Belated Merry Christmas to all. Especially to Triciae, who was on my mind a lot this holiday and will be during future holidays. Dear Wonder Woman, I hope you are doing well, where ever you are. Thank you for showing me what courage and strength and kindness are. We drove down to the Bay Area for the holidays. Christmas Eve we had dinner with our good friends in Berkeley, raw oysters with mignonette, cracked crab, and the traditional Buche de Noel. Last night we had dinner with other good friends in Richmond, tenderloin, mashed potatoes and a warm cauliflower-brussel sprout salad. I made half of the tenderloin, cut pieces 1" thick and tied them into rounds, pan cooked, with a sauce of reduced white balsamic vinegar, Muscat wine, shallots and garlic, butter, sauteed mushroom stems, blended smooth, then simmered over whole mushroom caps. No recipe, just made it up. Our hostess roasted the rest of the tenderloin with a red wine and shallot reduction. We were supervised by a friend who is a head chef at a large hotel and, for the first time in many years, didn't have to work on Christmas day, but was nonetheless pressed into service which he did with good humour. I've been negotiating a stressful matter at work for the past few weeks. As of Dec 24, we were uncertain whether our little business unit would be shut down and I had prepared myself to be jobless come Jan 1st. That all got resolved satisfactorily at noon on Christmas Eve, final document review pending, so for the first time in a month, I was able to relax and unclench. It was nice.

Merry Christmas to all. Julia, too have spent my fall vigorously working to recover from the time off. It is still not finished, but I will try to post a couple of photos to show the mess that the back was in. and here is a more recent photo: still not finished but much of it is done...spring will be another work and I am getting very much along in years too. I have cut down and hauled over over a hundred little saplings. mostly oak or Mimosa but a maple or two and one magnolia tree. (courtesy of the birds.) The stumps are all painted with Remedy so they will not return. In Alabama, and I am sure it happens in other southern states as well, weeds, grass, trees, etc will grow very thickly if not managed constantly. My husband can no longer do any yard work other than grass cutting where the land is clear, so I had better stay well this year. Anyway, this is what I have been doing in November and early December. kay

"I've been locked out of GW for the past month!" It seems many posters are having problems. I'm able to log in and post ok, but nothing shows under my activity. Hopefully they'll fix that, so will be able to find my old posts for reference. I was away over New Year's, and at the hotel on Jan 1 no one's card worked to unlock their rooms. ACK! Poor desk clerk was running all over opening up people's rooms for them. Hopefully they finally got that sorted out, it was something with the flip to the new calendar year and the system controlling the locks.

Merry Christmas to you all, also! We had our second ever Christmas in our own home! While our parents were living we always traveled to Arizona to spend the holidays with them. Now we are the "older" generation! Our son, daughter-in-law, and granddaughter came on Christmas Eve for prime rib dinner, presents and games. It was wonderful. Her parents and siblings are here, also, so Christmas day was lunch and presents at their house. We had beautiful weather (for Colorado) - it was 55F, so I took a walk while DH finished putting together his new computer (Christmas present) and I took a long walk. After leftover dinner, we took a drive around town to see Christmas lights. It was lovely! Today DH had hernia surgery so it's a quieter evening - but he is doing great. Sue