Ericast 340 - How was March?

What's a few weeks among friends, right? But this is a very special time of year around the Ericast, so I've got reason to put out an episode. Wondering what it is? Here's your show.   Website viewers: Click here to listen to this week's episode! Podcast listeners: Click here for a link to the show notes page! Everyone: Call 701-645-ERIC (701-645-3742) and comment!   This is not the promised "Follow-up on Hope" episode that I have sitting in fragments on my hard drive. Instead, here are some life updates.  If you don't want those, skip this episode, but if you do then you'll miss the hamster-themed song after the outro.   It's our birthday! The Ericast was created in March of 2005 as I had switched jobs and was wrapping up my Master of Arts in Human Resource Development. Nineteen isn't all that special a number, unless you're Paul Hardcastle, and if you get that reference then you are my people!   But, I did indeed follow up on what I may or may not have mentioned in a previous episode or two - what's just a click away for you is months ago for me - and right now I'm taking two classes in the Master of Science in Artificial Intelligence program.  Yup, why not pick up a second Master's degree, right?  This semester it's "Python" (which I got into early) plus "Data Analytics and Visualization" which I didn't get into until after the first class had passed so that's been a bit of a trip. If you're interested in that stuff, I'm happy to talk about it. If not, I won't bore you.   It wouldn't be the Ericast without talking about the weather. In late February it was 65 degrees, which is very, very unusual for Minnesota. You can do your own research on how warm it's been here but, trust me, it was warm. Then people started saying "Winter is over!" and of course we got a March snowstorm because that's how Murphy's Law works, but it wasn't that bad - less than a foot of snow here in the Twin Cities, and it's basically melted clear.   I might have mentioned that Dad picked up RSV in December which isn't great when you can see "90" on the horizon, but after a couple months in a care center for rehab he's back in his home.   In February we observed a year since Mom passed away.  That "is what it is'' as they say.  Still lots of stuff to go through and decisions to be made. It's not quite so morbid as "dust in the wind" but I was telling Dad tonight that there are things like boxes of letters she sent home from college.  That's interesting. I have some of those myself kicking around somewhere.  But who cares?  We tell ourselves that "the next generation" will but they're busy making their own memories, not reading through someone else's.   Almost a year to the day, Chloe had a second ear surgery - a "tympanoplasty" to repair her ear drum. Last year things went great with the left ear so, hey, why not do the right one?   Candela is the opposite end of the spectrum for family surgeries and when she got her wisdom teeth out last week it was her first IV, first anesthesia, first prescription medications even.   A couple weeks ago I was able to go to a talk by a name I'm sure long-time Ericast listeners must recognize because he's someone I did quite a bit of work with years ago. That was a weird feeling to flash back to events and conversations from 20 years ago...   So, that's where things are at.  And the website Suno.ai is bringing me joy.  So, we'll wrap up with something from that.