Cali, Alex, Sam and Ann

Sam is hanging out with Alex this weekend at Tarleton. We met Alex in the Fort Worth Stockyards for dinner. He brought his friend Callie along. Callie is from Denton and her dad happens to work at Collin College in Frisco.

It was great to see Alex. Sounds like things are going great at Tarleton. He’s enjoying school, his new friends and his job with Kobie Wood. Kobie is a horseman in the Stephenville area. He’s letting Alex work at his ranch. Another great opportunity for Alex to learn from people in his field of interest.

Keep up the good work, Alex!

Crocket Hall - Tarleton State University, Stephenville, TX

We dropped Alex off at Tarleton today. Eighteen years in the nest and he’s finally on his own. I think Alex was ready. Not sure we were, but that’s another story.

We left Wednesday evening and spent the night in Stephenville. Move-in was 10:00am Thursday. Alex registered with the dorm staff and we started traipsing up and down the stairs to move in his stuff. Alex’s new roommate, Justin, was there as well moving his stuff in. Justin brought the TV, Alex brought the XBox. What more do they need.

We all had a nice lunch in the Thompson Center Banquet Hall hosted by the Residential College staff. Saying goodbye wasn’t easy but we’re all proud of Alex and know he’ll do well. Go Texan’s!

PS. We’ll get you his address as soon as he gives it to us!

Sam, Sarah, Jose, Ashley, Alex, Bo - Heading to Billy Bob's

Alex and Sam brought a couple international counselors home from Spruce with them this week. Brazil, Spain and the Dominican Republic were represented. Bo from Spain and Jose from the Dominican Republic are still heere and went to Billy Bobs with Sam and Sarah and Ashely (who works in the Camp Office). Oh and Ann and Amy Sible went as “chaperones”.

Posted with WordPress for iPhone

The Wordpress for iPhone app was released for the iPhone today. It allows posting to WordPress hosted or self hosted WP blogs directly from your iPhone. Doesn’t have much in the way of administrative support but I don’t think I’d want to try and do that on the iPhone anyway. Using it to post this as a matter of fact.

Time will tell if this gets me to post more often or whether it results in me posting more junk that no one wants to read!

UPDATE: Actually had to do final updates on the computer. The app on the phone does make adding a picture easy, but you can’t adjust site or position without adding html to the post. Typing html on the iPhone is a beast. Nearly impossible to do with any accuracy. And clearly accuracy it rather critical when manually typing code - yes?

Despite all of the doom and gloom reported in the press, the wait wasn’t too bad and the activation process also went smoothly. Though I admit that the average person would still think that waiting in line for 2 hours to buy an phone was crazy. But our wait was different. We had fun. We met some nice folks and it was generally a pleasant experience.

I struck up a conversation with the guy in front of us because he was using a Kindle and I was curious to hear what he thought and to get an upclose look at it. It’s a pretty amazing e-book reader but does much more. AnyWho - turns out my Kindle buddy is also world famous Judson Laipply. World famous you say. Who the heck is Judson Laipply you say…..ever heard of the Evolution of Dance? THE most viewed video on YouTube EVER. I’m talking 92+ million views. Yes million.

Judson is an Inspirational Comedian and an all around nice guy. I think it’s safe to say that the Evolution of Dance was truly the first video to go “viral”. Popular term these days for videos that everyone is talking about around the water cooler (and, boy, does that term date me!). People are always asking him “how do I make my video go viral.” I suspect if he knew the answer he wouldn’t have been standing in line waiting for a iPhone! Seems to me that that’s the essence of viral video: it just tends to come out of nowhere. Amazing stuff. Shows the power of word of mouth these days - for good and for bad. In Judson case I think it’s probably all good.

You can learn a lot more about Judson at www.theevolutionofdance.com. Thanks for hanging out with us Judson! (That’s Judson in the aqua shirt between Alex & Sam)

10:45pm Update: Great party! Lots of friends who have been important in Alex’s life were there. We are all grateful to have such wonderful friends! Alex was pleased with the turnout and - of course - pleased with the thoughtful gifts.

1:00pm: We’re having a party for Alex today. You can click on the picture to see updated pictures that refresh every 5 minutes were taken throughout the day. You can also go to http://www.ustream.tv/scottblackman to see a live stream starting around 3:30 central time.

Long story short we took them both to the Animal Emergency facility near by and Shadow ended up needing 10 stitches. Toby had some minor damage to a paw. They’ll be fine, but it will certainly cause us to be a little more careful about how we separate them while we’re out.