Getting away for awhile

I'm traveling this week in Oklahoma and Arkansas! I attended a wedding last weekend, now I'm spending a few days relaxing with my family at a cabin in Arkansas, and I'm spending a couple of days at the end of the week in Tulsa while my little brother attends orientation for his graduate school program.

We are staying for a few nights at a lovely cabin in Eureka Springs, in north western Arkansas. I love little mountain towns. The creativity and inguinity of the original builders always impresses me! Eureka Springs was settled in the late 1800s and it must have taken quite a bit of work and smart planning to build the town on the side of the mountain. The streets in the main part of town zig zag back and forth across the steep land. In some places, you can stand on one street and look nearly straight up or down to see the next parallel street.

I'm also experimenting with being “computer free.” Well, not quite, you might argue, as I do have my iPad with me. But, this is probably the first time in years when I've gone well over a week without any access to my laptop or another computer.

I recently discovered a blogging app called Blogsy which seems to make it quite easy to write blog posts from an iPad. Besides blogging, my iPad works great for checking email, a bit of Internet browsing, reading the feeds from my favorite blogs, organizing photos from our trip, checking maps when we get lost, reading ebooks in the car, and even as an alarm clock. Several times recently I've heard mention that iPads and other tablet style computers are eventually going to replace most laptop and desktop computers. Still not sure what I think about this, but I do think it's getting easy and easy to stay “connected” without having access to a computer. What do you think?

Below is a view from the back deck of our cabin looking down on the river and valley below. We've been enjoying sitting outside in the mornings and evenings, surrounded by the beautiful scenery. We've even seen a bit of wildlife. Today we saw a few deer near our cabin and a hummingbird on the porch. The poor hummingbird was trying to figure out if the red fire extinguisher was a hummingbird feeder. Eventually, he gave up, disappointed, and fluttered away.

Also, in totally unrelated news, I've just learned from my friend Patricia that Paul McGreevy and Robert Boakes' book, Carrot and Sticks, is once again available. Amazon has been showing the book as out of print, but it is now available from the University of Sydney's online bookstore. I really like the Carrots and Sticks book. It is meant as a textbook and contains a wealth of information about behavior analysis and operant conditioning, as well as how these concepts and techniques apply to animal behavior and training. It's a great text if you want to delve into the science of animal training and it also makes a great reference book. The book is a bit pricy, but I think it's one worth having on the shelf. If you've read it, I'd love to hear what you think of it.

Posted from my iPad with Blogsy