Today was the Fort Bidwell BBQ (Chicken & Steak). The profits go to the volunteer fire department. The weather was wonderful and the thunder storms did not appear - nice sun and in the high 70's with little wind (Last year was windy and very wet.). The food was excellent this year and they drew a big crowd but the serving line was under a minute. What a great bunch of efficient volunteers. The JnR Hotel was full so I took the housekeeper with me to take a break since she started at 8am and it was already 1pm when we left. She didn't finish until 5pm. I'm still doing laundry and thinking that I should have taken something out of the freezer for dinner. I guess I will go to the Country Hearth Restaurant and refill my stomach before it gets too late.

I like to automate everything I can to save labor costs and therefore keep low room rates. So I want to automate the housekeepers task list usung Excel. So far no luck but my formula is definately missing something. I am looking in a range of cells for a room number match, then another range of cells with a date plus another range with days staying to see if the room should be cleaned for a new guest or serviced for the existing guest or ignored since it wasn't occupied in the date range. I can get it to work until I change it to ranges of cells. Great challenge.

We had some motorcycle guests last night that came across the desert looking for flora & fauna. They said it was magnificent out there. Lots of water, fields of flowers and lots of animals - antilope, deer, wild horses.

Sounded like a great trip to take.

The Surprise Valley Chamber of Commerce met today and had an interesting presentation on the Ruby Pipeline project. The project involves running a 42" gas pipeline from Opal Wyoming to Main Oregon, all underground. The pipe will deliver 1.3 bilion cubic feet of gas per day when it is finished. There will be 3500 workers divided into 7 construction camps. 500 will be byVya Nevada near Cedarville. The camps will be self contained, but the workers might come to town now and then on their day off. Hopefuly not all at the same time.

The Surprise Valley Hospital saved a guest from certain death from an anurism. Quick response, good diagnotics, stabilization and a flight to a hospital with a specialist waiting by. Great job. I guess that's why we all love this hospital.