Cindy's Happy Dance

Riverton, Utah High 50 Low 36 (Where is the 70+ weather?)

Cindy, several years ago bought the Phaff 3-D suite for her embroidery machine. It came with a dongle, which I can only describe as a fancy USB flash drive. They emphasized "do not loose the dongle,as the program will not work without it, and it can't be replaced." The company is afraid you would give the program to someone else. She has had to upgrade several times, at considerable expense. She thought she had taken the dongle with her to Arizona, and toward the middle of January, wasn't able to find it. We had been taking the computers to the library in Yuma to use the internet, and she thought she had the dongle in one of the compartments on her computer bag. She noticed that the zipper was open and thought she had lost the dongle.

She has been fretting about the dongle ever since. We were at one of the quilt stores the other day, and she asked the salesman what could be done about the dongle. He told her that in most cases there was nothing that the company was willing to do because that is how they protect their software.

Yesterday, while moving stuff around on her sewing table, she moved a piece of paper and there was the missing dongle. It seems she had not taken it with us to Arizona after all. You could almost feel the relief. She even did a little happy dance for me.

I spent some time yesterday helping our plumber, Steve, change one of our water heaters. It was only 3 1/2 years old and was supposed to be stainless steel with a lifetime warantee. When we got back from Arizona, Tammy told me there was water in the water heater pan. The water heater had a leak. I had Steve check it, and he said it would have to be replaced.

It was a special one, and had to be brought in from Ogden. I think the manufacturer had a very stupid design, in that there is no way to drain the water heater. Steve put his pump on the outlet and was able to get about half the water out of it. We still struggled to get it out of the pan, and then out of the closet. We then had to take it up the stairs and outside. Neither one of us is young and it was a lot of work for two old men to get the old heater outside, but we finally got it done.

I have been concerned about our taxes this year, because Cindy ended up with 4 different 1099's and W-2's after retiring from the State. I was afraid we were going to be hit with a lot of taxes, but the accountant told me most were just 401 and IRA rollovers. He assured me that we probably weren't going to have to pay any more tax than normal. I hope so. I don't like to pay any more tax than is absolutely necessary. I'm sure everyone else feels the same way, at least I don't know anyone that is happy to pay tax.

Sorry about no pictures today, but thanks for visiting.