7 hour drive through east texas today. crossed I-10, I-20 and I-30. great place to play that cow game. ranches and baptist churches everywhere. totals ended in the millions.

I can't believe you guys got my packages already. I sent them on Monday at 3.00pm. Wow!

esSO: I'd be happy with that! I'm ready to start celebrating Christmas.

Frank: I got one box from Amazon yesterday. Didn't open it since I was unsure about who it was from. That and the way the gift Adrienne sent Tracy had the wrapping paper just thrown in with the gift.

Thinking of letting the kids cut class in the afternoon tomorrow and head out.

NTO & Merel, so just how bad IS the snow there?

Good job, Edgardo!
Don't worry, esSO. That would be a family trait, there.

Sandy & Brandon will each receive two packages from Amazon...the first ones to arrive will be gift wrapped inside, the second packages will not. Sorry bout that, amazon's third party shipping...

No alarms until January 4th!

How bad was it?

So, Nicolas had a nosebleed this morning at 2:30 and I just about passed out. I didn't realize I was such a wimp. Luckily Edgardo was there to handle the situation.

just reverse those two numbers.

happy solstice, celebrate in Houston with 82!

2 packages from an R. Johnson arrived yesterday as well as a package from AO (I throw my hands up in the air sometimes).

Yay! Nathaniel made it! Give Merel a big hug from us!

yes, it was batting practice. I just had to document that technique for posterity.

My favorite videos are the recital and the Wii baseball. At least, I figured it was baseball.

greetings from Utrecht. Merel says hi.

I'm excited for everyone to get here after a visit today with Mary, several of the Manella's and Dolores and Rich.

playlist of fall videos

I had been feeling the same way too, but a party Friday night and again last night cured that!!!!

The next 2 days still have a lot of work so I have been trying not to get too excited about Christmas just yet. Then yesterday the work Christmas party had cheese and crackers and I completely lost the control and am completely excited for Thursday afternoon to come!!!

Guess it could be worse. The UK appears to be coping poorly

Schiphol's current home link:

Access to this website is impeded due to huge visitor numbers as a result of the current bad weather conditions.

We apologize for the inconvenience

3A is first class, so that was good. In MPLS for 4 hours now, hoping they keep flying to Amsterdam. The professor in front of me found out her flight to Paris was canceled before we even reached the gate, but I just heard a flight to Amsterdam heading out, so hopefully the weather holds.

delayed vs arriving

if you have a drink in your hand at this point you are either in first class or delayed so long that they had to give you drinks.... hope my thinking is wrong.

One Schmitz Family anxious for Christmas to come. And Daniela wants SNOW! they tried to go sledding on the snow/grass today. Doesn't work as well.

One Nathaniel dropped at the airport. His flight out of MSP had not yet been cancelled.

Interesting link - word usage through history:

Rise and Fall of Cities

Netherlands vs Holland

I updated my address with my new skype phone number. It's a Bozeman area code, so US rates apply.

Oh, and Schiphol airport is currently closed due to snow, along with most other European airports, and the Dutch rail services are "severely disrupted" due to a power cut in Utrecht and "a number of incidents" elsewhere, and the roads were described as "complete chaos". Merel said her normal 9 minute commute took 60. So there's that.

rsj and I have made gingerbread cookies, sugar cookies, Russian teacakes, and almond pretzels so far today. Rita is napping now and we'll frost the cookies this afternoon.