Christmas has come and Christmas has gone and the memories endure like a warm cup of hot chocolate on a cold winter night. Jennifer made it home and we had a short, but fun-filled visit. As her military career has drawn out...she is now in her third year...she has appreciated the comforts of home so much more and she is quick to let us know how much she appreciates us. What a blessing it is to have a child show appreciation for the simple things in life.

Jennifer split her time between our house and her Mom's and we even let her two worlds collide on Christmas Day when Diane hosted us for a Christmas brunch. Jennifer was late arriving on Christmas Eve, her flight circling the airport for 45 minutes as the ground crew worked on a disabled plane in their arrival gate. Why they couldn't land at an alternate gate must have to do with some obscure FAA rule, but it was a bit irritating as the crowds in the arrival area waited for their loved ones on the last arriving flight of the night as it did wide loops of downtown Sacramento waiting for room to land and disembark. Finally fifty minutes after their scheduled arrival, the passengers began to arrive in small groups and then a steady stream. Darla, the boys and I waited and finally saw a tired and dishevelled Jennifer riding down the escalator, weighed down with packages and carryon items. It had been a long day for Jennifer. Not only was it 2:30 a.m. her time, but she had pulled a 21-hour shift on guard duty the night before at work. She was a trooper, though and had been able to catch some sleep on the drive to the airport in the morning (no worries, her roomate drove) as well as on two of her three flights.

She woke up bright-eyed and raring to go on Christmas morning, even breaking into her brother's rooms to wake them up from a sound sleep. We ate breakfast together and opened presents. My Dad called and talked to Jennifer and then we were off to Diane and Bill's house for fritatas, mimosas and sugar-free ketchup.

Darla and I took Jennifer, her ex-boyfriend, Jason, and Darla's sister, Alicia, out to dinner on Saturday night at the Zinfandel Grille, a new restaurant in Rocklin. We all enjoyed ourselves and had a lot of laughs. It was nice to have Alicia join us. She is a good role model for Jennifer, as she is an independent and successful woman. Jennifer told me how much she appreciated having Alicia join us for dinner. Jason is a great guy, who is getting his life together at age 24. He still holds a burning torch for Jennifer and is one of her greatest fans and greatest friends. We all retired back to the house and played pool and watched the movie, "The Pirates of the Carribean."

Jennifer slept through the second half of the movie, which was fine as she had to be up at four a.m. the next morning. We had her to the airport at shortly after five a.m. for her 6:35 a.m. flight to Salt Lake City. It was hard to see her go, knowing that she was back to Fort Gordon, only to prepare for her departure to Afghanistan on January 7th.

Jennifer was suffering from some after effects of all of the shots that she's been taking in preparation for her deployment. She had some flu-like symptoms, which were a result of her smallpox vaccine. She also had a nasty blister on her arm from the same shot. You may have heard that the military now has to allow their soldiers to opt not to take the Anthrax vaccine. True, but if they do opt to not take the vaccine, they will not be deployed and will basically end their advancement in the military. Some things never change.

We had a great Christmas, made even better by the gift of having Jennifer with us. For those of you who didn't get a chance to talk to Jen on her visit, you can still call her. Her cell phone number is 310-927-6311 and she is available this weekend or at night. Call her, she'd love it.

Lastly, please continue to pray for Jennifer's safety on her mission. She will be insulated at her military base, but will be living in tents with no electricity and little in the way of creature comforts. It is brutally hot and the sand is omnipresent. She saw pictures of the base and the tents are yellow because of the shifting sand. The soldiers all have respiratory problems because of the fine sand and Jennifer will have to wear a mask when she does tower work on the base. Happy New Year to all and God bless.

It is a wet, rainy and altogether December day here in Sacramento. The cars swish by my office window leaving a wet slick of rain behind them as they all head on to work on Christmas Eve eve. I had trouble sleeping last night for some reason and that last push of the snooze button actually caught the off button and I inadvertantly got an extra 20 minutes of sleep this morning. With the paucity of traffic I arrived at my office only about ten minutes later than normal and was the third person to arrive rather than the second.

Darla and I finished up the last of our Christmas shopping last night, making a nine p.m. call on the local WalMart. There was a surprising number of shoppers out at that hour, but we were able to make our selections of stocking stuffers and last minute gifts in about forty-five minutes and we were home by shortly after ten pm.

David continues excelling at his basketball. He actually scored 18 points in the opening game of last weekend's tournament and led his team to a 74-39 thumping of Mission of San Francisco. They went on to lose their next two games and finish fourth in the tourney. The team is now 5-5 in the preseason and struggling to find themselves.

