At Work, Home, Play & Stats

What a week for us -- as a matter of fact for the first time in years there was one day this week that I did not even log on to the computer -- I can hardly believe that. What was going on to change our routine so drastically? Was it the garage, was it the harvesting of produce from both houses -- partly that but mostly this:

The above is a collage of some of the activity in training sessions with the organization Guide Dogs for the Blind.
Gail and I have been attending the sessions now for several weeks. We are impressed with the whole idea of being a part of an organization that breeds, trains and donates seeing eye dogs to the blind at no cost to them.

As I write this, Janie is sitting next to my desk. She is a gorgeous black lab 4 1/2 months old. She is already well on the way to completing her couple of years training before becoming a full guide dog. We are lucky to be puppy-sitting her this week. She belongs to Guide Dogs for the Blind, but for a year and a half she resides with "puppy raisers". Her puppy raiser is on a business trip and Gail and I are taking care of her -- now you may understand why our week was (and is) the way it is.

We are in training as well and we will be receiving an 8 week old puppy soon to raise in our home. Here are a couple of additional collages:

This was taken earlier this week at the training session for the puppies. There were games and events with prizes for the best voted costumes -- Janie is the "bumble-bee" on the right.

These are some photos of Janie at our home as she plays (and chews) on her pad. Our task is to socialize her and to expose her to a variety of activities out and about -- and we have done that quite a bit.

While we love Janie -- and the other dogs that we have "met" at Guide dogs, we look forward to taking a new born pup in to begin it's journey. If you'd like to investigate the Guide Dogs site, here is a link:  Guide Dogs for the Blind


Other Events


This week we celebrated my brother's 77th. He and his wife Nancy provided a great comfort food dinner in honor of the occasion. There was delicious home made meatloaf, mashed potatoes and stir-fried vegetables  along with chocolate cupcakes and gelato for dessert.  It was a fine evening:

Lookin' good in their contrasting aprons -- I did not see any food stains on either of them . . .


Speaking of births -- in the next week or so the world's population is supposed to reach 7 billion -- whew. Where do we fit all these people into the scheme of things and how many have done their genealogy and family histories . . .

If you'd like to see where you yourself fit into that picture there is a neat website that can help. I visited it and here are the results for me:

Go to the site and put in your date of birth info to get the above results for you. Here is that link:

The World at 7 Billion


Hiles Name Distribution in the USA


Here is an interesting (to HILES) chart on where the name shows up in all 50 states:

Click on the above to see more detail -- what are all the HILES' doing in South Dakota & Wyoming . . . we knew about Ohio?


Reality back here with the upcoming holidays and celebrations:

The above is the scene in a local across-town display that gets bigger each year.

Below is a collage of a holiday celebrated by many of the locals:

And on the more uplifting side:

Boeing has introduced the "Dreamliner" this week with a maiden commercial flight to Hong Kong. They have been working on this plane for some time now AND two folks from our tree work in that facility that produced the jetliner -- in Everett, Washington -- Lisa & Bob, you must be enjoying the celebration. What will be next. I almost wish I was flying again on a weekly basis . . . almost.


And so goes our week -- after a short walk with Janie it will be sliders on this Saturday night . . .


See you in a few!