MAC ATTACK AND SOME CICADAS ANYONE?

Picking up the truck to pack Carly out!

Wow!  Where did the week go!  Things have just happened over the past seven days that have made me sleepy and then again unable to sleep at times.  First off, seven days ago, Ray and I woke at the lovely hour of (earlier than) five am to hit the highway (yes, I-95 but southbound).  We had to leave a bit earlier since the rental truck Ray had reserved was not at the original shop, but there was one about twenty minutes farther from our daughter's apartment.  Ray decided we should move up the "wake up and go" time.  As we were driving along the highway, we noticed stopped cars ahead (we were about ten minutes into our trip).  What the ___?  That was Ray's exclamation.  On a Friday, at 5:40 am, southbound, what could possibly have gone wrong?  Oh, no problem, just a slight delay of a few minutes, and we passed the problem.  An 18-wheeler had its back crashed into.  The far right lane was closed, and there were some pretty blue tank-like cans in the road.  We continued on to Grafton, VA.  We picked up the lovely truck as seen above, got to Carly's apartment by 8:30, one of her roommates was still around as well as her boyfriend to help expedite the moving.  Thank goodness for the boys.  I hate moving couches and mattresses.  Thank goodness for her roommate helping, too.  We were done packing the truck and the backs of two cars (Ray drives a Juke, and she drives an older model of a Scion--think the toaster looking thing).   She cleaned a bit more, and out the door we went by ten am.  We hit the road to get home before anything could go wrong.  On the way home, there was an announcement (at eleven am) that I-95 southbound had just reopened.  It had been shut down for five hours.  There was a twenty mile backup.  This was from the accident we had driven through.  Those pretty blue tanks were phosphoric something or other--hazardous material spilled all over the road.  Hope we didn't breathe into deeply!  I called the office, because many of my co-workers leave work around 12:30 and was telling them to abort I-95!  Abort Route 1!  Find a different way to get home!  And that's when I was told that the office manager had been told "I have to let you go".  What the ___? was now my exclamation!  This woman has worked in the office for ten years.  Basically, the past week has pretty much told me nothing except that she must have done something not quite right to have been let go like that.  And I will leave that at that :(  Needless to say, there wasn't a plan since it was a bit sudden (sort of), so things at work are unusual.

Back to the packing and unpacking.  Once home, thank goodness we hit no traffic delays or I think Ray would have gone postal, we unloaded the truck, dropped it off and hit Moe's for lunch with Carly and her boyfriend.  What a day!  We put her bed, a dresser and nightstand (eventually to sell?) and few things back in her old room (she had been occupying the guest room over winter break), but we left the rest in the living room.  It will soon be going to an apartment somewhere.  We had some downtime Friday, Saturday Carly and I were at a bridal shower (her best friend is marrying in July, and Carly is a bridesmaid) about two hours from our house, a little downtime that night (Ray had a nice day I think although he had some testing going on at work and had to log in for a short time) and then we hit the road west on Sunday to the Apple Store.  A graduation gift to our daughter was a new computer.  A Mac more specifically.  She has been running down an old PC for the past four years, and it was time. 

 Now back to me again.  As Ray and Carly like to say, I must have toxic, poisonous fingertips.  In the past seven years, I put two laptops to rest (not my fault) and the third one that I recently had to start using was Carly's original laptop Circa 2001.  Time for me to get a new laptop!  This is where I was attacked by a MAC.  Holy cow!  I do not own an IPAD or IPHONE, so I do not know a whole lot about any of it.  This is why I signed up and paid for some One to One help :)  This is why blogging has gone by the wayside.  This is why I am sleepier by ten pm (my mind is toast).  The goal is to get into APPLE products so that hooking up with Carly once in Panama will be easy breezy.  We have gone the Skype route, and now we will Facetime.  We waited to buy these computers until Carly was home, so she could teach me (patiently?) some tricks of the trade.  She isn't next to me right now, and I managed to upload a picture so that's a big start.  And here I will try it again.  This thing is super fast which I LOVE and am so not used to!

This is a live cicada (the one's shown below are just the shells)

Lake House Cicadas

In Stafford, I was attacked by my MAC.  In Bumpass, we have been attacked slightly (not as bad as I thought) by Brood 2 Cicadas.  They show their red eyes every 17 years.  Once the female does her business and lays 600 eggs, she dies.  The male dies shortly after.  They are loud (not so much for me, but I can hear them), they can be eaten, and they are harmless.  This weekend is Memorial Day weekend.  Carly will come to the lake house for a day or two, her boyfriend may show up as well, one roomies sister is coming, but other than that, it will be a quiet weekend without any floating time.  It is supposed to be the warmest on Monday (75 degrees maybe that day, but today it is barely 60 and the next two days, it will possibly be 70).  We will be heading home  early enough to beat some traffic, as usual.  So my worries of floating on a raft in the serene calm waters of Lake Anna only to be a landing strip for cicadas go unwarranted.  Until next weekend--will there be more?  Perhaps this weekend kayaking is in order, and hopefully, they won't be out there over the water.  I hope to catch up on some sleep this weekend, try some new recipes (food and liquid one's), catch up with friends, play games, and perhaps learn a bit more about this super light, super fast 13 inch metallic piece of confusion.