Tomorrow is my secretary's birthday. She is taking tomorrow off, so, today, I had twelve, helium-filled balloons and a big, "Happy Birthday" banner waiting for her when she arrived at work. She always does nice things for the other employees, on their birthdays, so I wanted to do something nice for her on her birthday. She will be forty-three years old tomorrow, and she has been with the firm since she graduated from community college! Another of the employees baked a pound cake and an Italian Cream cake. She brought a bag of chips, some punch, a birthday card, some homemade fruit salad, some plastic plates, and some plastic cups. I brought a half-gallon of orange juice. Whee!

While surfing, the other day, I stumbled across a commenting system, for web logs. Also, a site meter, to track the number of visitors, and other statistics. In other news, last night, I dreamed that one of my teeth fell out! Note to self: make appointment with dentist, soon.

I must say, I'm pretty proud of myself. I managed to stay in my pajamas all day long!

The Friday Five:
1. What's your favorite vacation spot? I haven't really been to many "vacation spots," but, of the ones that I have been to, I like Twin Falls, Idaho.
2. Where do you consider to be the biggest hell-hole on earth? Afghanistan, before the Taliban were driven from power.
3. What would be your dream vacation? An around the world cruise on a freighter.
4. If you could go on a road-trip with anyone, who would it be and why? My son, because I enjoy his company but don't get to see him often.
5. What are your plans for this weekend? To relax, be lazy, and finish reinstalling all the computer programs that were wiped from my computer's hard drive when I had to reformat it.

Exactly one year ago, today, on Tuesday, February 27, 2001, at eight o'clock in the evening, I was in my Father's hospital room, waiting for the lady who would stay the night with him. A cardiologist from the group that was attending him came to check on him. The doctor listened to my Father's chest with his stethoscope and said that he was sounding good. The doctor said that he would probably send my Father home with the dose of medication that he was currently on. I certainly felt encouraged about my Father's condition. The next morning, between one-thirty and three o'clock, just two months before his ninetieth birthday, my Dad died in his sleep. I sure do miss him!

Twenty-two degrees! Brrrr! That's pretty cold for the Deep South, even in February.

I picked the daffodils this morning, before going to work, because the low temperature forecast for tonight is twenty-one degrees, and I think that would have been too low for the flowers to survive. This way, we'll be able to enjoy them for a few more days.

Lunch menu: Mandarin Chicken salad at Burger King, with crisp noodles, slivered almonds, and Oriental Sesame salad dressing. After lunch, I had a French vanilla cappuccino. I love that drink!

One of my fellow employees put me on to www.winmx.com for downloading songs. I downloaded the application and, then, just to try it out, easily downloaded two songs. I don't know how, or if, winmx.com manages to get around the problems that Napster has had with the recording industry.

Here is a list of some of the programs that I have downloaded and installed in my quest to find just the right one to organize information on my home computer: KeyNote, TreePad, A1 Visual Contact, PhoneDeck, Diary Defender, InfoStore, Memoirs2000 Lite, MyInfo, NoteKeeper, and Bottin. There have been others, which I uninstalled after discovering that they were not freeware.

In other news, more and more of the King Alfred daffodil buds are turning into beautiful, yellow flowers! The weather here in the Deep South (U. S. A.) has been unusually warm for February; i.e., today, it was sixty-nine degrees Fahrenheit!

I am reading a book entitled The Diagnosis, by Alan Lightman, who, in addition to being a bestselling author, is a professor in the humanities and a lecturer in physics at M. I. T.