The "Goin' South" Newsletter was an idea hatched from a Coast to Coast Rally we attended with friends from home, in 1998. It was a way to communicate with our relatives while we were on the road, without having to write every month. It seemed like the ideal premise. Write one newsletter ,..........and send it to everyone in our family who was interested in hearing from us. We just presumed that everyone we sent it to, would want to hear from us. We haven't had any complaints so far, and we've enjoyed doing it along the way. Some our family have even complimented us on the wonderful job we did. Well......They said that for free the "letter" is okay, but if they had to pay for it, we could stick it.The first year we attempted to write the "letter" with WordPerfect and had a lot of difficulty formatting the pages to make them fit into the publication. We'd get it all set-up and ready to print, and then one more click would send the page into oblivion. Frustration was a key word in my vocabulary along with #%&*+@!. Although it was difficult the first year, we are now using another program to formulate the "letter." The program we use is Serif PagePlus 4.0 and it works wonderfully easy. The formatting is a breeze and it takes very little getting used to. The air sometimes turns a little blue every time I fire it up after a 7 month hiatus, because we only write the letter in the winter months from late December to the end of April. Generally that amounts to 5 issues for the entire year. That's the main reason it takes a little time to get everything up and running again. The second thing is that I'm not too bright and I get older every year. Two highly indelible marks against me.We would like to print the "letter" in color but it would be too 'cost prohibitive.' Cartridges for our printer are just too expensive, and having them printed commercially would also be pricey. Putting them on this website in color might be a cost effective alternative. We'll see.We intend to continue the "letter" as long as we have unique places to visit and write about, and our interest and enthusiasm remain intact. I don't foresee any lack of interesting places to write about, at least in the near future. So this "letter" may continue indefinitely.If you have any comments or questions about this site feel free to e-mail us, or write us snail mail. We love hearing from people.
