Jan & I at 5000 ft.

The view from our hotel in Loen.
















A really awesome view of a lake... somewhere!


So, I've been back from Norway for a week, and still haven't updated my blog. Sorry! But I'll try and get a bit out today, and more soon.

The trip was wonderful. The group that we traveled with from Eau Claire were a lot of fun, and the rest of the tour that we met in Norway were from all around the world. I definitely made new friends (Hi Lana & Darlene!) and came away with wonderful memories of a beautiful country (and around 1100 photos).

I will put more photos up later, along with a slideshow (once I figure out how to do it!). But I promise not to put all of them up here -- you'd never get through all of them! But I did get some great shots, and can't wait to share several of them. It was a great trip, even though by the end Jan and I were ready to kill each other. :) But overall, we enjoyed traveling with each other, even if we won't be doing it again anytime soon!

So we got back Sunday night, I got back to my house Monday, picked up Thor from the kennel (he was not happy with me, btw), and got ready for school on Tuesday! Three days of inservice, and then I headed up to the Cities to hit the MN State Fair on Friday. I went with Chris, Ger (her mom), and Nicholas (her nephew). We had a blast, and ate our weight in fried food. Big Fat Bacon -- nummy! Pig Lickers -- gross.

Now I'm enjoying a few days of NOTHING before school gets going in full swing on Tuesday. It's hard to believe that summer's over with already!

Who needs to sleep when the Olympics are on???

So, pretty much I haven't slept more than a few hours at a time this week. I am obsessed with the Olympics, and since they are on 24-hours a day, it doesn't leave much time for rest. I've even been watching boxing (4-7 p.m., CNBC). I even know how they score boxing. I have created a "nest" on the couch, always surrounded by smokes, a bevvie (coffee, Pepsi or beer, depending on the time of day), and a book to read during commercials. It's a good thing these only happen every 2 years!

But, I figure I need to get all my Olympic needs filled this week, since I leave for Norway on Friday and don't really plan on having time to stay up-to-date next week. I haven't started packing yet, but that's on the agenda for today. I did talk to my credit card companies and let them know I'd be gone, and dealt with all my money stuff, but as for actually putting stuff in a suitcase, well...

My next post should have plenty of pictures, and will be updated sometime the week of the 25th. Although, I will be at inservice for school, and probably need to do some stuff to get ready for classes, too. It's hard to believe school starts on the 2nd! I'm not ready!!!

Nothing's Ever as Easy as it Seems...

So, I was pretty excited when I had the opportunity to buy Microsoft Office 2007 Suite for a great deal. As a (now former!) student at UWEC, there was a website I could log into and get this great student discount. Instead of around $300, the CDs were shipped right to my house in 3 days for only $75.00! So, it showed up last Friday, and right away I tried to load it. Ummm... it didn't work. So, I went online and learned I had to first remove the old Office stuff. No more Word and PPT. Not a problem, though, because I'd load this right up, right?

Not right. I ended up having to download and install SEVERAL Microsoft Updates (apparently, it's a really good idea to install those right away when your computer tells you to). So that took most of the weekend. But finally, all updates were installed by Sunday morning. And the damn CDs still didn't work! Ugh. I found out I could call the UWEC computer help desk, but of course, not on a Sunday in August. Grr.

So this morning, I gave them a call. A very nice young man named Kyle was ever so helpful! He pointed out that these are DVDs, not CDs, and should run in my DVD drive. They don't. He told me then that my only option was to call the company where I ordered them from and request a new copy. I was profuse with my thanks.

But, I thought, before I call this company, I should double-check my DVD drive. And guess what!!! That doesn't work. Nothing will read in that drive. So, I went online and bought a stupid new DVD drive. Another $45.00. Then I found a great website on how to install DVD drives. I thought, "Great! I can do this myself!" Untill I actually read the steps. It seemed a bit more complicated than I want to tackle. I called my local computer store (Viroqua Office and Computer Supply) and found out that they will install it for me, along with any software for between $35 and $70. Good lord. Not that that's a bad price, but my "GREAT DEAL" on software has turned out to be a lot more work than I'd expected. But then again, what else is new and different???