Christmas

Yes, Christmas happened. And you didn't hear anything about it here, as ... well there was a lot going on.

Mom (Krick) got a second infection the 16th, and after it didn't go away for a week. So she and Vicki went doctor shopping on Christmas Eve and ended up in the UMH emergency room. They did a culture to figure out excactly what it was and in the mean time put her on another antibiotic. But she was on a liquid diet for Christmas Eve and Christmas Day.

It was pretty much a White Christmas due to the snow & sleet leftover from the walkabout weekend. Brian & Kristin came for Christmas Eve dinner, the traditional Oyster Stew and Cinnamon Pears. It's an Adams (Mom Krick's maiden name) tradition, and I was quite happy to adopt it when I married into the family. Kevin came after dinner and stayed the night.

Christmas morning they came back and we opened the presents. Vicki got me the coolest watch and the first 26 years of "The Complete Peanuts" -- 8 hard back volumes, 1950-1966. Peanuts was always such a big influence on my two younger brothers and myself. I got Vicki a coat, some silver chains, and the all-important movies, movies, movies. She loves movies. Mom gave us some money which I used to pay for my 0 degree down sleeping bag. Kevin & Angela got me a bourbon sampler from Knob Creek and a thumb-drive card reader. And Brian and Kristin gave me a gift card to Bass Pro which turned into a Nite Eyz intelli-switch and LED conversion kit for my Mini Maglite. Our big surprise for Kristin was a video camera which she wanted mainly for the baby. The grandchild. Who will be here in April.

Vicki's cousin Jim and his wife Carol came out from Las Vegas to visit some friends in Illinois and drove here Saturday after Christmas and stayed the night. We always have a good time with them. I'd love to have their house out in the Nevada mountains. We cooked up a pot of home made spaghetti sauce. I've been making it since I was a teenager, but we hadn't made it in quite some time. I think the "recipe" came from the Leith side of the family, probably from Aunt Pat. It's not really so much a recipe as a method. This time I actually added small yellow and zuchinni squash to it, which added color and texture and... since you cook it all day long, it pretty much took on the flavor of the rest of the sauce.

Tom and Betty are also taking care of Betty's mom due to illness this holiday season, so we called off the annual bro-fest on New Years Eve. So Brian and Kristin came over to watch bowl games on New Years Eve. We managed to stay up to midnight, but we had people coming over for the REAL bowl game on New Years Day -- but for breakfast first. So we didn't stay up long after midnight.

We watched Mizzou in the Cotton Bowl and they were impressive, beating Arkansas handily. And we proceeded to watch the Rose Bowl and Sugar Bowl. I watched more football in two days than I've probably watched in the last 2 years. I was pretty much footballed out.

I did manage to catch the Kansas game, since they are Mizzou's archrival -- and I hate to admit it but you gotta hand it to Kansas. They played an impressive game against Virginia Tech -- who should have beaten them (I think there were some questionable coaching decisions) -- but even so, Kansas proved they could play with the big boys.

Plus it's good for the Big 12, which is good for Missouri.

And that about wrapps up the holidays.