Robotics and Family


Me and my Great Nephew Greyson.

By Allan Olson

The first week of January is over, and it was a busy one. It seems like everything possible was crammed into one week; not a night or day went by when I didn’t have a full schedule. And the weekend proved just as busy as the weekdays.
Saturday morning Nikolai and I kicked off the day by heading to Nevis for the 2018 Robotics Game Reveal – First Power Up. We watched the game reveal with the two CL-B teams along with the host team and 16 other teams. The game this year promises to be tricky and will rely a lot on good communication skills from the competitors. For the next six weeks, all of these students (including Nikolai) will be spending many hours after school working to complete the robot build.
We finally got home at about 4 p.m., and I decided that I really needed a nap. Since my room was occupied by my wife and Abigail who were doing a Harry Potter marathon, I decided to make use of the bed in the guest room and passed out for the next two hours. The nap felt great, and I was awakened by the sound of supper being made, along with very loud children and my wife having a Nerf gun fight. The important part of that was supper being made.
The only downside to taking a late nap is a later bed time, and sure enough, it was after 11 before I hit my good slumber time.
On Sunday, my alarm went off for the seventh day in a row at 6 a.m. I had some things to do for work before we hit the road to Moorhead to see that new baby great nephew. The weather for the trip was perfect, and even though the next two weekends are a little longer for the school kids, I didn’t want to risk having a blizzard or some other such inclement weather cancel our trip. I got the rest of the family out of bed just prior to 7 a.m. and we were out the door and on the road by 8. A quick stop for fuel and some goodies, and we were headed for our destination, and arrived there at 10:30 a.m. Of course I deferred the primary honor of holding the little guy to my wife, but I refused to let the kids budge in front of me. It wasn’t long before my niece and I were sent off to the grocery store to get some food for lunch. In the end we hit three different grocery stores (the third just for some delicious coffee).
On the way back we also found a geocache near her apartment. We will be making a long weekend visit there sometime this spring after the weather warms up some and the snow melts to go after several more geocaches.  
We stayed until 2 p.m. The original plan was to head home by 4 p.m., putting us at home by 5:30 p.m. It was fun to visit, but if we had stayed any longer, both my wife and I would have been napping, and then it would’ve been late before we got started for home.
In all it was a productive (but exhausting) week, and I’m looking forward to not being quite so busy this week. I will probably make some jelly this weekend and maybe, just maybe, we will get to the rest of the Christmas cleaning list that didn’t get completed.

Please remember to watch out for the buses that will be carrying our most precious cargo. Also, snap a photo or two to preserve a lifetime of memories. Thanks for reading, and have a great week! Feel free to drop me a line at cltimes1@arvig.net or stop by the office for a visit.

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