Tonight the Tigers and Wolves were supposed to do the visit at the fire station that was cancelled last week due to an "emergency." However, there was a lot of snow late today so even though school was not cancelled, we decided pretty late on that scouts would be cancelled. So, we'll do it another time...again!

Today Beth begins her new job. It was pretty unexpected that she is going back to work, but it just all came together so perfectly it must be a God thing. The job is at the kids' school. She has gone into the classrooms to help out with Alex and Missy's classes since Alex was in kindergarten, and always gets raves from the teachers. So much so, that when a new position became available to help out with guided reading, three different teachers at the school specifically asked that the job be offered to her. So she will be working for 30 hours a week helping students that need assistance with reading, either due to language barriers or learning issues. She's really excited, especially since she never thought that a job with good hours for her would ever come by. This is going to help us out a lot, and I think she'll be great at it and will love it.

What better thing to do the day after Thanksgiving than geocaching? We sure didn't want to be anywhere near a mall today. It was a chilly but nice day today so we headed out south of town, towards Akron and Roann, and went looking for a total of 9 caches, but only found 5. I hate posting DNFs but a couple of them we found evidence of nothing being there. For Thanksgiving, we were at home. This is a year when everyone in Beth's family is busy with in-laws, so nowhere to go there, and Laura let us know earlier this week that she and Thomas won't make it out here either (too much work to do), so we were going to be here alone. But, in talking with our neighbor Linda, we found that her kids are both with their significant others families this year too, and she was just going to order something or microwave something. We didn't think she should have to be alone on Thanksgiving, so we invited her to have dinner with us and she accepted. No need to make a huge turkey, so Beth made one of our farm chickens Greek style and we had that instead.

The Tiger and Wolf Cub Scouts were supposed to have the tour of the fire station tonight, unfortunately when we got there the place was deserted because the firemen were all out on a call. Go figure. We waited around for a little while, but eventually we all just went back to the school and joined the rest of the pack making Christmas cards for soldiers overseas. I'll just have to reschedule the visit.

Today the elders and deacons all helped pack up and load DeeAnn from the house. We are all so thankful that she has sold the house without too much trouble, and she is moving into a much better situation. She's moving to southern Indiana on a lot that Marcelle bought and built a house on for her, which is adjacent to his house. So, she will live right next to her son and grandkids, and as of today, she's out of the old house.

Cub Scout popcorn is ready for pickup. It is all in my garage, all over the place. We sold $6461 worth of popcorn this year, a bit more than last year, which puts about $1800 in our account with commission, Yay. And our top seller, with a total of $1129 in sales, was...Alex Knight!

The Neers were having some tree trimming work done today, and since we still have the big branch on the hickory tree broken and hanging down from the storm last summer, we decided to grab the guys with the bucket truck and chain saws and ask if they could take care of it quickly. Which they did for a couple hundred bucks, however when they cut down the branch it bounced on its branches a couple times and made like it was headed for the picture window. It didn't quite make it there, but the main trunk of it did come down on and crush the porch swing that was on the patio, and miss the window by a few feet. So, they owed us $40 back to pay for the swing. Which we're just going to throw out and not replace, probably.

I am back from Vancouver again. Every time I go there, I am pretty sure it'll be the last time I go, but somehow I always need to go back again. Which is OK with me, because secretly I love going. I left early on Tuesday, right in the middle of the kitchen floor renovation, so when I left the old vinyl was all up and the new subfloor was down. As I posted on FB, it was already looking better than the old floor. Anyway, I got to Iotron Tuesday around 1 pm local time, and spent a couple of really long work days getting the real-time monoblock irradiation temperature experiments done. The good news, I also had plenty of free time while materials were preheating for hours on end, so I could get quite a bit of good geocaching in. I found some excellent woods to go exploring. And I'd like to share the log with you here:

OK, here we go. Little hike to the cache site...wow, steep trail. Aha, nice spot for a hide here, hey wasn't there something about a log held up by a stump? No, wait, that was another egg cache. Anyway. I can see where it must be from this little bridge...there in that giant stump. OK, not seeing it. Hmm. GPS is jumping all over, must be the canopy. Oh well, I'll just poke around here a bit more...nothing...maybe over there? Now the GPS says it's over there. Not seeing it...Not here...not here...not here...still can't get a good fix. Well, I'll just use my geo-senses. OK, not here...nope..nope...nope...almost out of time on my lunch hour...well, crud, I'm going to have to come back tomorrow. OK, I'm back again. I'll find it if it kills me. Now. The GPS is still pointing at the big stump. I looked in there several times yesterday but maybe I just overlooked it. Hmm, still not there. GPS is pointing here today, that's new...nothing here...nothing here...oh great, now the batteries died. Oh well, it wasn't helping out anyway. It's gotta be right around here somewhere. Nope. Nope. Nope. Getting frustrated...and dirty...what did the hint say? Better use the geocaching app to look at the page again. Roaming, so that'll be expensive. Oh well, let's go. OK, got the hint. Hmmm, from the bridge eh? OK. Here I am on the bridge. So it should be that way. Guess I have to bushwack a little...must be...THERE. Huh, it's not here. Not here...not here. It has to be here! Where is it!!? WHERE IS IT!!!?? OK, fine...I give up. Oh wait, there's another bridge over there. Let's take a last look...oh. There it is.

I'm not even in town, but this is worth mentioning. Lincoln Elementary is doing a walk-a-thon fundraiser for PTO this year instead of selling crap like they usually do, which blows since it's right after the popcorn sale and I hate asking people to buy stuff...again. So does everyone else. So, this year they decided to change to the Race for Education and it blew them away with all the donations, they raised over $13k, way over their goal, and had a nice day for the kids to go out and walk!