Lots of stuff going on and very little time to post. Got back from a 4 day
weekend in Philadelphia being a history geek and looking at all of the
18th century stuff in that city. Very enjoyable trip. Photos (without any
sort of context or description) are available at href="http://www.dotphoto.com/go.asp?l=jwynia&AID=1741529">DotPhoto.

Also finally picked up a bluetooth headset for my phone and am loving it.
It's so much better than messing with the cord in places like the car
where the seatbelt gets in the way.

This past week, I've started using an autoresponder service to send
followup emails to people who download Sokkit, leading them through the
features and what are inevitably the FAQ and support issues. So far, I
think it's going OK. I've received a few positive comments about how
people appreciate the help the series of tutorials provide. I still need
to update the site to seperate the tips and release notices and to
automatically pass those results on to the service (I'm still doing the
daily import manually). Fortunately, the service allows multiple "series"
of emails, so I'll probably start using them more completely on my sites
and on client's sites to provide scheduled followup with prospective
customers.

Since we got the boot on Sunday to let people look at our house, and
Shelly had been wanting to go, we went to IKEA.

Now, I am not a fan of crowds. I generally don't go rushing to places like
the State Fair, Valleyfair, Taste of Minnesota or anywhere where thousands
of people congregate. Since the IKEA has been open for a couple of weeks,
I figured that the initial rush might have died down. If what I witnessed
on Sunday is after a few weeks of being open, I can't even imagine the
carnage during the first week.

I watched the escalator going up to the showroom for a few minutes and
there was NEVER a gap between people. That escalator just moved a solid
mass of people up to then bump into each other while gazing longingly at
Swedish furniture.

The funny thing is that when we left, we went over to the Mall of America
because we still had time to kill and that place felt abandoned compared
to IKEA even though there were normal crowds there.

I think that if I need cheap birch and steel furniture, I'll just order
online or show up on a Wednesday morning or wait a year or so for the
novelty to wear off.