Happy New Year!

Cannot believe it's 2008 - what happened to 2007 (ok what happened to the last 10 years if we're going to be really honest)...

Anyway, in keeping with the tradition of "going somewhere you've never been before and doing something you've never done before", I decided to have a New Year's party. Never done that before, and never been to one in Indiana (ha ha).

The theme was "fondue" - and as you can see from the pictures Alice posted, not only did we slurp up much cheese we actually fought over the last burnt bit at the bottom of the pot. Llew and I went and bought champagnes from around the world (Spain, Italy, France, and believe it or not, New Mexico) to complement the evening. So there was much bubbly, and much bubbly talk and laughter. Alice and Steve rounded out the evening by bringing "crackers" (not the flat flour wafer types but the round noise popping type). Lugh (the dog) of course had to get in on that by chewing on the papery goodness of the wrapper. At midnight we put messages of what we hope for the new year in a bowl and then lit them on fire - then scrambled out of the room to watch the ball drop in NY on TV. Fabulous way to bring in the new year and say "adios" to the old one!

Now the story wouldn't be complete without telling what also happened some time that evening. I had a couple dozen cans of soda and a few bottles of wine left over from the Aussie party. They were in the garage - and it was "on the list" to move them into the basement. Well, it was a cooooold night that night and I had left the garage doors open and the car outside. Didn't really think much about this until I walked out to the garage New Year's Day. At first I couldn't put my finger on what was different...weird bits of aluminum can everywhere...brown sticky stuff stuck in the snow...and then it dawned on me. While we were toasting the new year with champagne, the soda and wine decided to join the party and explode in the garage. Now that's a toast!

Happy Holidaze

Well, in the throws of the Christmas spirit Lugh and I crafted a new version of the "12 Days of Christmas":

• On the first day of Christmas my Lugh dog chewed for me -a lamp my best friend gave to me (very $$$)


• On the second day of Christmas my Lugh dog chewed for me - 2 global passports (one Italian, one American), and a lamp my best friend gave to me


• On the third day of Christmas my Lugh dog ate for me - 3 sticks of butter (ewww), 2 global passports, and a lamp my best friend gave to me


• On the fourth day of Christmas my Lugh dog chewed for me - 4 yard umbrellas, 3 sticks of butter, 2 global passports, and a lamp my best friend gave to me


• On the fifth day of Christmas my Lugh dog chewed for me - 5 pairs of shoes (well, ok, at least 5 pairs of shoes), 4 yard umbrellas, 3 sticks of butter, 2 global passports, and a lamp my best friend gave to me


• On the sixth day of Christmas my Lugh dog chewed for me - 6 flower pots, 5 pairs of shoes, 4 yard umbrellas, 3 sticks of butter, 2 global passports, and a lamp my best friend gave to me


• On the seventh day of Christmas my Lugh dog chewed for me - 7 draft proposals (thanks NSF!), 6 flower pots, 5 pairs of shoes, 4 yard umbrellas, 3 sticks of butter, 2 global passports, and a lamp my best friend gave to me


• On the eighth day of Christmas my Lugh dog chewed for me - 8 plastic bottles (or is it 8 dozen...), 7 draft proposals, 6 flower pots, 5 pairs of shoes, 4 yard umbrellas, 3 sticks of butter, 2 global passports, and a lamp my best friend gave to me


• On the ninth day of Christmas my Lugh dog chewed for me - 9 unpaid bills (I have no idea what they were or for how much, oh well), 8 plastic bottles, 7 draft proposals, 6 flower pots, 5 pairs of shoes, 4 yard umbrellas, 3 sticks of butter, 2 global passports, and a lamp my best friend gave to me


• On the tenth day of Christmas my Lugh dog chewed for me - 10 bags of mulch (yup, mulch), 9 unpaid bills, 8 plastic bottles, 7 draft proposals, 6 flower pots, 5 pairs of shoes, 4 yard umbrellas, 3 sticks of butter, 2 global passports, and a lamp my best friend gave to me


• On the eleventh day of Christmas my Lugh dog chewed for me - 11 fluffy pillows (well, OK, closer to 20), 10 bags of mulch, 9 unpaid bills, 8 plastic bottles, 7 draft proposals, 6 flower pots, 5 pairs of shoes, 4 yard umbrellas, 3 sticks of butter, 2 global passports, and a lamp my best friend gave to me


• On the twelfth day of Christmas my Lugh dog gave to me - 12 doggy kisses (and nibbles on my nose), 11 fluffy pillows, 10 bags of mulch, 9 unpaid bills, 8 plastic bottles, 7 draft proposals, 6 flower pots, 5 pairs of shoes, 4 yard umbrellas, 3 sticks of butter, 2 global passports, and a lamp my best friend gave to me

It's always nice to land on a high note - I'm very thankful that Lugh chose to leave the shelter and come and live with me. He has "issues", but he also has a big heart (and a bigger stomach for paper, butter, plastic, cotton, etc.), and he didn't eat my couch (whew!) or my computer (oy!).

Lamps, passports, butter, umbrellas, shoes, pots, proposals, bottles, bills, mulch, and pillows are all replaceable.

So from us to you, "Happy Holidays" - give kisses and hugs to those you love.

Snow!

Wow - we've had ourself some serious snow these last couple of weeks. Big happy fluffy snow. It's so pretty...

Even my weird little metal flowers look pretty with the snow - like starts that fell from the sky.

Lugh loves the snow - he burrows in it and jumps around like a crazy bunny.

In between the two snowfalls we had what is called "ice rain". Now, like most people I thought, ice rain is when rain falls and then it turns to ice. Well, that's sort of true. Here, when the rain falls it immediately turns to ice. So all the trees were covered in sheaths of ice. Absolutely beautiful. They looked like diamonds in the noon sun. At night they glowed - as seen on my cherry tree out front.

One small step...

Well, last month we launched our new building - Armstrong Hall. Purdue is very proud of their alumni who have been astronauts (something like 25 astronauts) - so a bunch of them came in all their glory for our building opening. Of course, the person EVERYONE wanted to meet was Neil Armstrong. You might imagine that this would be difficult...secret service men managing the crowds, and then poor Neil who is kinda shy. Well, thanks to my years of "Disneyland" I got to put my well-honed skills of "cutting line" into action. A friend who is a huge fan of Neil really wanted to meet him and and so I took her hand and winded my way through the crowd (in all my Space Mountain line-cutting glory) and "lo and behold!" got to the center of the crowd. This is Chrissa with Neil (I'm the one taking the picture).

As it turns out - incredibly nice man. Very down to earth. When he gave his talk at the dinner that evening he said "I know what speech you all want to hear, but tonight I'm going to talk about something more important...Homecoming." It was Homecoming that weekend and one of the stories he told was how he chose not to go to MIT because they didn't have a football team - and then chose Purdue because they had a good one (as well as a good engineering program). The crowd hooted and hollared...gotta love someone who cares that much about football...