Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas to everyone! I hope that you all enjoyed the holidays. I spent a week in Lexington and got to spend a lot of time with my family (pictures, video) and even managed to visit with two friends from my undergraduate days. Unfortunately, we were unable to have Christmas with my mom's side of the family because my 90-year-old grandfather was hospitalized with pneumonia. We were able to visit him in the hospital on Christmas Day and the doctors are saying that he will be released today (12.30). Some of my aunts and cousins are celebrating New Year's in Sarasota, FL, so it looks like I will be driving down there tomorrow to celebrate with them.

Since my cats spent Christmas alone, I assuaged my guilt by buying them a climbing structure. So far they are enjoying it, but I'm not sure how long that's going to last. For now, Cassie seems to prefer laying in the Christmas tree box. The woman who ran the store where I bought the structure said that one of her great-grandmothers was a Jarboe. Given that she is from central Indiana, we decided that we must be distant cousins. She said she didn't know much about this great-grandmother because nobody ever spoke about her; apparently the woman ran off when her children were very young. Does this sound familiar to anyone? Any idea who this could be? She also said that one of her other relatives told her that Jarboes are known for having a mean streak. That's the first time I've heard anyone say that!

We tried to be adventurous this year and make some oven-roasted chestnuts. They were terrible! My sister said they taste like cat food smells, LOL. Has anyone eaten (and enjoyed?) chestnuts? If so, have did you prepare them?

The holiday party that I hosted for my labmates went very well, except for the fact that both cats bit someone. We played Cranium and had a great time. Hopefully we will have another get together soon. Albert, I wish you were here to explain how to play Catan.

Happy New Year to everyone!

I will be hosting a small holiday party for some of my labmates tomorrow night. The thought of having company was great motivation to clean my apartment, hang some remaining pictures and finally finish unpacking. OK, so I didn't actually finish unpacking but I did move the boxes into the bedroom. I've got meatballs in the oven right now and then I need to make some brownies and a Dump Cake (bad name, good dessert). I'm looking forward to some social interaction! The party was also a good excuse to download some new music from iTunes, which I am greatly enjoying right now, especially the classic Stevie Wonder and James Taylor.

On Wednesday I'll be flying to Kentucky for Christmas. In comparison to the 13-hour drive, the flight there will take less than 5 hours. I'm flying directly from Gainesville to Lexington, with a connection in Atlanta. Flying definately saves time, but then I have the disadvantage of being without a car in Lexington. Regardless, I'm looking forward to seeing family and friends.

I picked up one of my "Little House" books this week and (as always) great enjoyed reading it. I may have to go through the whole series again. I feel a little silly enjoying those so much, but they really are great books. Plus they have short chapters, pictures and large print - what more could you ask for? During the move from Kentucky to California we stopped at two of the Little House sites: Mansfield, Missouri (where Laura spent most of her adult life) and the Kansas Little House replica. Two other sites (De Smet, South Dakota and Walnut Grove, Minnesota) are within a few hours of Ames, Iowa - so I'm looking forward to visiting those someday. And for the people who think I am too old to be reading these books - I also frequently reread the Ramona Quimby books.

Merry Christmas to everyone!

30!

Hello everyone - I hope you all had a great Thanksgiving. Our family celebration was wonderful. We had 4 generations present and (I think) 25 people. My brother-in-law cooked a great turkey. There are pictures here and video here and here. It was great to see so many of my family members; some of these people I hadn't seen since my grandfather's funeral 3 years ago. It was also nice to be able to celebrate my birthday (30 this year!) with family, something I hadn't been able to do when I was out in Los Angeles. Someone came to this page and left me an anonymous birthday greeting. Thank you, whoever you are!

My friend Katherine from UCLA got me a lovely birthday present. It's one of those alarm clocks you see advertised in the SkyMall catalog on airplanes. It has several really cool features. 30 minutes before your alarm time, it slowly lights up (simulating sunrise) and instead of an annoying alarm, it starts to play a pre-selected nature sound. Also, the light feature warms aromatherapy beads so you can wake up to your chosen scent. For good measure, there is also an annoying alarm at the end of the wake-up cycle, which is good for me. I'm still playing around with it and checking out all of the features.

I haven't started any new books lately, but I'm continuing to enjoy my netflix subscription. I recently watched "A Door in the Floor", which was very good. Movies based on John Irving's book are usually very good, even though I don't like reading his novels. This week I also enjoyed "The World's Fastest Indian", based on a true story about a man from New Zealand who travels to America to test his souped-up motorcycle on the salt flats. It starred Anthony Hopkins, but I don't remember hearing anything about it when it was first released. Netflix kept recommending it to me though, and they usually pick good movies for me. I'm always eager to hear book and movie recommendations from other people.

I wish there was more to say, but there really isn't much going on here in Gainesville these days. I'm struggling to get some work done after being out of town so much. The weather has been warm here for most of the week; I even had my air conditioner on a few times. However, tooday is rainy and gray. Perfect weather for a nice long nap!