I can’t imagine what she’s going through. My week has been terrible enough, but with part of this week being her baby, her grandfather, and now her own medical scare… it’s just hard to imagine.

The past week has really shown me just how fortunate I am to have an amazingly supportive group of family and friends. I’ll admit, it has been an eventful summer — but not the kind I was hoping for.

So, on top of everything else, including knowing full well I still have a few more day of some unpleasant things to deal with, I can only hope for the best and wait and see what will happen.

First impression: It’s great.

While nothing life changing, there are quite a few user interface updates. I really like the new phone/web/launcher system, with the left/right page buttons in addition to screen swiping. Plus, it also frees up two spaces on my main screen as I no longer need the Phone & Browser buttons eating up valuable screen space.

The Alarm Clock interface update wasn’t really needed, but is nice. The “dim” setting seems a little more… dim? Which is nice at night as I do actually use the phone as my alarm clock also. The additional screensaver is nice too.

I see that the Twitter app is now installed by default, now I’m not sure if I should keep Twitdroyd or not. My first impressions of the Twitter app when it was first released were less than ideal, so I’m not sure I’m ready to try it again or not. We’ll see, maybe when I have more time.

The Camera seems to have a few small UI tweaks also. The only real downside I’ve seen is that there is still no option to disable the camera “sound” when I take a picture (other than silencing my phone all together prior to taking a picture). While not the end of the world, I really wish this was an option.

There are lots of other updates also, see my previous Android 2.2 update post, but these are the quick things that actually stood out for me from casual day-to-day use. Overall, I’m happy with the update.

I feel very fortunate to have grown up with my grandparents for as long as I have. They were both able to see both me and my sisters graduate not only from high school, but college as well, and to see many of us continuing on in life to get married, and in my oldest younger sister’s case, even start a family.

My grandfather made it to the ripe old age of 94. In my book, that’s something to be very proud of.

So here’s to you, Grandpa. I will always remember you and will miss you very much. Rest in peace.

Today we found out that my grandfather has slipped into a coma. His health has been slowly getting worse over the last couple of years after suffering a couple of strokes.

The situation has been somewhat expected, but even when you know it’s coming, it is still horrible news.

On top of that, we found out that Sonja’s mom is going to need surgery for her back. They are going to be transferring her from the Luverne hospital to the Sioux Falls hospital today, and we will be discussing more about it later and find out when and what exactly that will be.

I have to admit, this week has been draining in every way possible. It’s only Tuesday, and I am already completely worn out.

While I’m not overly informed of what this really implies, from what I am told, this is a big red flag for a number of terrible things that I don’t even want to list as possibilities.

So, over the next few days they will continue to do more test, which simply means more waiting.

I hate waiting.

In the mean time, all we can do his hope for the best. Good luck, little man.

Of course, that all ended this morning when we heard the news that Sonja’s mother was in a Car accident late last night as she was driving home. The accident was pretty bad, at least four broken ribs which is causing some difficult breathing and possible fluid build up int he lungs, along with a fractured vertebrae, and a body covered in some severe bruising.

The good news, and what we’re thankful for, is that she’s alive and ok. Sometimes, it’s hard to tell yourself “it could’ve been worse.”

Although, as you can see above, I don’t think it could have been any worse for the poor Toyota Prius, as it is pretty much totaled.

The only major thing that was impacted is the “Recently Updated Blogs” widget. I am aware of this, and should have a fix up within the next day or so.

As for anything else, if something seems out of place or if you have any questions about the updates, feel free to contact me directly.

Late in the evening we celebrated with a small group of friends, mainly: Dan, Carrie and Mike. It was great that Carrie and Mike were able to make it from Minnesota. They arrived just in time to laugh at us while we played Cineplexity.

I have to admit, that game was a lot of fun. A little beer, a little wine, and a bunch of movie nuts battling it out. I think the best part had to have been every time we were stuck trying to plead why our movie was best! Good times.

Anyway, it was a good day. Happy Birthday, Sonj-e!

Last week NewEgg was having a sale, $30 off, and I had missed the previous sale, so when I saw that there was a similar offering I went ahead and picked up a new Hitachi 7K2000 2TB hard drive. It’s actually the same model as my previous Hitachi HD32000 2TB, but just the OEM version instead of the Retail.

Obviously when I got home, I quickly added the new drive to my WHS Storage Pool, and it looks like I really needed it! I was down to about ~5% free on my two primary 2TB drives.

Yes, I do have a couple extra 1TB drives laying around, but I am trying to phase them out with 2TB drives to maximize space without having to add another SATA controller card some day.

So, a bunch more free space, and no more WHS yelling at me about low disk space! Now I just need to balance the drives a bit.

Verizon has released a bit of marketing fluff, available here.

One of the big updates I’m looking forward to is the new Android 2.2 Launcher, which should give a couple extra buttons to make launching phone and web access easier (and free up some room for other applications on the desktop). Also, I am curious to see what the camera UI update looks like. The current camera UI “works” — but definitely could use some improvements to make it a little easier to change settings.

All-in-all, I’m excited to see the new update… but for now, I’ll just have to sit and wait.