July Heat Wave; Computer Crisis and Joys

The heat wave throughout much of the nation has affected us in Southern Illinois also. Not me cause I am able to stay mostly under AC. But I worry because of Katherine's MS and I worry because Gerald was up against a deadline on a project with our neighbor, and he has worked outside in his shop right through all of this heat. He has come in with his clothes wringing wet. But tonight he came in celebrating, nevertheless.

Tonight Gerald and Scott tested the two spray rigs they have been building for weeks now. The sprayers worked. In the cool of the evening, I went out and watched them try out the first sprayer. One will be shipped to Florida tomorrow and another to England. Since he has to help load hay or straw bales in the morning before he goes to physical therapy, Gerald will still be working out in the heat. I must say he is tough.

Because we had two blue-screen shut downs at the first of the week following by another crisis on Monday night, I have spent a couple of days getting at least some of my documents backed up. I am terribly negligent about back-up. And I have never arranged to keep back-ups in another place in case of fire as I was told to do in a class early in the history of computers. I considered it excellent advice, but I have failed to follow it.

I have warned all my email buddies that I may be shut down with a crash anyday now. But once I started warning people, our computer has worked perfectly. Well, slow, but just fine otherwise. So we will see what happens. I am pleased I have the back-ups accomplished. Certainly not everything as I got terribly bored, but I hope the most important documents. On an older computer, I used to back up important emails, but then I did not know how to retrieve them from the disk. So I don't back up emails anymore.

Computers are so amazing and mystifying to me. I have been receiving emails of a friend's son and family on a mission trip to Morocco. The same Texas friend is also sending us up-to-date information about a mutural friend in a nursing home in Nebraska. I am also checking Jon Musgrave's blog and audio entries from over in the Ukraine with a mission team from Marion Second Baptist. I am in closer contact with cousins than I have ever been in my life since I hear from them regularly at least with forwards while in the old days, we might only hear from each other at Christmas. And like much of the population, I have found family history on the Internet that I never dreamed I would ever be able to discover. And like much of the population, I will go through a difficult withdrawal period if and when we crash.