March 19, 2010. Jackson, Mississippi. March.

Pleasures are to be had in Jackson in March. The temperature is 75 degrees. All the pear trees are in bloom and are everywhere in town. The red bud is also in bloom but is purple and can be seen on every street and woods. It seems that Spring comes early to Jackson and we like it. Our apartment looked appealing when we arrived last night late. We were pleased with not only the function but also the beauty of our little condominium. I liked it even better this morning drinking coffee in bed where I watched the ducks swimming around in the reservoir, right outside my window. How sweet it is.

"Global Entry" is a new experimental program in the U.S., the equivalent of the Nexis program for Canada, whereby you can by-pass the customs by being approved as a "Trusted Traveller". Yesterday was the first time we used it and it worked well. It certainly saved us many many minutes waiting in line. The system going in and out of Canada works very well, and works using a retina scan, but the entry to the U.S. from Mexico is using fingerprints. One machine would not pick up my finger prints, so I moved to another machine and all went well. The system is being evaluated, so we hope it works well as it certainly saved us a lot of time. Only two other people were using the system yesterday, while the lines were long, so Ken and I are definitely early adopters, thanks to Ken. This modern world is wonderful.