Using Picasa

I have noted how useful the Picasa softwre is from Google. It can do a lot of editing, straightening of crooked pictures, fixing exposure and sharpness problems and so on. It can find and identify all the pictures with faces in them. All you need to do is identify a couple of them and Picasa will do the rest. You can also put a very neat caption on your photos identifying the subject matter. When you create and burn the photos to a DVDhe captions show up on the screen with the slide. You can GEO tag your photos, it will index all the photos on your computer. The list goes on.

You can spend up to a hundred bucks buying something like Roxio, or Nero and get much of the photo editing from Picasa for free. What it doesn't do however is offer a "Burn DVD (cd)" button. For that you can always look to Windows live DVD maker for help. It works well too.

Windows DVD maker will also do a lot of the things Picasa will do for your photos, plus you can burn a pretty good DVD as well.

Calgary Co-operative Memorial Society

A number of years ago, a lot of people got tired of the high cost of funerals, and some of them decided to do something about it. In Calgary the above named society was formed to allow members to have a dignified burial/cremation at a much lower cost.

Other areas of the country have similar societies, for someone who is reading this and who lives elsewhere. In Calgry he cost of joining is just $20.00 and has been for years. It is a one time only fee to join, which gives you access to one of the largest funeral homes in Calgary, McKinnis & Holloway. They are the societies provider.

For anyone interested you can call the society at 403 248 2044, or toll free at 1 800 566 9959. They have a website at www.calgarymemorial.com

We have belonged to this for years now. We expect to save not hundreds of dollars but thousands on the high cost of dying. Look them over, it costs nothing to find out what they can do for you.

CARIBBEAN CRUISE: OLD SAN JUAN

Well, we are back to the real world, for us anyway. Ariving in Calgary at night when it was 12 below zero with a little wind was a real wake up call as to what we had missed for 2 weeks. Waiting outside for a taxi did little to increase our enthusiasm for the Calgary winter, after being papmered by temperatures no lower than 78 during the day and 77 at night. Even the water temperature was well over 80!
We had a great time with a few exceptions which I will go into at later dates. The cruise itself was very nice with weather generally in the 79 to 84 degree area. Nights were as low as 77, imagine that! It was not without some rain, we had showers at times on various islands, but no real rains. Our first stop was at San Juan Puerto Rico. We got to San Juan late the night before we sailed and this tour was taken midway during our cruise.
San Juan is one of the oldst settlements in the Caribbean founded by Ponce de Leon in 1508 and was later changed in 1521 to San Juan. This is Old San Juan. There are old forts that are still in existence, along with old churches in the Old Town area. The whole thing is virtually a Unesco World Heritage site. It has been beautifully maintained today by the National Parks System. The main wall goes for miles and it is very thick and high. It's function ws to defend the harbour from invading navies. From where it is situated it looks very easy to defend any attack from the sea.
The views from the fort are spectacular. The harbour and the surrounding area scenes are hard to beat when viewed from the walls of the fort. Some of the buildings were used during WW2 as housing and offices for the US military. It is a protected tarritory of he United States. Spanish is the national language, but English is used as well by many of the residents. "Spanglish" is heard at times when an resident is speaking with a tourist.
It is warm, about 78 degrees when we are taken by our tour guide around the site. There are guard towers and gun emplacements that guard every angle of the fort and the town. The walls around the fort are 18 feet thick and 140 feet high; it took almost 200 years to complete what was started in 1540.
Today it is a tourist attraction that should not be missed if going to San Juan.