I’ve spent last few days arranging various bits and pieces together for our trip to California. Mostly browsing Google Maps around the hotels and other points of interest.

It is baffling how much information is available on the Internet. All places that I’ve gathered to my maps have photos and reviews. I’ve got feeling that I’ve already been there — this is probably just an illusion that will be shattered when actually being there.

The only problem with the online services is that they are not that easily accessible on the field. I’ve paid special attention to select hotels with free WLAN access — I’m such a cheapskate that I cannot justify myself paying extra $10 per day for WLAN, but I happily pay it when it is baked into the room price.

Thus, the weekend will be spent with printer. Hopefully printing in Google Maps has been improved from the last time.

We’ve been gearing up our actions for getting everything ready for the trip to California in couple of weeks.

As we are a family of engineers (not the boys, at least not yet), we have written all the details down into checklists. There are checklists for purchasing needed stuff, handling miscellaneous items at home, and packing — for each of us separately and one common list. That makes seven lists that we will meticulously go through soon.

This might sound a bit extreme, but I tend to sleep better when I know that things are under control. Items for the last two or three trips have been put together so hastily that I’ve got a nagging feeling of forgetting something for the first days. We’ve become seasoned, as nothing has been left behind…

Anyhow, I now need to go to print out some ticketing and reservation mails, so I can check one box off.

It is almost a month since the last post — apologies, I’ve been extremely busy with my company, churning several offers every week. Some of them have been already fruitful, and others are still in the loop. Hopefully this would be a busy spring, in a positive way.

Besides work keeping me busy, boys have been sick last three weeks. Not continually, but first Niilo for four days, then Aapo a few days, and finally both during this week. Sanna was sick, too, and I haven’t been in top-notch condition, either.

Anyhow, we had an excellent trip in early March — I managed to prepare slides to a conference talk that I held a couple of weeks ago, and still squeezed some time for skating with Aapo.

There was a free ice skating school in Polvijärvi on Saturday, and Aapo attended. He was really eager to join the company, but unfortunately the pace of teaching was a bit too much for him. We decided to leave after half an hour. He learned to skate backwards, though. Sanna, Aapo and my parents went to skiing, too, and my dad taught ski skills to Aapo. Huge improvements in short time; children are so fast learners, as long as they want to learn something.

We left Polvijärvi early on Sunday to have time to wash clothes, and prepare for the forthcoming work week. The next weeks went in haze, writing a load of quotations and taking care of sick children…

The future looks a bit brighter today, boys should be able to go back to kindergarten on Monday. Sanna’s mother came to help us on Wednesday, and she’s been invaluable — I and Sanna got today some time off and went to shopping. I’ve also managed to read a whole book during the weekend, and it’s just Saturday evening now. I could get used to this.

The next weeks are hopefully less hectic, as there are more people off due to Easter holidays.