Scapegoat of the week

We did this thing mostly out of desperation. We designated a "Scapegoat Of The Week", and passed the "privilege" around.

It worked really well. When something happened, instead of multiple fingers pointing at each other, we just blamed the SOTW and everyone had a good laugh.

Pixie Stockings

When Mildred and I were first married, as decorations for one of our very first Christmases we got six miniature felt Christmas stockings that we hung on the tree.

I got this idea of putting a little piece of candy in the one that was "hers". When she asked about it the next day, I told her the Christmas Pixies must have left it :)

We continued that tradition until the kids left and Mildred passed away.

I spent the 2008 Christmas season first in Houston and last in Utah, and the kids with kids have kept the tradition alive.

David and Ian playing with lights

When the kids were growing up, there was one thing you could count on if you were in a public place and the lights went out - it was David, playing with the switch :)

That's why I wasn't surprised last Christmastime when I was visiting with David, April and Ian, and the lights went out.... Ian is his father's son.

The International Space Station

I had read that there was always a ham radio operator on board the International Space Station, and that they took time to talk to hams on the ground.

Two weeks ago when I was driving Sally and her mom to Boise (for the birth of our grandson, Tyler), we heard the ISS! It was amazing!

Somewhere outside of the Tri-Cities I was scanning around (the ham version of channel surfing) and got a strong signal, that I stopped scanning for. The operator was talking about being 200 miles above the earth.

Is She or Isn't She?

The older kids used to tell Deborah she was dead. I guess she believed them, because she would come to us, crying about it :)

Christmas, 2008

Christmas is really hard these days. I am torn between spending it with my children and spending it with my wife. I wish I didn't have to make that choice, but there it is.

For reasons that I won't go into right now (no, I'm not dying), I have chosen this year to spend Christmas and New Year's with my children. I am happily going to be able to do that in two stops; Mary and Mark will be in Houston the week before Christmas and Deborah will be there for the whole holiday.

So a week from tomorrow, the 15th, I will be flying to Houston. Mary and Mark will already be there and Deborah comes in the next day. I'll get to know Ian, finally.

The day after Christmas I will fly to Salt Lake City. I would like to be able to spend Deborah's birthday on the 27th with her, but I just couldn't make the flights and my budget work out.

I am planning on staying with Paul and Melina, as long as I don't have too severe a reaction to their cat. I don't know what Plan B is on that front.

Paul and Melina have something planned for New Year's Eve, so that night everyone else is having a party, probably at Rachel and Tim's. I will spend other time with the girls too, I just don't have it figured out yet.

Then I go home on the 2nd, Friday.

I am really looking forward to seeing everyone, though I also feel bad about not being with Sally and Emma on their first Christmas without Walt. But as Art Williams used to say, "All you can do is all you can do".

One other thing came up which almost scuttled the trip. I just found out (minutes from pressing the "Buy this plane ticket" button) that I am being moved to a different project at work, and that I might have to stick around to get trained on it. Luckily, that got ironed out.

I wish could come bearing Christmas gifts for everyone, but not this time. I am working on a sorta hand-made gift for the kids, one per kid, but I'm afraid it won't be finished in time.

Bonnie in France

I had two favorite cousins, Ginny May on my mom's side and Bonnie on my dad's side.

I spent part of my mission in the south of France, not on the Riviera. I spent time on the Riviera as well, but this one summer I was farther west than that.

My cousin Bonnie got a job there! She spent a summer as (if I remember correctly) something along the lines of a chambermaid at a resort hotel on the Mediterranean.

I got the opportunity to spend some time with her, which was really a lot of fun.