Generous support and kindness from our readers….Getting Tom’s google account restored today…

Seated over the wing on our way to South Africa on this date in 2013, some of our views were obstructed. But the Heavens offered up this cloudy view. For more photos, please click here.

We have received many messages from readers, not only as comments on particular posts but also by email. We’ve made a point to respond to each one as promptly as possible and hope we haven’t missed responding to you. The outpouring of love and concern fills us with such joy that it surely makes the daily efforts to post new stories with photos meaningful and purposeful. Thank you!

This morning, at 10:40, we have an appointment with the Geek Squad at the Best Buy store in this neighborhood. Louise went to our house, picked up Tom’s two old phones, and charged them, but only one worked. The Geek Squad tech will submit a request to Google for a code that will come to that phone. Once Louise sees that code, she will tell us, and the technician can proceed from there. There will be no more for Louise to do.

Fortunately, she could get into the house, find the phones and do this for us. We are very grateful. We’ll undoubtedly figure out some unique way to show our appreciation once we return to Marloth Park, although she’ll dismiss her efforts as “nothing at all.” But having her and Danie always providing us with so much help means more to us than we can say.

Hopefully, this process works, and by this afternoon, Tom will have his laptop functioning and his new Google Pixel 6a phone. We are holding our breath that this process works. If not, Tom will have to create a new email address which will cause so much work for him to go into every app, file, and website he uses and change the email, which is time-consuming and cumbersome. It could take him weeks to accomplish this task.

Yesterday afternoon, as mentioned, we visited Tom’s brother Jerome at his house in Coon Rapids. As it turned out, seven of us had stopped by, including daughter Tammy, grandson Vincent, sisters Colleen and Patty, and niece Jeanne. After a three-hour visit, we all took off for dinner at Texas Roadhouse. We all shared a large booth, ordered drinks, and enjoyed fresh, delicious meals.

I ordered salmon and salad, and Tom ordered steak, mashed potatoes, and green beans. The rest of the group ordered steaks and ribs, which were huge portions, and all said everything was delicious. The service was exemplary, and Tom added a generous tip to the bill. Later, Jerome’s daughter Kathy stopped by for a drink. It was a lovely afternoon and evening.

Tonight at 7:00 pm, we’re meeting Greg and his family at Champps for dinner. It’s not as if we can go on a picnic or do outdoor activities in this cold weather. It’s often cold after a snowstorm for several days. This morning it was 6F, -14.4C, but fortunately, it is warming up during the day. Today’s high will be 31F, -.55C. According to the weather report, there doesn’t appear to be much snow on the horizon until we leave a week from today.

We’re heading off to the Geek Squad at Best Buy now. We’ll report the results when we return.

We just returned from the Geek Squad. After about an hour, we got Tom’s Gmail account restored, and now his laptop and new phone are working. We called Louise, who had his old broken phone in her hand, and she gave us the code that popped up that made it possible to restore his Google account. What a relief! Thank you, Louise!!!

Best Buy only charged $40 for the help. While we were there, we purchased a portable phone charger. When Connie visited us (when Jeff passed away), we saw her use a separate phone charger which should be helpful for us when we travel. We’ve been on several planes lately that don’t have USB plugins, and we were cautious about freely using our phones. With this external charger, we can use our phones as we like.

The Anker, Slim and Powerful +46 hours will be perfect for us on many occasions. I will keep it in my bag when we head out and perhaps forget to recharge our phones or run them down from use.

Tom’s happy with his new phone, and I’m so glad not to have to think about this anymore. One problem was solved and is now out of the way. Now, we have bigger “fish to fry” contacting our credit card company to discuss the coverage included for lost bags. We will report back the results.

Not much here in the way of photos. I haven’t wanted to pressure family members to have their photos taken for publication. Not everyone is comfortable with this, and we surely understand.

Have a wonderful day!!!

Photo from one year ago today, December 1, 2021:

A yellow-billed stork with a reflection in the water at the Sunset Dam near Lower Sabie in Kruger National Park. For more photos, please click here.

Comments and responses Generous support and kindness from our readers….Getting Tom’s google account restored today…

  1. Thelma May Reply

    I am so sorry for all the trouble you have had. I know you were looking so forward to your cruise! But to hear you visiting family and having such a grand time with them, it seems things have worked out pretty good! Praying everything works out good and easy for you from this point on. Enjoy your time in the USA! Wish you were closer, I would love to meet you!

    • worldwide-admin Post authorReply

      Thelma May, we’d love to meet you too! You’ve been such a loyal friend/reader for so long. We appreciate you.

      You’re right, all has worked out well for us coming here. It’s awful we lost so much money and are doing everything we can to see if we can recover any of it. Time will tell.

      Be well and content.
      Much love,
      Jess & Tom

  2. Julie Baker Reply

    Hi! I started reading your postings after hearing your MN history segments, the interview, and most recently your holiday travel challenges on Garage Logic. I continue to admire your retirement choice and your ability to “keep calm and carry on.” It’s such a relief to hear that you’re getting many recent issues resolved and that you’ve been enjoying bonus time with family.

    I do hope you get reunited with your bags. I had much more minor issues this summer when my checked bag failed to make a connection on Delta flights to 2 different European destinations, first via AMS and second via CDG. At least they’re consistent (ha!) In both cases, my bag was delivered the following day, which was inconvenient but much less significant than what you’re experiencing. However, I will now, forevermore, pack essentials and another outfit in my carry-on whenever I check an international bag!

    At any rate, what saved my sanity in both cases was the fact that I had followed advice to put an AirTag (available at Apple stores or via Amazon) in my checked bag. This enabled me to track my bag and see when it was (or wasn’t) loaded on the plane. When I landed in Pisa, for example, I could see that the bag was still in Amsterdam. This didn’t make me happy, of course, but I felt better seeing that it was still at that airport and not on its way to another destination. It also allowed me to see that it was on its way the following day, and I knew when it finally landed at the intended airport.

    AirTags work with iPhones, and I don’t know if either of you have one. Hopefully, whatever brand of phone you are using, a similar tracker is available. I can’t tell you how much it restored my sense of control in situations where I would have otherwise felt completely clueless.

    May God continue to bless you with health and safe, happy travels!
    Julie B

    • worldwide-admin Post authorReply

      Julie, thanks so much for writing. We so appreciate hearing your stories with bags. We had looked into Airtags, but we don’t have iPhones. We’re Google Pixel fans with non-contract Google Fi service. We had checked a while ago. In time, Google will come out with a device that will work for us. In the meantime, we contacted the airline, and they tracked our bags. They are currently in Addis Ababa and hopefully heading back to Johannesburg in the next few days. We hope they make it to Nelspruit before we do next Saturday.

      You named it correctly, BONUS TIME WITH FAMILY. Thank you for that.

      Warmest regards,
      Jess & Tom

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *