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The flooded apartment didn't end up doing a whole lot of damage. We have some peeling paint on the lower couple inches of the walls, and some of my books are a lot less flat than they used to be. The computer is also displaying some very strange behavior. Strangely, this is the computer that was off when the water hit, but the one that was on at the time was completely fine.

I still haven't heard anything from greyhound about my missing pack. When I called him about a month ago they told me they hadn't found it yet, but that they would contact me a month after I had reported it missing. That would have been around three weeks ago. Apparently I'll have to harass them to get reimbursed. I'm not looking forward to that, since I spent over an hour on hold last time I called.

Just a quick note: our apartment got flooded tonight. We'll be living in another one for a week or so until ours is less damp. Apparently a pipe burst while we were away today, and we ended up with around 3 inches of water on the floor. We won't have internet, but our phones will work.

Hello again, I'm back from my trip...

I got back Tuesday afternoon, and it's good to be home. The hiking was great, Big South Fork is a beautiful park (pictures). Considering that neither of us had done much hiking since high school, it was extremely successful. Travelling wasn't so good though, and I can't say I'm anxious to try greyhound again.

I'll be leaving soon for a hiking trip...
The first day will consist of an 11 hour bus ride to Kentucky, where I'll meet Joe and begin a 4 hour drive to the Big South Fork National Park in Tennessee. Then we'll actually start hiking, which will be good since I'll be pretty tired of riding by then. So far it's looking like excellent weather for hiking, despite the hurricane.

We recently finished moving to Grand Rapids... It took a few weeks, and we're very glad to be done. You don't realize how much crap you have until you have to move it all. Thanks to everybody who gave us a hand, it would have taken forever without you.

We like the new place for the most part. It's a quiet complex, and we have lots of room. The downsides are mostly little things, such as the kitchen cupboards and drawers all being narrower, which creates a surprising amount of trouble. I definitely like the improvement in the commute though.

Heidi put up some more pictures:

• Royston Birthdays and Father's Day
• Working on the Wever Cottage
• 4th of July at the Bolen Cottage
• The new apartment in Grand Rapids

It has been a while since my last update, so here it is...

Pictures from Easter are up in the gallery.

I'm in the middle of my first week at Smiths. So far it has been pretty unglamorous, involving reading a bunch of acronym-filled technical documents. A lot like grad school that way really, but with less equations and more coffee. The plan is to ease into more programming-related stuff once I’ve learned the ropes, since the project is gigantic.