Ho, Ho, Ho

No matter what your calendar says, all the calendars in this family say this is Christmas week--time to spend a few days with the whole family eating too much delicious food, talking, laughing, hanging out with each other, and playing the diabolical games that I've laid awake at night plotting for them (more about that later). *evil laugh*

An adventure somewhere fun is what we now give the girls and their families instead of the video games, pajamas, sweaters, and other terrible (and utterly forgettable) gifts we used to come up with back in the days when we were trying to be "normal" with our Christmas gifting.

Once I figured out we were clueless in guessing what teenage boys really want or in keeping track of everyone's favorite color and/or current clothing size, we decided to bail on the concept of being normal. Instead we now give them a one-size-fits-all present: good memories of being together.

It has proven to be one of my best ideas ever....well, except for last year when we rented a houseboat that lost it's power in the middle of a stifling hot night and left the kids with no running water, working toilets, lights, air conditioning or human comforts of any kind. That year we had more of a Survivor/Gilligan's Island type adventure than the kind of adventure we had in mind. But that's beside the point. We made memories. It's all good.

Anyway, here's the video we sent them last Christmas announcing where this year's adventure would be:



You'll note that the video said we were going in July, but getting these kids together is like herding cats. We had to switch the dates around so everyone could make it--everyone, this is, except Kurt and Julia who learned at the last minute that they had to stay behind due to work obligations. Wahhhh! *sniff* *sniff*

So we're in the woods for the next few days. I'll tell you all about it after we get home Sunday.

Love

Who loves you more--your husband or your dog? Here's a simple way to find out:

Lock your husband and your dog in the truck of your car, then leave them there for an hour. When you open the trunk, which one is really happy to see you?

addiction

I was looking through the 1,496 photos I took last weekend (okay, I'm exaggerating but not by much) and this one caught my eye.

I took it early one morning when I was sitting in the cockpit sipping coffee and soaking up the tranquility that comes early in the day before the lake came alive with activity. Who wouldn't want to wake up to see a sunrise like that?

Unless you are more into sunsets, in which case you'd see this:

I took that one while I was sitting in the cockpit sipping a glass of wine, grooving on the tranquity that comes late in the day when most boats are back in their slips and things settle down to a peaceful, slow pace. You can smell the delicious aroma of distant charcoal grills and hear the soft sounds of far away laughter and easy conversations as they come floating across the water.

It's addicting, this boating thing.

Joy

Seas the Moment officially has new owners. Or more precisely, she'll have new owners as soon as the buyers' marine surveyor looks her over to make sure there are no ugly surprises (there aren't) and a few minor details--such as a somebody handing over a check--are taken care of.

Not only are we looking forward to owning one boat instead of two, we're glad she will have new owners who will take her out to play. She hasn't really been happy playing second fiddle to the Butt Ugly Boat these past few months and is excited to be Numero Uno again.

*tap* *tap* Is this thing on?

Contrary to what you would reasonably think, there's no need to collect up money to pay our ransom. We have not been kidnapped by aliens. We are alive and well and still among the living, we've just been deep in the weeds and half nuts.

We came home after our two week trip to England to find business finally picking up after a few months of eerie, worrisome calm. Everything--and I do mean everything--demanded our immediate and undivided attention, which, of course, means nothing got any more attention than we could throw at it on the fly as we careened from one screaming priority to the next. May was a blur around our house.

Here's what we did the entire month of May: we worked. A lot. Thanks for asking.

But it wasn't just ordinary work, it was in-your-face, frustrating as the ever lovin' bejeebers, GET OFF MY BACK ALREADY kind of work where one annoying thing after another happened.

This past week is the perfect example: we dragged home Monday after a rare night at the boat followed by a particularly frustrating day at the office to discover our fridge had gone to Appliance Heaven over the weekend. The timing couldn't have been worse either because for once it was crammed full of newly purchased groceries (vs our typical food supply which would pass for a light lunch in Somalia). Ack! About $600 worth of fresh food and frozen meat went straight into the dumpster.

So Tuesday we peeled ourselves away from the chaos and mayhem we fondly refer to as "our jobs" to go appliance shopping, and by Thursday this baby was sitting in our kitchen:

I love it. It has lots of room inside too, mainly because all that's inside it at the moment is a bottle of steak sauce and a shaker of parmesean cheese, the only food items we could salvage after the tragic demise of our old fridge.

So back to the one-thing-after-another bit, yesterday (Friday) we had to be at the lake by early afternoon to meet a delightful couple who were driving up from Alabama to look at the boat we're trying to sell. Yes, alas, the Carver is still floating two slips down from our new boat, flying her "for sale" sign and patiently awaiting a new owner while feeding off our bank account at an alarming rate and with a loud sucking sound. But I digress.

When the time came to head for the lake Friday afternoon , I had to stay behind to finish off a couple of proposals so Morley went on without me to keep our appointment with the Alabama couple.

He arrived at the boat an hour or two before me. And he found the fridge on our new boat had accidentally been turned off.

For a week.

In hot weather.

And it was at that exact moment that our official family motto became "Son of a #$#%, what next!?!?"

So we cleaned out that fridge too, tossing out another $200 or $300 worth of food and frozen meats. And now we have two perfectly clean refrigerators, each containing precisely one bottle of steak sauce and one shaker of parmesean cheese.

On the brighter note, there are signs that our month of mayhem is finally petering out: we have not one but two potential buyers for the Carver, one firm offer in hand, and high hopes that another offer will follow any minute from the couple from Alabama. Bottom line, it appears the Carver will soon have a new family to love and our bank account will finally get a break from too much boat love.

And we have two immaculately clean refrigerators and all the parmesean cheese we could possibly eat, plus the looming adventure of the Mother of All Grocery Shopping Trips to look forward to.

So that's what we've been up to. And now don't you feel bad about all those disparaging things you thought about me when I was a bit remiss in posting to my blog? Heh.