View from the Mountain

First tomato sandwich of the year

I have had a tough 24 hours, I came home yesterday and we had experienced a less than two minutes power outage.  It did not bother my Mac, but it caused all sorts of havoc with my Windows PC.

In fact the problems have been so bad that I actually went down to Staples and considered buying a new Windows laptop.  There is one piece of software and one MLS system where I have to use Windows to participate.  I hate to give in and buy a new Windows machine. 

I tried several things to repair or reinstall Windows without a lot of luck.  I was almost done formatting one of the drives but I have now seen the blue screen of death and it is telling me it cannot format the drive.    I guess it is a new drive or a new computer.

However, to get myself through the forms I had to print tonight I installed Windows on MacBook.  It turned out to be much easier and faster than installing in on my Dell.  Unfortunately I can't seem to get Microsoft to recognize the activation code which must be somehow tied to my almost dead Dell hardware.  That gives me only 30 days to come up with a solution.

I am almost to the point with computers, that I would just as soon not use them, but I cannot figure out how to get my job done without them.  They have reached the point of being a necessary evil for me no matter who designs them and that includes Steve Jobs and his bunch of cronies.

So after a tough day of battling hardware, it was a great pleasure to have the first tomato sandwich of the year.  Unfortunately for Roanoke area readers, that ripe red tomato came from a hot house in Cape Carteret, NC so I wish you luck in finding something as tasty.

Our friends over at Bucks Corner Farm just off Route 58, not far from Emerald Isle, are the suppliers.  While they are just starting to get tomatoes, they are literally swimming in fresh strawberries.  We have taken to making strawberry smoothies every night.  We just use a few frozen berries, some light yogurt and as many strawberries as it takes to fill up the glasses.  It's absolutely delicious and much better than wrestling with stupid technology that sometimes causes more grief than anything.

Official notice, Beach season is open

I am not in the habit of giving notices, but I feel that this is a special case.  Last weekend was beautiful at the beach.  Now is the time to visit before the crowds and humidity.  The water is great for wading and a little swimming.

The beach to me is now Emerald Isle or one of the spots a little farther east along the strand of sand that runs along North Carolina's Southern Outer Banks (SOBX).

The Southern Outer Banks, often called the Crystal Coast, is a little less crowded than Nags Head and the Northern Outer Banks.  The waters seem a little warmer and the beaches a little wider with the exception Corolla on the Northern Banks which has some fantastic beaches and Ocracoke Island's thirteen miles of beaches.

Yet, I find that the Southern Outer Banks are just fine for me.  They are closer to the Roanoke area with a driving time to Emerald Isle of under five and one half hours.  The forecast for this weekend is even better than last weekend. You will find temperatures warmer, probably eighty or better off the beaches, so the cool water will feel great.

There are plenty of weekly rentals, over 700 at the weekly rentals link that I provided.  Sometimes you can snare a short weekend rental if you call late in the week.  I will be doing an Emerald Isle travel guide in the next day or two so check back here for the link.  You can find lots of area information, including pictures at my Coastal Paradise site or my Realtor® site.

If you want a taste of the salt air, but a more historical vacation, you might check out my newly enhanced Beaufort, NC Travel Guide.  Beaufort is a great place to enjoy the sea, have some great food, and do a little shopping.

Virginia Tech's extended family

Somehow this picture of the somber rainy morning we had last Sunday is about as close as I can get for a visual element.

I have been worked on the Va. Tech campus off and on since 1988 so I am just as shocked as many others in this area who have close ties to the campus.

Yesterday morning I was actually talking by instant messenger with someone I have worked with at VT when she became first aware of the unfolding events.  I tried to go to VT homepage as thousands of others did.  Strangely I was also talking with someone in Washington when the 9/11 events were first reported.

The horror was brought even closer to home when I learned from my wife that one of the students whom I watched be interviewed on NBC National News was the wounded intern at Cave Spring Veterinary Clinic that she had mentioned earlier in the day.

As is always the case, bad news draws more of crowd than good news.  It is hard not to feel that Va. Tech will always be marked with this event.

Yet there is no choice but to go forward, find comfort where comfort can be found and try to rebuild for a better tomorrow with the knowledge that Va. Tech's extended family is behind them 100%.

Yesterday I was surprised as I got a note from a friend in Vancouver asking me if my Va. Tech friends were okay.  One of the real estate brokers I work with took the time to call while on the road to ask if my friends and colleagues were okay.  I happily found a senior at VT with whom I worked last year online later in the day.  Last night a friend from Penn State asked about mutual acquaintances, and I got forward a note from Apple about some communications with Va. Tech.

It is reassuring to know that lots of people care and are wishing the best to an institution and connected people they have come to know as VT family.

We will all be in shock for a while, but there is little to do now but comfort those who have lost loved ones.

A consulting system engineer who is a graduate of Va. Tech and works for Apple forwarded me this link of VT memories.

The storm, two perspectives

Weather really is amazing stuff.  Today a storm whacked North Carolina and Virginia. 

I was lucky to be watching it from the coast.  Surprisingly our temperatures never dropped below 66 Fahrenheit last night.  We had serious rain until about the middle of the afternoon when the sky got light and the sun same out.  It even got up to 75 degrees. The heat from the sun was warm enough to cause our upstairs air conditioning  to run a couple of time late this afternoon.  It was set to 78.

I know the weather was very different in Roanoke.  The temperature got into the upper fifties before falling off a cliff in Roanoke.  I heard that the temperature was below 40 degrees before 11 pm.   I got a report from Pulaski that some cars got covered with some snow.

The temperature is now dropping rapidly here.  At 7 pm when I went across the Emerald Isle bridge to snap this picture, it was very windy but the temperature was still 70 degrees.  In four hours the temperature has dropped twenty degrees.

The good news is that we needed the rain.  Everything is definitely "well watered," and I am sure some other spots were not as lucky as we were here on our little part of the coast. 

The way the wind is blowing and backing the waters into the bays and sounds, I am sure some coastal folks will be facing flooding so it ended being a storm that we needed but with some after effects we could do without.

The Shooter, a great action flick

So here is the strategy to get to see a good action movie.   It might even work out like it did for me.  My wife, Glenda, even found the action movie and chose it as the one we were going to see.

She did that after reading a couple of reviews for "300" which I had been campaigning to see. My oldest daughter was even willing to go to see "300," but my wife suggested we go see "Shooter" instead.

Now I cannot help you out as to which reviews you should have your wife read, but I can suggest that you send her to the Rotten Tomatoes.com site for "300."

Have her watch three or four of the clips that they have, and she will be buying the tickets to "The Shooter" for you.

The "Shooter" is just an action classic that moves very well.  Fortunately you do not have time to ask yourself a lot of questions about the movie.  Still it is one of those movies where you can lose yourself in a bunch of action which has very little relation to reality unless you are shacked up in tiny cabin in Montana and writing manifestos.   My wife even enjoyed it, but wanted to know why no money was ever used in the movie.

I found it nice to go see a movie where the good guys win and the bad guys get nailed.  It took my mind off of doing my taxes which I finished up a couple of days later.

It has my recommendation, and I will likely buy it when it is available on DVD and put it on the shelf next to "The Rock."