I keep meaning to write my post-Christmas blog. I've had a bunch of false starts.

The night before we left for the EPT it snowed about a foot. It was bad enough that they closed the office for only the second time I can remember in the 7 years we've been in Madtown. So we had all day to snowblow and shovel our way out. Our street still wasn't clear when we decided to leave early for the airport, and we left extra early so that the snow plow didn't plow us in just as we were trying to leave. The roads were pretty bad, even some of the main streets weren't all that great. The highways were pretty clear though. Of course the storms hit the entire mid-west so all the planes were late. We left Madtown with absolutely no time to cross several miles of airport in O'Hare. Kim went to the next gate without me so I could grab the checked bag. I literally ran across two terminals and we were still some of the last people on the plane. Even still there was a pretty good wait on the tarmac. I smacked some poor lady with the suitcase running across O'Hare.

We arrived in the EPT to be greeted by Kim's parents and then we went to Applebee's by the airport. I'm not a big fan of hip-hop, but the stuff they were playing in there was especially bad. I was thankful to be out of the airport, and out of Applebee's. We went to my parent's house and slept in the new bed the bought just for us. It was a gigantic improvement over the torture device they used to have in there.

We spent the next day Saturday waiting for our luggage to arrive and packing the cars and stuff. Mom and grandma took grandma's car, Kim and I took mom and dad's car, dad took a motorcycle early, and Kim's parents drove the caddy. So there was at least four vehicles for seven people. We took grandma upstairs to the living room/kitchen and all settled in.

We spent most of the time hanging out, watching movies, listening to Christmas music, and playing games. Kim and I did much of the cooking, mom made a few things beforehand. We spent a lot on the groceries, and we didn't eat a lot of it. Someone pointed out that eating out the whole time would have been even more expensive. The condo was also expensive, but not more than 4-5 hotel rooms for a week over the holidays. Dad said it was boring, and I guess it wasn't the most exciting time, but I think most of us enjoyed it. The idea was to spend time altogether.

Sunday morning Kim wasn't feeling well, so I went to church with her parents. They were having their Christmas special, the girl that was the main character in it had more talent than all the rest of the church. She really made the service.

Auntie H and Tori came up on Christmas Eve after picking Tori up at the airport. Undarma came up with dad who dropped off the bike in the EPT. Christmas day we exchanged White Elephant gifts. It was sort of a last minute thing, with some rules that dad made up. In the end I think Dorothy won and Tori lost, the idea was to be especially white elephant-y within certain constraints. In the end I ended up with a box of crayons.

On the last evening it snowed on top of freezing rain. In Madison we'd have thought nothing of it, Kim and I were actually making fun of it. Two things make it more serious up in the mountains of New Mexico though. One is the mountains make slick, very narrow roads much worse. The second is that evening though they live in the mountains, many of the people visiting are not used to it and even those that live there are not prepared for it. Some hicks from Texas slide down the hill in their pickup into the back of Karl's caddy. The people in charge of the place came by and sprinkled literally two cups of salt over the entire parking lot. The car wasn't too damaged, at least not compared to the side swiping it took in Colorado Spring at Thanksgiving.

Tori and I rode together down the mountain. It reminds me that we don't get to spend enough time together.

Kim was again not feeling well, but we went to Margarette's house and had Mexican food and they gave us some gifts.

On the way home we sat in the ELP airport watching the plane to Dallas that was scheduled after us leave first because we were delayed. We got to Dallas two hours late and they were kind enough to hold our plane to Madison for a couple of minutes. There wasn't weather anywhere in the country that day so it much have been logistics or mechanical issues. We only got home 20 minutes late.

A co-worker had shoveled our walk twice while we were gone, which we are very grateful.

Last night we did head out to Cross Plains for our small group Christmas Party. With somewhere around 5 inches of snow I was surprised by how many people came out. We had a good time talking and eating.

Speaking of snow, it was supposed to be an appetizer for Thursday's main event which should start in the evening (just after work) and go until Friday at noon. 8-12 inches of snow and us with an evening flight, and here's the main thing...through Chicago. They shut O'Hare down for wind sheer when someone sneezes, and an evening flight means it is got a decent chance of no go.

I got Kim a new iPod for her birthday, I already gave it to her so we could load it and charge it for our trip to the EPT. I have been taking records (LPs) and converting them to CDs and MP3s so we can listen to them move conveniently. Kim's parents got me a record player with a USB connection so it is much simpler to convert, but it is still a lot more effort than CDs.

The garage door broke last week. I order the part from Sears and it just barely shipped, having to move the garage door manually in the cold stinks.

Its snowing again, looks to be the second major snowfall of the year. It seems to mostly snow on Tuesdays, I wonder why that is. Tonight our small group is planning on having our Christmas Party out in Cross Plains (about 15 miles from home). Generally snowfall means it gets canceled.

We are looking forward to the EPT, although technically we won't be in the EPT very much this time. We got a cabin up in the mountains. Even though it is up in the mountains the lows are still 30 degrees warmer than the highs here. We were talking about skiing or sledding while there, but it must be higher up cause it is in the 50s there during the day.

Wednesday morning we got up at the crack of yesterday to drive to Milwaukee to catch a flight to Colorado Springs (via Denver). After a whole two hours of sleep I didn't think I was gonna make it, so I let Kim do most of the driving. The flights were uneventful.

We went out for Mexican at some place owned by former El Pasoans. It was pretty darn good.

Thursday we had Thanksgiving dinner which was awesome. All the standards, and tons of mash potatoes. We watched football most of the day.

Friday we went shopping, we didn't actually buy much. Afterward we went out for Italian which again was awesome.

Saturday I got up had breakfast and went back to bed for a "nap". A nap that lasted five hours, it was a beautiful thing. Then ham dinner.

Sunday we went to church. Then we went out for Thai at Wild Ginger, also awesome.

Monday we went to Perkin's for breakfast. The flight from Denver to Milwaukee was loud, cramped, annoying and despite it only being two hours long was one of my least favorite flights ever. After the flight Kim and I went to Mo's (an Irish pub) in Milwaukee and had shepherd's pie. It snowed while we were gone, actually it was freezing rain and topped off with snow. The side mirrors were completely ice covered making driving not all that fun.

Other than eating we watched movies, played games and hung out. That doesn't sound like much, but it was pretty relaxing with little demands on us, other than to eat more. We actually wore out a coffee pot and went through nearly a gallon of creamer.

I made CDs out of the LPs that Kim's uncle had, we ripped them and spent way too much time labeling them. Windows Media Player is one of the worst programs ever written, which is a new low, even for Microsoft.

A week from today we are headed to Colorado Springs for thanksgiving. We are looking forward to seeing family, eating too much and drinking large amounts of coffee. We keeping tell ourselves that if we can just make it to Thanksgiving a bunch of things will be resolved. These last two months since Dave died haven't been great.

Sunday night we went to the Irish pub downtown. They have music on Sunday nights so we went and listened to the session, it was fiddle and guitar.