Happy New Year!

My blog has gotten a face lift. I don't really want to spend that much time on it, but there are lots of bits that could use improvement. If you think of any good links, comment.

I expected to be blogging from a boat floating in the Gulf of Mexico, but it seems we've brought colder weather with us. It's been windy here, and it rained yesterday. We're having a good time anyway. Patrick's dad, George, and his stepmom, Susy, are taking good care of us. We went to Susy's graduation from massage school today. She already has a promising interview lined up. Exciting! And she's still enough in learning-mode that she doesn't mind giving free massages to family. :)

Back in the Bay Area, we saw a lot of friends and family, not spending quite as much time as I would've liked with everyone I like but also kind of overwhelming ourselves with engagements. It was nice to see more of Patrick's family, though; his aunt Theresa and her partner, Cal, just moved to Oakland this year--well, last year, as of today!--and we had a delicious and delightful dinner with them. I enjoyed seeing George, Maria, Sophie, and Annie, too. Annie was sick, but her increasing proficiency in the English language was still discernible. My cousin Caitlyn is still quiet, but she is way less shy and consequently a lot more fun. Ian discovered that I am strong enough to toss him but not to sustain it for an hour straight, so he's made friends with Patrick. I missed Matthew, since he's down in LA fulfilling childhood dreams of conducting the Disneyland Train (it's been a multi-year climb up the theme park ladder); soon, he'll be in Edinburgh, another long-time aspiration. I'm proud that he's stuck with this stuff.

The nuculer family had a good time watching Ratatouille on DVD; Jarrett and I made a very tasty apple cake from the Firehouse Cookbook; and I tried to deftly maneuver my way into winning a game of hearts, only to have Jarrett stick me with the queen of spades in the last hand, leaving me trailing behind my dad by a number of points too trivial to calculate yet too tragic to ignore.

Food highlights included sticky rice, a very creative curry+fried tofu+mushroom+miso soup, more sticky rice, a surprising cole slaw, AMAZING cookies (Auntie Lorna only baked how many, somewhere around 1,500 this year?), pear ravioli, pear and squash soup (vegetarian! yay!), the best chocolate chip cookies, battered crab, veggie chicken, quesadillas full of black beans and sweet potatoes, homemade rice porridge, oh I could go on but I won't.

I have a few pictures to post, but they'll have to wait until we get back to Chicago. In the meantime, I have lesson planning to do!