Darla and I will work a concession stand tonight at Arco Arena for the Kings-Memphis Grizzlies game. We are part of a thirty-person volunteer group that will make $2,500 for the Woodcreek Varsity football team. The King's owners, the Maloof's, are very supportive of the local schools and allow one school per game to volunteer time and make money for their sports programs. We are up tonight.

Work is really rounding in to shape for me and, although my stress level is considerably higher than it was in my last two jobs, the sense of accomplishment and of "belonging" is strong here. I wrote a $30,000 account yesterday and it felt good to put that on the books.

I went out last week and was fitted for a new set of irons. I spent about two hours with the pro over at Haggin Oaks golf course and finally purchased a set of Wilson Deep Red irons. We had to order them through the factory as I have a very upright swing and we had to adjust the lie angle down about 4 degrees. I'll get my new clubs sometime in the early New Year. I also used up all of my money in the pro shop at Diamond Oaks and bought a new King Cobra 440Z driver. I've been slow to accept the new drivers with the gigantic heads and because of that, I'm losing 10-20 yards off the tee. I've tried hitting them and wasn't successful. The pro showed me that I have to tee the ball up higher and now I'm pounding the ball. I played on Saturday in a wet drizzle at Cherry Island golf course and shot an 88. Some of my drives were world class and some weren't. I am a work in progress right now, but my goal for 2004 is to get down into a single digit handicap.

Jennifer flies in tomorrow night and will spend the night with Darla and I and we will spend Christmas morning together. She will be at our house until about ten in the morning, so if you want to call and wish her good luck on her deployment to Afghanistan, call us Christmas morning. I'd like to also ask that you continue to put Jennifer in your prayers that God watches over her as she enters (literally) a war zone.

Merry Christ Mass to each of you and enjoy your loved ones this holiday. God Bless and Happy Holy Days.

It is with a sense of true confliction of emotions that I write today. Jennifer will be home for the holidays and it is an unplanned, but necessary and important trip. We have just been informed that on January 7th of the New Year Jennifer will board a plane and be deployed to Afghanistan. It is the sort of news that you don't want to hear when you have a son or daughter in the military. My conflict comes from the fact that Jennifer is a true soldier and she is anxious and excited to take up her new post and relieve some of the communications soldiers that are in harm's way now. As my dismay at the news lingers, I know that another Father is thrilled to hear that his son or daughter will be returning from Afghanistan.

Jennifer will spend Christmas with us. She flies home on December 24th and returns to Georgia on December 28th to prepare for her departure. It will be a quick turnaround, but (frankly) IF she wasn't coming home, Darla and I would have been on a plane in the new year to see her and spend time with her before she leaves.

As most of you know, Jennifer is a Specialist in the Signal unit of the Army and specializes in communications. She is a fibre optics specialist and can wire a complete telecommunications network from the ground up. In fact, in preparation for this mission, her unit spent a week in the field (which is the vacant land that makes up most of the several thousand acres that is Fort Jackson in Augusta, Georgia). She and her fellow soldiers from the Signal Unit had to wire a complete phone system between the various tents that were set up for the week and then take that communications system down and repack it. My understanding is that she will be working on a base in Afghanistan and completing a new communications center on the base. Her deployment is scheduled to last only three to six months and she will be surrounded by infantry at all times. A Dad can't help but worry though.

I'd like to ask that all of my family include Jennifer in their prayers and ask God to surround her with his loving embrace while she is in hostile territory and guide her on her journey.

Jennifer was very excited and upbeat when she passed the news on to me. I knew something was up because she had called home when I was at work and asked me to call her back and give her my status as a citizen...was I a Canadian citizen, a U.S. citizen or did I have dual citizenship? The US does not recognize dual citizenship, although Canada does, so my answer is different depending upon who is asking the question. I knew that the military was doing a clearance for Jennifer and I called her back and left a message that I had become an Iranian citizen since I'd talked to her last. I figured that would slow her down. In truth, a part of me is excited for her. She has reached the level of a Specialist by being the best at what she does in the military and she is itching to put her knowledge and skills to work. I'm damn proud of her and prepared to see her leave. That is NOT to say that I won't worry about her every day that she is gone, though.

Christmas approaches in it's inexorable way and I look forward to celebrating the birth of Jesus with family and I'm especially happy to have Jennifer home this Christmas. I'm sure the hugs will be a little tighter and the conversations a little more focused while she is here.

Darla and I have found the boys a pool table and we have already donated our living room furniture to one of the group homes that Darla works with. The pool table which is a cherrywood standard table with carved legs and a polished wood exterior will fit well in the former living room and now game room. The boys are excited. Darla and I decided to get a new table from a furniture manufacturer, rather than a used table. The quality of this table far surpassed anything we saw on the used market and we will have this professionally delivered and set up, levelled and installed. We are all excited about the addition to the home and, hopefully, the boys will feel comfortable to invite friends over to play pool and hang out.

