CoolIris

I made this short video to demonstrate the browser plug-in called CoolIris that enables a new dimension of image viewing on web sites that have lots of pictures (shopping sites, photo storage sites, etc.). CoolIris works in Firefox, Flock, Internet Explorer, and Safari and can be downloaded here. (As with all YouTube videos, click directly in the screen below to go to YouTube for a slightly larger—and better, in this case—video.)

Movin' On Up! (Lizzie Moves to Chicago)

Here are a few pix from Elizabeth's and my trip to Chicago last weekend to take her furniture. I road to Atlanta with Gail and Anna to meet Liz at her Norcross apartment where we loaded the truck. Then Lizzie and I took off for Chicago to deliver her goods to the apartment she's been in for a month or so (with only clothes, toiletries, and her cat). We left Atlanta around 2:15 in the afternoon Saturday and got to her apartment around 2:00 a.m. Sunday. I flew home late Monday afternoon and was picked up at the airport by Anna.

Loading the truck in Atlanta:



Unloading the truck in Chicago -- note the snow. It got up to around 12-13 degrees during the day while we were unloading; a tad warmer the next day. They really know how to handle snow up there. The streets were perfectly clean with mounds of snow piled alongside the roads, and MOUNTAINS of snow piled up in shopping center and mall parking lots that look like they will probably finish melting in late July.



Liz's apartment complex is really nice. This is just a small portion of her building. There are 12 of these huge three-story buildings, all with European names, in the complex. Plus a really nice gym, pool, rec center with pool/ping pong, etc., and activities for residents every night of the week. The people in the office are really nice, the grounds and buildings are extremely well-kept, and a huge maintenance staff that fixes everything pronto. All the sidewalks are shoveled and the streets plowed immediately when it snows. She really loves the apartments -- easy to see why. (See the movie below for a quick look at her apt.)



We ate twice at the local Wholefoods -- Yay, Wholefoods! They had a HUGE and delicious food bar filled with amazing veggie dishes, hot and cold. So good!



And we took a spin through the local HUGE Ikea store. I wasn't allowed to take any pix of her store -- company policy -- but it is beautiful, about three times larger than the Perimeter store in Atlanta. She's done a great job getting the store and staff into shape.



The view from Liz's living room windows on the THIRD FLOOR. :-) Fortunately, we were able to use the elevator to move everything up except for her GINORMOUS L-shaped sofas. Those, we had to carry up by hand. I had prayed before we left Atlanta that God would provide someone to help us get the sofas up the stairs, and a really nice young Indian man who lived in the apartments saw us struggling in the door with the first sofa and asked if we needed some help. He helped us carry both sofas up to the third floor -- and wouldn't accept my offer to pay him for his troubles. He even asked us if we'd like to come down to his apartment and have something to eat with he and his wife. We needed to keep working, so declined, but he was a really nice guy. Liz is going to deliver a chocolate gift basket to their apartment this week.



HRH Trina, who condescended to sit in my lap by the second day:



And two pix of the lovely Liz, sitting on the infamous red sofas, the color of which conceals the blood (sweat and tears) we spilled on them wrestling them to the third floor:





And here is a short video tour of the inside of the apartment.(Click in the center of the video if you want to be taken to YouTube for a slightly larger formatted version.)



It was a great trip -- safe and productive. Liz has a great place to live and a great job with a great company, so is well-suited for the next chapter of the Great Adventure known as Life.

She Knows What Will Make the Prez Fat

Here's a letter a schoolgirl wrote to President Obama (see the New York Times article here.) Yes, it will make him fatter, but it will also make him deader faster: