelong Learning

Jim and I spend from 4 to 12 hours on the computer every day. What *are* we doing all that time? Sometimes I struggle to answer that question, so I paid attention one day, and now I have an answer. The bulk of our time – up to 50% – is spent learning. Another 30% is spent communicating; reading, writing and managing emails; reading and writing blogs. That leaves 20% devoted to productive work.

Jim is reading technical newsletters and other articles about networking, Wi-Fi, and all things hardware, software and operating systems.

I am watching Lynda.com video tutorials on website development, CSS, Dreamweaver, Fireworks – I love Lynda.com! I am reading newsletters and forums on Blogger, Picasa, and general computer issues.

And we both spend time on what we call ‘playing’, but I could just as easily call it ‘learning by trial and error’.

I’m teaching a hands-on class here at Palm Creek starting next week. I’m calling it ‘Computer Confidence Class: For Women Only.’ 2 sessions/week for 3 weeks, maximum 6 students. I’m hoping to impart an expectation of lifelong learning. There’s no such thing as ‘learning how to use your computer.’ There’s just too much. The best you can hope for is to develop the confidence that you can figure things out – and to enjoy the process.

I’ve been learning, and teaching, computers for 24 years now and I’m learning more new things each day now than ever before. Not only is there an infinite amount to learn about using computers, but there’s an infinite amount to learn by using a computer!

I’ve learned how to cook artichokes in the microwave by researching on the computer (I used to boil them till google showed me another way.) We had some corn on the cob to go with our chicken last night. Jim asked me, “how are you going to cook that?” I answered, “I’m going to google it.” Betcha didn’t know that google is a cooking method!

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Water in Arizona!

Jim and I are both water-babies. We’ve always lived near the ocean and we spend as much time *in* the water as possible. It has surprised us how we can enjoy the beauty of the desert where there is no water. The Saguaro cactus and the sunsets are exquisite and quite beautiful. But, when we got an email inviting us for a boat ride on a lake in this desert, we jumped at the chance. A Lake! Where around here is there a lake? It’s only an hour and a half away! We were able to put in a half-day of work, drive up there, have a nice lunch and take a great boat ride, stop at Trader Joe’s on the way back, and be home before 8.

The invitation came from Brent and Molly. They both took a couple of our seminars at the FMCA rally in Redmond this summer, and we contacted each other via email afterward. They are RVers, but they usually spend winters on their sailboat in Mexico. This winter, Brent is the captain on the Desert Belle, a tour boat at Saguaro Lake. They have a great Blog, so you can read all about sailboating in Mexico or take (virtually) the same tour we did on Saguaro Lake … just visit Adventures with Brent and Molly!

Here’s a few photos from our wonderful day. See more on our web album – just click on any photo below and you’ll be at our web album – then you can click on the next or previous arrows above the photo to see more.

Thanx Brent!! Sure hope to visit with you more someday – sorry we didn’t get to meet Molly.

You gotta bring her down to see us in Palm Creek. Come to some more seminars!

Here’s Captain Brent:

We were lucky to spot a total of 4 bald eagles! I had to put the camera on extreme telephoto to get them.

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A French lesson

How do you say “Network Connections” in French? Hmmmmmm

This is what Jim had to figure out today. A couple of guests in the park here today needed help getting connected to the Wi-Fi network here. He said, “No problem, I can help” and took a look at their computer. These people were from Quebec and all the titles and instructions on their computer were in french!

Ah! But of course! This will take me a few minutes longer. But, he did it.

… in case you’re wondering … “Network Connection” translates into french as “raccordement de réseau.” At least that’s what Babelfish translation website tells me!

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Palm Creek Photo Albums

As I mentioned in a previous post, we were asked to take photos at some Palm Creek events when the normal photographer was unavailable. This means we’ve taken a lot of pictures of activities here. What they want is a CD of all the photos we take. But, you *know* we can’t do just that! Photos deserve to be on the web for all to see! So, we’ve just created a Picasa Web Albums for Palm Creek.
Yesterday, we went hiking with the Palm Creek Hiking club. Another gorgeous hike in the desert around the Superstition mountains. All the photos are on the Palm Creek web album, but here are a few just for us.

I sure wish we could be there at sunset time for better photos, but – till then, I just played around with color settings in Picasa to make a more interesting photo

Picasa is SO much fun! Here’s the original photo, untouched by Picasa:

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Palm Creek Photo Albums

As I mentioned in a previous post, we were asked to take photos at some Palm Creek events when the normal photographer was unavailable. This means we’ve taken a lot of pictures of activities here. What they want is a CD of all the photos we take. But, you *know* we can’t do just that! Photos deserve to be on the web for all to see! So, we’ve just created a Picasa Web Albums for Palm Creek.
Yesterday, we went hiking with the Palm Creek Hiking club. Another gorgeous hike in the desert around the Superstition mountains. All the photos are on the Palm Creek web album, but here are a few just for us.

