Upcoming Live Webcasts

Dave and I have decided not to attend the upcoming Family Motor Coach Association (FMCA) convention in Redmond, Oregon.  We decided that the daily cost to attend was too high.

The other reason, besides the cost, that we decided not to attend the convention in person is that four of the seminars are going to be available by live webcast.  That means we can (hopefully) watch the seminars next week from the comfort of our own home.

Click on this link, FMCA Webcasts, for more information about each  of the following four webcast seminars.

1.  Supplemental Towed Car Braking

      Wednesday, August 11, 10 to 11:15 am Pacific time

2.  Picasa (by Geeks on Tour)

      Wednesday, August 11, 3:15 to 4:30 pm Pacific time

3.   Ask the Experts (with Gary Bunzer)

      Thursday, August 12, 3 to 4:15 pm Pacific time

4.  Microwave-Convection Cooking

      Friday, August 13, 9:45 to 11:45 am Pacific time

I’ve never tuned into a live webcast, so we’ll see what happens.  As far as I know, I do not need to be a member of FMCA to view these webcasts on my computer.

Portland Festival Symphony, Part 1

Last night, Dave and attended a free, outdoor concert at Cathedral Park in Portland.  Every year the Portland Festival Symphony, started by Lajos Balogh thirty years ago, plays free concerts in Portland area parks.  We’ve been going to these concerts for many years.  They are always held the first three weekends in August.  The crowds of people don’t keep us away because we know the reward of hearing live classical music is worth it!

Cathedral Park is located underneath the north end of the St. John’s bridge.The symphony

Many thanks to my online friends, Roberta, who has a blog called Our RV Travels, and Rick, of Rick & Paulette's RV Travels for sending me the instructions about how to embed a slideshow into my blog!  Click on the arrow to start the slideshow.

Dave and Carol and the rest of the appreciative audience at last evening’s Portland Festival Symphony concert.

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Today’s challenge was to embed the slideshow.  In tomorrow’s blog I’ll tell you more about the symphony, the music we heard, and the park.

Stay tuned!

I Need Help!

Help with Picasa, that is.  Well, I probably need help in other areas, too, but that’s a topic for another day.

The other day I posted some sunset pictures.  I edited them by using Picasa and they turned out okay.  I wanted to put them into a slideshow but didn’t know how to do that and get it on Live Writer. 

I have become a big fan of Live Writer, but I’m still learning to use it, too.  I haven’t downloaded the new beta version of Live Writer because I barely know how to use the current version.  Besides that, Dave always tells me to be wary of beta versions of any programs because the reason that it is the “beta” version is because it may still have bugs in it.  Well, don’t programs sometimes have bugs in them even after the beta version is gone and the “real” version is out?  But that’s a rant for another day.

Back to Picasa.  I am slowly making my way through the Geeks on Tour videos.  They provide a lot of information, but unfortunately, it’s not always the information that I need. 

 

I know how to watch a slideshow of my photos in Picasa, but I don’t know how to export a slideshow (if export is even the correct word).

The other feature that I tried to use was Geo-Tag.  I downloaded Google Earth and it came up okay and I found the location that I wanted to highlight, and I was able to Geo-tag the photos.  But again, how do I get the map to load onto Live Writer? 

The final area of Picasa that I need help is with is getting any edited pictures into Live Writer.  I am slowly figuring this out, but the way I’m doing it seems cumbersome.  I store my pictures in my computer’s C drive, not in Pictures.  One of the Geeks’ videos said you don’t need to save Picasa files.  Well, obviously I do need to save or export, or else I don’t know how to get the edited photos into Live Writer.  I added the Picasa Link plug-in to Live Writer but that doesn’t work unless I’m online.  The whole point of Live Writer is to be able to write a blog offline and then publish it later when I have an internet connection.

I did have a bit of success with Picasa.  I created a collage of the sunset pictures.  But I don’t like how they look in a collage.

I like my ocean collage a little better.

Today I feel very technologically-challenged.  I want to make use of all this new technology, but it’s a struggle to learn it all!

Empty Spot

Our motorhome parked at home It’s a sad day.  Our motorhome is not in its usual spot in our back yard.  We took it to Camping World this morning for some warranty work.  The main issue is a problem with the bedroom slide.  A part needs to be replaced and since the part needs to be ordered, it could take up to ten days for the part to arrive .  A few other minor things need to be worked on, also.

Waiting to be checked in for service at Camping World

Our next RV trip is planned for August 20, so we hope the motorhome will be ready by then.  In the meantime, we are thinking about taking the car and staying in a motel (horrors!) and possibly going to the Family Motor Coach Association (FMCA) conference in Redmond, Oregon. 

I didn’t even know that FMCA was holding their convention in Redmond this year.  Roberta and Wayne of Our RV Travels mentioned in their blog that they are going to the convention and planning to attend one of the Picasa seminars taught by Chris and Jim Guld of Geeks on Tour.  Roberta introduced me to Geeks on Tour and I recently joined their site, which offers video tutorials on many topics, not just Picasa.

We can’t go for the whole conference (August 11-14) so we have see if it makes sense to pay the high daily rate ($65 each per day for non-members but includes seminars and entertainment) as well as making the four hour drive each way from home, and besides all that, paying to stay in Redmond/Bend.  Have any of you ever attended one of the FMCA conferences?

The temporarily empty spot in our back yard.  How sad!

Thank you for reading my blog!

The Drive Home from Astoria and My First Picasa Pictures!

We drove home from Astoria this morning.  The trip took a little over two hours.  I took some pictures and when I got home I got them loaded into the free Picasa program from Google.  I played with a bit last night, so I kind of knew what I was doing.  I’m still learning, though.

Driving east on Oregon State Highway 30, we came upon the inevitable flagger.  These guys were installing a new telephone pole.  We were soon on our way.

The highway follows the Columbia River, but we couldn’t see it much after we left Astoria.  We are happy when we get our first glimpse of it again as we near the bridge that crosses the river at Longview, Washington. 

 

While crossing the bridge, we got a good look at all the logs being transported abroad.  This place was busy today! 

In the following sets of photos, I am going to show you the difference between the photos I took and the same photos touched by using Picasa.  All I did was apply the “I’m Feeling Lucky” and the “Straighten” options to the following photos.

Original photo:

Picasa photo:

After Longview, we turned onto I-5 south.

Original photo:

We saw more logs at Kalama, which is also a river town.

Original photo:

Another glimpse of the Columbia River before I-5 turns away.

Original photo:

Turning east on Highway 14 east towards Camas means that we are almost home.  If we had kept going south on I-5, we would have ended up back in Oregon.

Original photo: (Pretty pathetic, right?)  New, improved version:

So, my verdict is that editing my photos with Picasa is a great success.  I still need to learn a lot more about the program, but I’ve made a start.  Thank you to my blog followers and online friends Roberta, Al, Rick, Jerry, and Gerri, all of whom gave me advice and/or encouragement regarding my photos!