Back home...

Hope that everyone had a great Boxing Day today. Personally, I scored a seventh round TKO and am now ranked seventh in the world in the light heavyweight division. Just a matter of time before I make it to pay per view.

Well, I’m back home after spending the holidays with my family. It was a fun weekend and it was also the first time in a year that I’ve actually been with all of my family at the same time. Sadly, as we’ve gotten older we’ve begun to scatter and build our own families so coordinating a mass gathering is kind of a challenge. But I did get a chance to play the favorite uncle to seven nieces and nephews, which is always a blast. I’ve always said that my family is close-knit. We might not call each other every day but when one of us needs help the others come at a moment’s notice. So that makes gatherings like this very special.

I received my usual assortment of gifts. Picked up a couple of books to add to the collection. I now have a picture of Notre Dame Stadium, which is really cool though from the looks of the picture I’m guessing that the picture was taken during the 2003 ND-USC game. On the plus side, that means I’m actually in the picture in the upper deck behind the flag. On the other hand, that is a game that I would like to forget for so many reasons, the score being one of them, so I’m not sure I want to be reminded of it on a daily basis.

And my best gift of all was an MP3 player so that I can finally move into the digital music revolution. My parents gave me the Sansa e250, which looks cool and should work for my first machine. I’d give you a full review of it but let’s just say that it isn’t getting along very well with my five year old laptop. Yeah, Julie the Laptop is kind of protective of her turf and music falls within that range so she is not reacting well to a newcomer. I know I’ll need to get a new laptop sooner than later (though I promise Julie, I’ll use you for the novel) and this might just expedite the decision.

(And yes, I have a very close and personal relationship with this laptop. It got me through business school and has powered the blog since the beginning. Which means that it has done everything from regression analysis to being a word processor par excellence. I’m at the point now where the letters are beginning to rub off but the old girl is still running with gusto. I really don’t want to let her go. I’ve had a longer (and sadly, more fruitful) relationship with this machine than I’ve had with most people.)

Otherwise today was just another quiet travel day. The airport was pretty calm and my bag was the second one off the plane, though I still had to wait ten minutes for the bus. I’ll spend the next couple of days writing about my New Year’s resolutions (there are several), my plans for New Year’s Eve (currently non-existent) and next week will be my big year in review (for music and books). So hopefully everyone will have something to look forward to. Me, I have to finish Richard II this week so I better start cracking.