NOTE: Tom penned this on Tuesday, the 22nd of Jan

Got up, worked the kids and then worked out. Then finish off a column from yesterday, do the Bowflex, set out the trash, pack quick and shower for the trip.

I mention all that because yesterday morning I just slept in after a marathon of books on Monday ended with a big, well-deserved martini and a showing of "Sunshine" (I love all Danny Boyle flicks) in the theater, after all the kids were put to bed.

But today I had to get my act together and out the door to the airport.

Flew SWA to Midway and then KC. Plenty of weather and bumps, but I read a ton of mags, one WSJ and a good World Bank report, so I noticed nothing.

Picked up by a USAF officer (and blog reader) and driven to St. Joseph, historic frontier launching point for westward expansion and where Jesse James met his end.

My host is the 139th Airlift Wing and my job is to give the after-banquet address to cap off their 4-day tactics symposium.

So here I am on the raised dais, just left of Sen. Kit Bond doing his before-banquet remarks and I'm grinning through some of his comments, grimacing through a couple others, and wondering how it was I ended up at the head table.

Turns out my young officer driver pulled it off through Jenn when he was fortunate enough to find out I'd be in the vicinity. So here I am on the dais, signing books and waiting to speak at 2020, which is late for my preference (I think the perfect talk is 0900), but I guess it's no weirder to suddenly finding myself in that helo in Afghanistan or standing in front of the Great Pyramids with my Italian model girlfriend ...

No, wait a tick, that's Sarkozy!

Then panic!

I look over to my laptop, set up for the show, and spot that damn Mac message about an OS crash!

Almost new Mac, working off Leopard.

Then I remember: two days ago I download one of those cursed MS Office updates, which seem to cause this with me now every time!

I go with the local AV person's Gateway. Have to cut some of the trickier transitions down to size, but I simply cannot start a talk worrying about that crash message appearing.

This truly depresses me. I am almost ready to get a Dell for speaking gigs only. I would go only keynote, but the questions I have then are: Can you run PPT files on Keynote and vice versa? Because that's always what has scared me off from switching, given all the PCs I am forced to run on in various mil locations.

I remember the first step to take in repairing permissions when this happens (before reinstalling OS). Can anyone tell me how to do that? Where you find the function?