Houston, TX area latitude N 29°46′50″ longitude W 095°588′18″ elevation 14’

Never a boring minute! We took an awful driving trip to Colorado at Christmas, I did a remodel in our Oregon house basement, Susan had major surgery, we sold the Oregon house, and I went back to work.

We drove the 1350 miles to Colorado to spend Christmas with our children, their significant others, and our grand daughter. Santa was very good to all of us. Much of the four day trip going out was on ice at 35 to 40 miles per hour. We had a great time during our short stay and a dry road for our trip back to Oregon.

When we returned to Eugene from our short Christmas holiday the western Oregon weather was wet and cold which is normal for that time of year I took that opportunity to do a remodeling project in our basement. I put up sheet rock and a drop ceiling on a 10 by 17 area that was part of a larger storage area. I moved in a desk, file cabinet, a TV, and some exercise equipment to give prospective buyers an idea of the possibilities available in all that space. I learned a lot about patience with that project and did a really good job. The project cost less than $300 in material and about two weeks of my labor.

I would like to think that the improvement made all the difference in marketing our house, because the first people that saw the house after the renovation bought it. The truth is, we don’t know what helped them make their decision. The house we want in Colorado is now in loan default which means we are dealing with a bank. We made them an offer, but they are taking forever to respond. We may try to buy something else. Susan is in Colorado trying to find us a house.

Susan had a large benign tumor removed from her abdomen the first week of February. The surgeons took out a bunch of unnecessary parts including her gall bladder, and appendix. Susan is to my reference to her surgery as a roto rooter job. She is fine now and completely healed according to her doctor. Susan did a great job of closing on our house and supervising the loading of our stuff in Oregon and getting it moved to storage in Colorado. We are now officially homeless.

I started a new job in Houston the 2nd of March. I’m doing some electrical consulting on a couple of offshore oil drilling rigs. I’m working on a contract basis for a small project management company that has commissioning responsibility for these platforms. The platforms are being built in the Corpus Christi, TX area where I will be working on the fourth of April. The rigs will load on barges near the end of September headed to Brazil for installation where the commissioning team plans to start them up. I should be in Rio for Carnival in February 2010. I know it sounds like a boondoggle, but who am I to complain?

Working after a year and a half sabbatical is a shock to the system. You know how hard it is to come back to work and get in the swing of things after a two week vacation. Just imagine how that feels like times about forty and going right into 55 hour work weeks.

Enough whining for now. How about dropping me a line to let me know what is going on in your life?