My latest addiction is Animal Crossing, simply the most fun game I have ever played period. The thought that it is designed to go until at least 2030 is beyond cool. I can't wait to be able to travel to friends towns.
1. What holiday or holidays do you celebrate this time of year?
In the past we have celebrated Christmas as well as observed some of the traditions of Chanukah and Kwanzaa. We want our kids to have a basic understanding of as many different cultures as possible.
2. What was the best gift you have ever received?
Two gifts stand-out in my mind. When I was a kid I remember waking up Christmas morning to find that Santa Claus had left an Evil Knievable Stunt Van along with a couple of the action figures with the motorcycle and the launcher. It's not that it was a great gift, but Santa had set them all up and when I saw them all there it was the most magical thing. The second was 4 years ago. My father-in-law surpised me with a BOSE surround system. The truth is I had found out before hand from my wife who can't kee a secret. But actually opening it was a bit overwhelming for me. I actually started to cry. It wasn't just the gift (which is amazing) it was that her father thought I deserved a gift like that. It's quite a compliment.
3. What was the worst gift you've ever given?
It wasn't the only gift I gave her that year, but one year I bought my wife some toys from an Adult bookstore and though we get a lot of use out of them she definitely didn't see the playful humour I was trying to display when she opened them up Christmas Eve. Some guys buy you jewlery, this one buys you vibrators.
4. Where will you be celebrating the holidays? Are you hosting? Going away?
With four different sets of parents between the two of us the holidays use to mean a lot of traveling for our family. However, as the number of our kids grew our ability to travel shrank. This year we will host Christmas here with my mom, sister and her kids. Then celibrate Christmas again with one set of Brie's parents around New Year Day. My father typically come to visit sometime around New Years as well. That leaves Brie's other parents who have sent the kids some gifts, but we hope to be able to see sometime at the beginning of the year.
5. If you could spend the holidays with someone who isn't around, who would it be with? Why?
It's more like someone's. I wish my family was still all close. My favorite holiday growing up was Thanksgiving at my Aunt and Uncle's. They use to have my dad's entire side of the family over which typically meant about 50 adults and kids. Growing up being with my Dad's family was very much like "My Big Fat Portugeuse Wedding". It was great from my point of view. Of course, as you grow up you find out the bickering between them and the drinking problems, cheating, and emotional drama. But at the time it felt like I was surrounded by love and protection and that I had something to be proud of. It's something I want my kids to experience. Next year I'm going to make an effort to dig deeper into my Portugeuse heritage and teach my children the value of traditions and family.
An odd thing happened today. I was weighing and measuring my kids to try out a few of the online "height predictors" and since a couple of them ask for the parent's height I thought I should give myself a measure as well. For at least the last 15 years I've always said I was 6'2" and today I found out I was wrong. I'm actually 6'3" so I gained an inch. One wouldn't think that an inch would make that big a deal at my heigth, but it does. All of a sudden I feel big. At 6'2" I never thought of myself as unusually tall, but for some reason 6'3" makes me feel quite odd. It doesn't help that I'm 6'3" and creeping up on 230lbs either. I mean I'm roughly the size of a professional football player, yet my mental image of myself is still as that 5'11" 145lb pound boy I was when I graduated high school.
So you may be wondering what did the height predictor say?? It said that my oldest will be around my height, but that "K" should be around 6'4" .. oh my start saving money for clothes and food now!! Maddy is going to be a nice height as well, she's predicted to be 5'9" although it really won't become clear until she's 4.
I guess now is a good time to mention that I only have about 2 more weeks then I will be unempolyed. As part of the new Teamster's contract with UPS my job is being eliminated and I can't work any of the other jobs they offered me because they conflict with Brie's career and childcare issues (like lack of). I'm ok with it. I have known that if the move to back east goes ahead as we plan that I would have had to resign anyway, but I'm not happy that I'm being forced out.
It's been a busy couple of weeks since my last post.
I celebrated my birthday a couple times, first with a party. Quite a few of our friends showed up and we had a nice quiet night with drinks and lots of laughter. Brie overdrank and paid the price for it, where I managed to only have 4 drinks. Then we went to Las Vegas. We stayed at NYNY. I really like it there. I know some people think it's too "themey", but I like that. It's the Disney kid in me. I've never been impressed by places like the Bellagio. When we stayed in a Bellagio Suite a few years ago I was in love with the room itself; vaulted ceilings, full entertainment center, 2 bathrooms, jacuzzi tub, but the hotel itself just isn't my cup-of-tea. I prefer fun to elegance. We went to Madame Toussad's which I also loved. It's so great that they actually encourage you to touch the wax figures. It allows you to really see how amazing they are. My biggest impression is that no one is taller than me. Michael Jordan wasn't even taller than me. It made me feel like a monster sometimes. It also made me feel really fat. Oh well!!
We spent Thanksgiving at Brie's parents in Valley Center. It was quiet and simple. The only people their, beside us, was one of her older brothers and his girlfriend. It's pretty sad in my book that we moved her to be closer to her parents yet we have only seen them 4 times in the last 5 months and of those visits they have only been here to our house once. I guess that is one of the reasons why we don't feel it would be that big a deal to move back east.
My ex-bandmate and longtime friend Mike and his girlfriend Catherine returned from their trip to Europe safely and have moved here from Lake Tahoe. They were able to find a small apartment right off the beach in Carlsbad. I hope it's a great experience for them and I hope we will get to see them often.
No updates on moving back east. Really things won't start being decided about that until the new year.
Other than that we just have to buckle down and get through the holidays. Always a fun and exciting time. I'm really looking forward to decorating the house. Hopefully we'll get started on that this weekend.