I’ve had back to back deadlines and suffered the Wrath of God.  Since the beginning of the year, I’ve written 3 books and proposals for 2 others. 

 

My daughter graduated from 5th grade.  Now I’m happy for her, but when did elementary school graduation begin to rival graduation from Harvard?  We received an engraved invitation, which included an RSVP card for the ‘reception immediately following.’  I gotta tell you - it was an event and a half and I’m still not sure all that frou-frou stuff was necessary.

 

Oh, and the week of graduation, they went on their 5th grade trip.  To Universal Studios in Orlando.  I think our 5th grade trip was to the UTZ plant to see potato chips being fried.  They dent a note home reminding us to have the kids bring sunscreen, bottles water and $50.00 spending money.  In contrast - we got a free bag of chips.

 

The week before graduation (see why I haven’t blogged in forever?) my daughter had her recital.  As usual, it wasn’t a recital, it was a wonderful production.  They did Cinderella, Katie was a mouse (in addition to dancing numbers for each of her 5 classes).  The good news is - she can finally do her own hair and make-up.  Granted, she’s heavy-handed with the make-up but slutty actually works on stage.

 

Then last week I was smote by God.  We took a direct hit of lightening.  Fried two computer (my desktop and my laptop where - of course, I had my nearly completed manuscript).  I called Dell they were, as always, useless and because I had to turn in the book on 6/30, I ended up buying an HP and paying my fab computer guy to come over and salvage what could be salvaged.  I had external hard drive back-up and flash drives but the hard drives were plugged in, so they fried and the flash drives were useless because nothing would boot.  Did I mention that Dell sucks?  Just checking.  The Dell solution - which, btw came on 7/1, was to completely reformat my hard drive and see if that worked.  I’ve owned Dells for my last 6 computers but I will never, EVER buy another one. 

 

The lightening also friend my daughter’s new Wii, the intercom system, the outlets, the circuit breaker board, my microwave, the control for the sprinkler system, the cable boxes, the satellite dishes, and probably a bunch of stuff I have thought of yet.

 

But here’s what I learned from my smoting - those surge protectors we all buy can handle 300 volts.  A lightening strike is normally about 10,000 volts.  For under $300.00 you can have a whole house surge protector put on your breaker box that can handle 60,000 volts.  Guess what I own now?

 

Happy writing,

R - who is off to Disney World today for the annual family vacation

Yowser -
I had a plain old ordinary computer crash once. Was lucky that DH knew someone who used to do data recovery for the Navy, and he salvaged the data. But living in the lighting capital of the world, surge protectors are vital. I usually send updates of my ms as I'm working on it to my daughter in Northern Ireland. She has plenty of room on her hard drive, and I figure the odds of us both being hit by lightning at the same time are slim.

WOW, Rhonda! Now I have to get a whole house surge protector, too. $300 is a worthy investment. Congrats to my friend, Katie, for graduating. I didn't have a fifth grade trip. We didn't get graduation ceremony until 8th grade. Our class went to Hershey, PA where the street lights look like Hershey's Kisses. Toured the chocolate factory and did the amusement park. Hmm. Disney World wasn't even built when I graduated 8th grade. Now I feel old.