Wednesday, May 2nd .....

What a relief that May is here at last.  The countdown to our holiday takes on a new meaning when we reach the same month as when we leave.  It's now less than three weeks until we start on the first leg of the journey.  Of course, it’s a bit of an anticlimax as we have four days in Wollongong before we really start the trip by getting on the Singapore Airlines A380 at Sydney Airport.  But, there’s a magic in leaving the state, even if it’s just for a visit to the family.

I had a call this yesterday from the nursing home to tell me that Uncle Archie had blotted his copybook again. Someone had taken his glasses case so Uncle Archie thumped him.  The staff of the nursing home were pretty sanguine about it; it’s what you expect from a resident with dementia.

I’ve come across a great photograph to use as a desktop background.  I get tired of the same old picture so I change it frequently.  This one shows the Legend of the Seas cruise ship tied up at Osanbashi Pier in Yokohama.  What’s the odds of finding a photograph of the ship we are sailing on tied up at the pier we are sailing from?

Using the brilliant Street View facility on Google Maps, I’ve followed every inch of the walk from Nihonodori Station to the pier.  What did we ever do without computers to help us.  I suppose we stepped out and hoped that everything unfolded as it should.  Perhaps, we were less adventurous and avoided places where we weren’t sure of what we might find. 

Things have been very busy around here over the past couple of weeks.  Marilyn has been absorbed in the organisation of the Sustainability forums and, as usually happens in Tasmania, everyone leaves it to the last minutes to decide whether to come or not.   The first session is tomorrow in Hobart and we sent off the final list for the printing of certificates at 8.30 this morning.  Within 30 minutes, we had four more entries.  And, of course, the plan is to have as many at the sessions as possible, so you can’t say Too late!

One silly issue is the number of people who send an email to say, I’d like to book for me and another girl.  Or, I’d like to book for me and my daughter.  Does the daughter have a name or do I put on her name-tag Pat’s Daughter?  Marilyn’s tried to find out about Pat’s daughter by sending an email and by ringing and leaving a message but Pat hasn’t bothered to reply, so the daughter will end up with a hand-written name-tag unlike the beautifully printed ones for everyone else.  I hope she blames Mum.

My blogging program, Blogspot, has just changed the look of its 'Dashboard' supposedly to give it a more modern feel.  Rubbish, it's more difficult to use, not as elegant and the size of the font of the published post is smaller.  Another example of an unwanted change resulting in a less usable outcome.