David has his Mustang back and $2000 later, the transmission is installed and it is running like a well oiled machine. Well, it IS a well oiled machine. He is in seventh heaven having his wheels back.

The holidays bring basketball tournaments aplenty and David's team took third place in an eight team tournament last weekend and will play in another eight team tourney in Rocklin this weekend. David continues to start at small forward for his Varsity team and is getting more into the flow of the game, even scoring the first four baskets of one of the games during last weekend.

That's it until Christmas weekend. I did play golf last weekend in our year-end tournament. Unfortunately, I was at my work Christmas party at my boss' home in Folsom on Friday night until about 1:00 a.m. and felt the effects of a few beers the next morning. I didn't overindulge at all, but Darla does not drink and I generally don't either. I was a bit cottonmouthed and foggy on Saturday and started my round with a skull shot into the water that culminated in a deathly 9 on the par 5 starting hole. I struggled back to a 44-43=87 or a net 75. Unfortunately with my handicap, I post that as an 85. Please do pray for my daughter and God bless each of you.

Good Monday morning from the golden state. It is a frosty, yet clear and cloudless day. The sun is working its magic on the frost that still clings to the trees and rooftops and the result is a steam that gently rises into the air. It is nice to view the surroundings from the warmth of my office with a mug of hot coffee within easy reach. A group of joggers in shorts and sweatshirts with hoods pulled over their heads jogs by, the steam from their breath obscuring their faces as they run to who knows where for who knows what reason. I admire their tenacity and take a long sip of my hot coffee.

This past weekend went by in a blur as we enjoyed two Christmas parties with two vastly different groups of people. Friday night was my annual golf Christmas banquet and Saturday night was a Christmas dinner with Darla's co-workers from the Auburn office. I still don't know how or why we were invited to that gathering as Darla works in the Roseville office, but it was a nice outing with excellent food from one of Folsom's better restaurant's, The Cliffhouse over looking the American River. We stayed on after dinner and did a bit of dancing in the bar.

The combination of two outings on the same weekend tended to crowd the weekend and it seemed that Sunday night was upon us shortly after I got off work on Friday. I was able to get the car washed and the lawn mowed over the weekend, but it was a rare golfless weekend.

I talked to Jennifer last night and she survived her week in the field. She endured rain and cold and spent Monday and Tuesday running phone lines between the groups of tents and then dismantled the communications network from 9-11 pm on Thursday night and they broke camp Friday morning. It is important training for the military, but grueling work and, as Jennifer said, it makes you appreciate the warmth and comfort of your own bed after sleeping in tents for a week.

David's Mustang will be back in his possession on Thursday after two weeks of inactivity. The transmission was shot and it was prohibitively expensive to rebuild his transmission. They ended up buying a rebuilt transmission from Ford and a local transmission shop is pulling the old transmission and installing the rebuilt. His father decided that the work was too much for he and David. I was actually glad to see that and David will now have a warranty and the work done right. He is tired of driving his Dad's old Ford F250 truck to school. He said he's embarrassed by the beat-up appearance of the rusty old tub. I think the Mustang has spoiled him a bit. I also told him that he could have his grandmother drive him to and from school. He said that the truck isn't THAT bad.

David is doing very well with his basketball team. It is still non-league season and they have so far played three games and won them all. The fun part is that they have played three Division 1 schools and dominated in all of the games. The only game that was close was against Folsom High School, Jennifers alma mater. We actually had a 13 point lead late in the game only to survive an onslaught of three pointers to win by two points on a missed final shot by Folsom. David is the starting small forward and he is enjoying himself. His team is the defending Nor-Cal champions from last year and they have a nice team this year. Two of their starters are juniors and one is a sophomore, so they should be good for the next two years. Tournament season starts next weekend and David will play in tournaments two of the next three weekends.

Darla and I have decided to get the boys a pool table for Christmas. I'm still a little conflicted about turning my living room into a game room, but frankly, like so many modern homes, our living room sits empty most of the time as we sit in the family room enjoying television or just reading on the big sofa or recliners. We will move out the sofa and coffee table and replace those with a pool table and perhaps another television and some barstools. Darla and I have decided that we want our home to be inviting to the boy's friends and a place that they can come and relax and play pool or listen to music.

I admit that infrequently I would steal away into the living room with a cup of coffee and the paper and sit and relax. I'll miss that, but it was not very often and the joy that the boy's and their friends will get from the game room will make up for my small sacrifice.

That's it for this week. I hope all of you are well. Darla and I have another Christmas party this weekend at my boss' home and then we will take some friends to our church's holiday play, It's a Wonderful Life on Saturday night.