Which Mac is Which?

BACKGROUND - My 5 year old MacBook Pro (translation: Apple laptop) is on its last gigabytes! I went to the Genius Bar today (translation: help desk for Mac geeks), where I was hoping to find a quick answer to its problems. Instead, Boromir (that's my laptop's name) is being shipped to the Depot (translation: where sick Apples go for refurbishment). They charge a flat fee of $310 to fix and/or replace everything that needs it. Sounds good. Except, because Boromir has a ding on its corner - from when the airline staff unexpectedly made me stow my bag in the hold, on my way to Afghanistan - I will have to pay $610 to fix him! Never mind that the problems pre-date the ding.

SETTING - So, exploring my options, along comes Jordan the Expert, according to his business card. Besides being the cutest guy there, he also proved to be exactly as his card said ... an expert.

PROBLEM - After Jordan explained all of my options and let me test drive all the models (including the Maserati), I am in a quandary. What should I buy, in case Boromir becomes too expensive to fix?

QUESTION -
Another MacBook Pro? 13"
MacBook Air?
iMac 21" ?
iPad 2?
Any combination of the above?


- Posted from my iPhone via BlogPress

Ode to a Soldier

I never really knew my dad as a person. I never knew his dreams, his hopes, his thoughts. I never knew his favorite sport; what his favorite team might have been; or what music he liked best. I never knew what he wanted for his children, or how he saw himself.

I did, however, know him as a Soldier. As a little girl, I remember holding his hand – but only his left hand, so he could salute with his right - as we walked to “the Company”, to the motor pool, to the chow hall, or to some other place that Soldiers walk. I remember the day I stood proudly at attention alongside my dad, at the PX cafeteria in Paris, as Ballad of the Green Berets played on the jukebox. I was 9, and I just knew that I would be a Soldier one day, just like my dad.

Two years later, he was in Vietnam, and I became Walter Cronkite’s biggest fan. Night after night, my mother and I stayed glued to the TV set – she on the couch, and I on the floor, two feet from the screen, because I couldn’t see anything in focus from far
away. You see ... no one knew how fervently I believed that, if I watched the evening news hard enough, and didn’t see my dad on the TV, then he wouldn’t die. It made sense to an eleven year old.

After Dad returned, we crossed the ocean again, and he saw to it that I learned how to properly polish

The End is also the Beginning

It wasn't planned to start a journal with a death.  But it happened. Betwixt and between the travel, the ceremony arrangements, that last-minute work related instructions, and the reunion of the four siblings, it was possible to gather some thoughts and compose a few words that turned into a eulogy.

Full military honors were rendered at the funeral ... honors that were earned through 20+ years of hard, yet determined, service to a Nation.

Stay tuned.