From The Bad To The Good To The Amazing.

Saturday and Sunday were just bad days. First, Saturday my computer started acting up and crashed in the late afternoon. Without the computer I couldn’t get to the blog or do any work requiring the computer. I walked over to the store Saturday night and bought the early version of the Sunday paper to check for ads on new computers. Office Max had a nice ad with a really reasonably priced computer for sale. They opened at 10 on Sunday morning.Sunday I made sure I was at the closest Office Max to my house exactly at 10. Of course the store was out of the sale model. The clerk did check all the stores in the Portland area and found out that the store in downtown Portland had one. The downtown store reserved the computer for me. It was about a half of an hour drive from the store where I was first at to the second store. On the trip from the one store to the other, I got maybe a mile and heard a clunking noise and pulled over. Flat tire city. It took an hour for AAA to get there. I finally did make it to the store in downtown Portlnad and bought the new computer. Not a great weekend.

Monday things started to turn around. When I got to work there was an email waiting for me from one of the partners about a project that I had done. The email started “nice job, Bill” I mean after the weekend from hell it was so nice to have a compliment. I know I did a good job but the partner didn’t have to say that. She kind of put me in a good mood for the rest of the day. Monday night was good too. A little background. I am in a football pool with ten other guys and one woman. At this point in the season four of the participants are knocked out of the pool and the other eight compete the rest of the season. At the start of the game Monday night I was one of the four to be eliminated. I needed something to happen for me to move into the top eight and it did Monday night. What happened would have normally eliminated my good friend Ted unless it was combined with something that probably had a thousand to one chance of happening. We beat the odds, Ted and I move on into the top eight and the guy nobody likes was eliminated. Then I found out that a link was provided to my blog on The Oregonian’s web page, Oregonlive.com. For those of you that didn’t read my comment to Pat, here is the link where they mentioned my blog, http://www.oregonlive.com/idahosportugal/index.ssf/2008/12/amazing_race_in_portland_voodo.html
Monday was a great day!

Today was a good day too thanks to an amazing neighbor. I’ve written about my leaf problem. I was pretty much fifty per cent done with the project and planned on complete the leaf removal this weekend. Today I was in an accounting seminar updating us on the new tax laws that came with the Economic Stimulus Act. It is a two day seminar so I will be there tomorrow too. Accounting seminars are a good place to catch up on some sleep, read a book, do some writing, but listening to boring speakers all day can be very exhausting. I was pretty tied when I got home. I heard some noise in my backyard. I walk out there and there is my neighbor Jim mowing my lawn and the rest of the leaves were gone. Bless his heart, what a great neighbor. Said he was bored and needed something to do. Is that a good neighbor or what?

May all your days be good and may all your neighbors like my amazing neighbor, Jim.