John's Letter

Hello & Happy New Year! May some of your greatest days await you all! For those first time letter readers, please note that I have included prior letters from an old obsolete blog into this one (refer to the Letters label), and I have decided to write one post per month with updates made upon occurances to the original post. With that, here we go...

1.1 Day One of '07
We were slugs. Barely moved all day...totally relaxed without using any effort to do so. Constructive Day zero, Unconstructive Day 1. I hope everyone was able to have a brief silence, or moment to refresh themselves like we did for the new year.

1.5 & 1.6 Dan & Pat
Friday night Dan came by for a quick visit and absorbed the UHF flick before heading on out. On Saturday Pat came by for dinner and football game viewing. He left to meet up with some friends at a bar, and heard from everybody about being single and heading out to do stuff after 10pm...that was rather funny.

1.8 Mom's Conference
On Monday - Wednesday my Mom stayed with us as she attended a conference nearby. The first night Janel had class, but Kristen, Vi, Adam, Summer, and Adam's friend came on over for some tasty pizza...and we chatted late into the night. On Tuesday we had a pot-luck like Spaghetti night over at Kristen & Vi's, and the meal was delicious, from our pick-your-own salad and the homemade garlic bread (the spaghetti was tasty too). Wednesday morning my mom went in a little bit later and so we hung out a little while in the morning, and fortunately her drive home in the afternoon was not too bad.

1.9 Mark & Fabiola
Gave birth to Noah Sebastian today at 3:01AM! Congratulations to them both.

1.10 Another Storm
So, around 4pm I zipped over to a post office in Bellevue to pick up some mail and bring it back to Newcastle for Jason. As I left Bellevue small snow pellets began to hammer down. Nothing serious, and it let up on my way to New Castle. Once there I also made a quick stop to City Hall and the staff was freaking out saying things like, "if you live north from here, leave now," and "there are accidents happening all over the place!" A bit over exaggerated I think. None-the-less, when I hit the road I got stuck on a 2-4 mile stretch, for over two hours. My cell phone worked once out of ten attempts, and I did make a quick stop for gas. When I reached I-90, after about two exits...it was fine! I mean, we weren't going the speed limit, but 10-20 under was not bad! It took me one hour. That was all. But that one stretch of road freaking killed me. waiting to get to I-90.

1.12 & 1.13 Friends Coming to Visit
On the weekend a few guys came over to hang out and catch up. Jon (and his cousin Joey) arrived, followed by Tim, Scott and Adam came up for some good ol Red Mill burgers. We talked for a while, played some games for a while, and watched Jackass extras. Tim & Scott stayed up talking till 5 but I was out at 3-ish. Saturday morning was a bit slower, and originally Tim & Scott wanted to go go-carting up at Mukilteo, but the snow started up again, and everyone decided to play it safe, so we ate a light lunch over at Wing Dome. Soon after they left, Janel & I went to Dataworks Conculting's Christmas party celebrated over at Jacks, the food was tasty and the company entertaining.

1.14 Game Day
Uncle Jerry called and told us that he was feeling sickly and did not come over, but Scott & Stacy, Adam & Summer came by and we shared some snack foods...despite the Seahawks loss. Pat called every-so-often throughout the game too. Scott and Stacy hung out and played Phase 10 and Uno Attack, and shared a relaxing afternoon (complete with a stroll up to Divas).

1.20 & 1.21 Wenatchee Trip
Over the weekend we traveled out to Wenatchee to visit the family (and also check out the storm damage). We visited with her granmother, who seems to be doing well, and still loves chocolate. We visited her aunt and uncle for some polish dogs and egg nog, and had dinner with her grandfather and Oryan. We also met up with her fascinating neighbors the Gills for a little while too. Susie has surgery to remove her thyroid (apparantly the "best" place to have cancer) this wednesday, and our thoughts will be with them for a smooth recovery.

1.26 & 1.27 Parents & Wine
On Friday my parents came up, and after deciding not to sleep on Adam & Summer's futon, stayed up at our place. My mom headed out with Kristen, Vi & Karen for dinner and a play, while my dad hung out with us for a pleasant evening. The next morning, after my mom's coffee cake breakfast, we traveled up to see my Uncle Mike and Sharla to help bottle over 230 cases of cabernet. That was rather cool, and filled the day. Over 20 people came to help including my Uncle Jerry and Aunt Therese (and Tim). Janel & I were going to go to a housewarming party, but opted out by the time we actually left. Sunday Janel and I took a walk, shopped for food, and visited with Barb & Neil...a relaxing unwind to the final moments of the weekend.

Other
Janel started another Monday 5-10pm class again. However, this time they really are planning to come very close to the full time allotted because they miss a few monday classes, she is also had a Tuesday class, but it seems as if that will meet only one more time with one optional class for people to see if they are on track.

I hope that this was enjoyable to view this month, and I always welcome hearing everyone else's updates too! Until next month, take it easy!