April 12, 2005

April 12, 2005

Tillamook, Oregon

DAY 298

 

Today was cold and raining. Are all days in the Pacific Northwest cold and raining ? And very quickly changing ? In the last hour, it has alternated between sunny, cloudy, light rain, heavy rain, hail, and back to a few minutes of sun.

Poor Bo was ill during the night. He woke us up about 4:00 A.M. suffering, and needing to go outside. I took him out twice between 4:00 and 5:00, and all he wanted to do was eat copious amounts of grass. Finally, after a couple of hours of tossing and turning, and whining, and restlessness, he had an "accident" on the carpet, then seemed to feel better. By then it was time for me to get up < sigh >.

Early this morning, I was picked up by the owner of Mechtronics and taken back to his shop to see the dismantled transmission, and discuss the situation. While I was there, I asked to be allowed to connect my laptop to a phone line so I could get online. He did one better. He connected me to their high speed cable connection. I retrieved e-mail, and updated my blog. I haven't had an opportunity to get online in over a week.

Joanne tried to make some phone calls to U.S. authorities to discuss the ramifications of our late return to Canada. All she could get were recorded messages, and endless voice mail "options". I suppose all we can do once the truck is fixed is drive as hard and fast as we can back to Canada, and hope for the best. Normally, the ramification of returning to Canada late is being hassled when trying to get back into the U.S. next fall. Border guards can refuse to allow entry into the U.S., based on a failure to return on time the previous spring < sigh ... again >.

I took a nap after lunch, then took Bo for an obedience training session. That was during the 15 minutes of sunshine, right before the hail storm < yet another sigh >. I'm having a problem with Oregon's cold, wet weather, and lack of sunshine. What a lousy week ! ! !

I finally stopped procrastinating and started to work on the preparation of our personal and corporate income tax information. I need to get it all sorted and organized and summarized before sending it off to our accountant in Ottawa. We need him for at least 2004 and probably 2005, to execute the tax planning we did for 2004 and 2005, last spring before starting our travel. With his strategic guidance, we can minimize the tax implications / liabilities of selling our businesses last year. I have been meaning since last Friday to use this week of delay to accomplish tax preparations. I've just had some difficulty getting started.

DSK