Saturday night – Plan B

Well. You guessed it. Gabes passport and Visa did NOT come today.. thank you USPS. Well. Let me modify that.. the good people at the USPS have been reallllly helpful.. its not ther fault that they are chronically understaffed, underpaid .. and their funding keeps getting reduced. They’ve been trying to help us locate this doc..

but.. we cant wait for it for Gabe to leave, so we kicked in Plan B.. instead of the two of us heading to Minneapolis with our Tons .. ok.. not tons.. technically (3×70 me ) + ( 2 x50 Gabe) plus our carry-ons ( ~2 x 40 ) plus our backpacks (~2 x+ 25) == 440 pounds of luggage between us. I’m able to help because with out United status I can carry more and heavier bags.

anyway.. Gabe packed up.. said goodbye (for a few weeks we’re taking her over in april) to his beloved nova and his very beloved mom. ( I cant believe I didn’t get a picture of gabe and diane that morning !) And me.. and. The snow and I took him to the airport..

I dropped off Gabe with his part of the luggage.. and just as I was driving away I got notified that they had tried to deliver his passport.. instead of leaving it for us….they left us a cryptic pink slip with no way of contacting anyone. I went to the Richmond post office.. which was closed .. but they oet me in anyway. They tried to help me locate the package. It wasn’t there They called the postmaster.. who offered to come in tomorrow (Sunday to see if it came in with the amazon stuff .. , they called the distribution center.. but no answer.

If they had just left the passport I would have actually had time to pick it up and make it to the airport with my luggage and fly with gabe..

but it was not to be..

instead I got at least one more day at home with Diane and nova.. which is always nice.

Gbaes on his way to see his grandma, his aunt and uncle and his cousins.

its been such a great time having him here in Vermont.

we are definitely going to miss him..
at the same time we are so excited for the adventure he’s starting in Germany !

Nite all, nite sam
-me

Friday night – One more party for Gabe

The plan is for Gabe and me to head to Minneapolis to see my mom and my sister Mary and fam on our way to Germany Next Tuesday. There’s one big catch. Gabes passport with his new Vissa haven’t arrived. He paid an extra $40 for the Consulate to ‘overnight’ it to him.. but they used USPS Expedited service which is supposed to take 1-3 days.. .. and that’s when its working. I think the germans must have confused our postal sevice for theirs. We were expecting the Passport and visa on Wednesday. It didn’t gcome, then we were sure it would be here on Thursday.. nope. So we were really sure it was coming today..

but it didn’t..

that means that if it doesn’t come in the mail tomorrow we have. Big problem .. we spent the day trying to figure out a contingency plan. At worst, Gabe will head to Minneapolis.. then I’ll follow as soon as we get the passport.

But for now.. we coan still have a good time.. tehre are some folks gabe still wants to see.

so today we.. (as aways) took a great rivershore hike.. for another romp in the snow. Check out the snow on just one side of the trees

Tonight Jack, Ali, Tom and Hope … (they’re dating which is so cool !) came over..

we started in on cheese.. my friend Mike gifted us this incredible cheese of the month service.. and its amazing.. aways good to share with others !

It was great catching up with everyone. They’re all doing great

It feels like Gabe has really gotten a great does of catching up with people. It’s been relaly fun for us too !

OK.. so lets see if that passport comes tomorrow ?

Nite all. Nite sam
-me

Thursday night – OnShape and On the town

today after work I helped run an OnShape cad xlass for 9 FIRST robotics kids.. The fine folks at Greenway were kidn enough to offer us the space. Tim from Work offered us some cheese.. and my friends Nathan and Jake offered their time to teach the class. And Seamus and McKenna help recruit the students.. it was a real collaborative effort

It was really great spending time with the robot kids.. and it was good for me to try and finally learn onshape.

We did find one realllllllly gnarly piece of cheese in a fresh new box !

I also got a chance to catch up with my friend Mark S who’s the founder and CEO of Greenway. Its and amazing new engineering college. Here in Vermont at th e site of the old Vermont College. . patterned a bit like Olin college where Mark taught for 10 years. 100 % project oriented .. and focused on real world issues like sustainability It’s turning in to a really special place > ||Its really a beautiful spot

From there I drove straight tto Burlignton to catch the ned of my fre4ind Eric’s 25th IBM anniversary. Eric is a very talented engineer and got his PhD while working at IBM. He’s super admired by everyone. It was great to see him surrounded by all this love !

I missed the pizza.. but it did get to see erik and so many of our old friends. David, Zuch, Jeff, Nate, Rob, Dabile Siko.. many others too ! . A bunch of our colleages from East Fishkill and Yorktown (Chandu, Natesan, Kerim) xcme up as well whc8h I know meant a lot to Eric.

I also got some time to catch up with Chandu which is always fun.

busy , busy , busy and fun day..
nite all, nite sam
-me

Tuesday night – talked to Billy

Billy continues to gather strength every day.. even so, we haven’t really been able to tlak to him.. Today was the first day we could really talk.. and he sounds like himself !!!!

it was so great to be able to talk just for even a few minutes. He’s doing ok.. eager to get out of there.. and feeling very grateful to be doing so well..

On the way home from work I stopped by Sikuras to pick up sushi for dinner. Sumner is coming over…

I love going to Sakuras.. Cooper who works there knows my rders before I even same them.. and he can do that with almost anyone who walks in the door !

they have a samstoen in one of their plants that I must have put there 10 years ago

I got hoem to find Gabe reliving his youth by digging a tunnel in a snowbank that had been made by the plow.. it was so fun to watch. I craweled in there to help a little too.. Finally he was through !

dinner was fun .. then Gabe and sumner headed out.

total deliciousness

nite all. Nite sam
-me