I sure wish we could be there at sunset time for better photos, but – till then, I just played around with color settings in Picasa to make a more interesting photo

Picasa is SO much fun! Here’s the original photo, untouched by Picasa:

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Giving Thanks

I think Thanksgiving is a great holiday. No pressure or commercialization of giving gifts. Just a time to be together and give thanks for the good things in our lives. A day to accentuate the positive. Mostly, Jim and I give thanks for each other. We know that we are very lucky to share the same dream and have the health and skills to accomplish it! We are living our dream – starting our 5th year of the fulltime RV lifestyle – and we couldn’t do it without each other.

We wish Health and Happiness to all of you on this Thanksgiving Day!

Geek Work

This weekend we gave our “High-Speed Internet on the Road” seminar. We discuss the 3 choices: Satellite, Cellular, and Wi-Fi. Most of the class discusses Wi-Fi because that is the most popular choice and there is a LOT to know about it. The seminar is also sponsored by MatrixRV who provides the Wi-Fi here in the park. Here’s a video giving just a taste of our seminars:

Then, Sunday, Jim had an unusual assignment – to take a Datastorm satellite dish down from a motorhome’s roof! When you put a dish up, it is on a mounting plate that makes it easy to just slide on the ladder. When you take one down, you leave the mounting plate on the roof – no holes that way – making it much more difficult to get it down a ladder. I’m not sure what is wrong with it – it’s not one of Jim’s installations. The people had to get on the road, and, since Jim had helped them with some issues over the phone in the past – they trusted him to take it and see if he can fix it. That’s nearly 100 pounds he’s holding on to there.

As for me, I’m just writing and doing web-work. Not much to take a picture of there. So, here’s a picture of pretty flowers! With the Arizona setting sun for lighting, they’re even more brilliant than normal.

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Jane Seymour at Palm Creek

This park, Palm Creek, has lots of events and entertainment scheduled throughout the season. We’ve never really taken advantage of it before, but we’re more interested this year since we’re here all season. So, when they asked if we would attend the Jane Seymour event and take pictures – we gladly accepted. Jim decided to be the photographer, but I had to grab the camera at least to get a picture of him with Jane … “Beauty and the Geek!”

It was an interesting event, not at all what I was expecting. It was about a new website by the founder of Monster.com – Jeff Taylor. The website is a social networking site for those of us, “Lovin Life on the flip side of 50.” The name of the site is eons.com and it does look pretty interesting. Here’s Jeff Taylor lovin’ this 55 – 80 year old crowd.

So, the event was a little bit about Jeff Taylor, a little bit about the joys of middle age and, then the headliner was Jane Seymour – their celebrity spokesperson. I really liked her! Lots more photos on our web album.

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Jane Seymour at Palm Creek

This park, Palm Creek, has lots of events and entertainment scheduled throughout the season. We’ve never really taken advantage of it before, but we’re more interested this year since we’re here all season. So, when they asked if we would attend the Jane Seymour event and take pictures – we gladly accepted. Jim decided to be the photographer, but I had to grab the camera at least to get a picture of him with Jane … “Beauty and the Geek!”

It was an interesting event, not at all what I was expecting. It was about a new website by the founder of Monster.com – Jeff Taylor. The website is a social networking site for those of us, “Lovin Life on the flip side of 50.” The name of the site is eons.com and it does look pretty interesting. Here’s Jeff Taylor lovin’ this 55 – 80 year old crowd.

So, the event was a little bit about Jeff Taylor, a little bit about the joys of middle age and, then the headliner was Jane Seymour – their celebrity spokesperson. I really liked her! Lots more photos on our web album.

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Changing of the Quilts

I own two quilts, both of which I love, both of which have rich sentimental value to me. So – I use one in the summer season, and one in the winter. The white and pastel colored one is the summer quilt.

This quilt was started by my grandmother … when she was pregnant with my mother! She painstakenly created all the squares in the design of ‘dresden plate’. When my grandmother died, I inherited the box with all the squares and, eventually, I got around to getting it quilted. I love that I have something to remember my sweet grandmother by.

The darker colored ‘tshirt quilt’ is our winter quilt and we put it on last night. No, it’s nowhere near winter here … 80 degrees and sunny right now … but it’s past time to make the switch if we’re going to use each quilt half of the year.

This quilt is made up of pieces of all those tshirts that we just couldn’t throw away because of memories, but we knew we’d never wear again. I love staring at each piece and remembering those times. There are tshirts of Jim’s before we met as well as some of mine from before we met, then there are a lot of memories from our early years together.

We don’t have many possessions in our tiny home, but the ones we do have are meaningful.

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