I'm back here again at my Caribou Coffee shop and this time I got my favorite seat next to the fire.  Ahhhh.... cozy!  I'm about to start work on the old manuscript but had to check in via Facebook, and for the first time found two other people have also checked in where I'm at.  But they didn't have proper photographs so I couldn't look around to see who they were.

Weird that you can now go into a place, punch buttons on your phone, and find out stuff about people sitting around you.  Fun and creepy at the same time.

Meanwhile I'm getting texts from my love's daughter's boyfriend.  He's been asking for manadvice (man-advice?) from the worldly older gentleman.  Me?  How did I become a worldly older gentleman?  When did I cross that line?  Not that I object, but it's never been a role I'd seen myself in.

I hope I don't lead him astray.  "Stay away from the tequila, young man.  Stay away, far away..."

This fireplace feels so nice!  I think I'll be here a while.

Okay, now to start working on my manuscript...

My vacation with my love was wonderful and now that we're apart I'm missing her terribly.  Hopefully we'll be back together by this weekend, but if not, then week after -- I have two days I'll be working in her vicinity and if everything goes right we'll have 4-5 days together.

Meanwhile here I am in Chicagoland.  I got off work and brought my mini-supercomputer to my favorite coffee place to work on a manuscript, but alas, all the tables next to the fireplace are taken, and it looks like the people are there for the long haul.  The temperature has plummeted here and it's supposed to snow before midnight, and my feet are freezing from sitting next to a window, and I'm totally coveting those fireside tables.  They're so cozy.  

I want a fireplace.  The next place I move to will have one.

I'm so cold I'm thinking of packing up and going to the Chili's across the parking lot, because I've never been in a cold Chili's.

That sounds weird, doesn't it?

I'm on vacation for the next 9 days.

I drove down from Chicago last night and am now on Lady Savina's farm.  She has a multi-page "honey do" list for me.  For anyone else in the world I would be resentful, but for her, I'll do anything.  I'll even climb under the kitchen sink and willfully destroy her plumbing.

I keep telling her I'm not a plumber, but okay, I'll give it a try.

Her eldest daughter just got a new horse named Joy.  It's a beautiful brown arabian with a white star on it's face.  I'm saying it because I don't know if it's a he or she yet.  By the end of the day I'll know.

The youngest daughter is 6 and keeps picking up a guitar and writing songs.  The amazing thing is that she doesn't really know what she's doing -- she's just strumming without chords -- but her lyrics rhyme and they're all about the power of being a girl, and the amazing things she can do.  You can tell she has some strong positive influences.

Just now I got a text from work.  They need me to do something immediately.  Hmm.  So much for vacation.

Hope all is well with you!

Jerry

I'm at Lady Savina's farmhouse right now. It's 2AM and I can't sleep, because I'd taken a "recovering still from being sick" nap this afternoon. So it's me and her eldest daughter's three cats, and we're playing with my high powered laser pointer I have from work.

The oldest cat, the one who scratched the hell out of my foot earlier because I dared try and block it from going up the stairs (where its not supposed to go) it has no interest in the laser dot whatsoever. Doesn't care. Thinks its silly.

The other two cats, however, go absolutely nuts. I'll try and post a video -- not sure if I can from my iPhone. But it's so fun watching them chasing this dot around, and these are not athletic, wiry farm cats, either -- they're big, bulky, fat house cats.

It was kind of cool -- I was invited to Apple for a meeting about using iPads in the business environment.  So I show up this morning way early, because I thought traffic would be worse than it was, and ended up having breakfast at a Starbucks a block away.  Everyone there, it seemed, was using an Apple product.

An hour later I get to the Mainplace store (in Naperville, IL) and had a great meeting with the Apple Business unit and the CEO of Lextech Global about all the ways that businesses are adopting the iPad.

What gets me is the sales figures.  The iPad is even beating the iPhone in sales, and is showing signs to have the highest adoption rate of any product in recorded history.  They're on track to sell 28 million of the things by the end of 2011.

What are businesses using them for?  Basically, anything you'd use a clipboard for and a piece of paper, that's what they're using the iPad for.  Instead of jotting down notes or data or filling in forms to be later re-entered into a computer, you simply enter it into the iPad and then it goes directly into the company databases. 

Me?  I mainly use mine as a television set.  I just finished watching the entire last 5 seasons of Doctor Who on it.

I never mentioned on here that I set up a photo blog. Did I?

It's at PhoBloggery.com

Gone is the paranoia that caused me to lock down this Xanga site.  I've removed it and thrown the doors wide open to let in some air and light.

LadySavina's estranged husband won't come looking here, and if her kids do, that's okay.  I love her kids.  Even the one who probably still thinks I'm the devil.

I'm happy to report that her and I are as crazy about each other as ever.  Marriage for us looks to be on an ever-receding horizon, but it's still on that horizon, and you know what?  Who cares?  We still have each other.  We've done the improbable: we've made a long distance relationship work.

I read somewhere that if you really want people to read your blog posts, you need to keep them to 4 paragraphs or shorter.  This is paragraph #4.  LOL.  Hello to everyone in Xangaland, thank you for still being here.

Today is the 4th anniversary of our first kiss. 

Four years ago tonight, Tracy (Lady Savina) and I were sitting in her car, and we were flirting non stop, and I had asked if I could kiss her.  She said no.  A little later I asked again, and she again said no.  Then about ten minutes later (I'm guessing at the time because I don't quite remember) she suddenly launched herself at me and we were kissing.  I think it was right in the middle of a sentence in our conversation, and then the next thing I knew she had her arms around me and our faces were smooshed together.

We have been kissing non stop ever since.

You know, it's actually healthy to kiss?  It's totally good for you.

So go kiss someone! 

And happy "First Kiss Day!"

I'd almost completely forgotten about Xanga in this world of Facebook.  Speaking of which, I seem to remember it was a couple of Xangites who first pulled me fighting and clawing into Facebook in the first place.  I didn't want to go.

Now it's taken over everything.  It and Twitter.

For me, Xanga started it's downhill slide after splitting itself off into the Mamaroo and whatnot sub-sites.  But now that I'm kind of sick of Facebook, maybe it's time to come back here.

I'm kind of glad I didn't delete this account.  I came very close.  Back when I thought LadySavina and I were no more.

We're still going strong.  We're not married yet, because her circumstances haven't changed, but we're more in love than ever and we see each other as much as we can.

My love prepares to venture out onto the Iowa tundra for something she left in the car last night.

We're spending a cozy weekend here at the farm house.

Hope everyone in Xangaland has a wonderful new year!