Merry Christmas!

Peace and Goodwill to all!

Nice socks Ronee~ (you can click on the pic to enlarge it)

Julian is heading out for his 6-day bike trip out of San Diego tomorrow -- the first day they are to dress for Christmas. We just sewed a hat on to his helmet!

Here's a link to the group trip with the San Diego Hostel's 52nd annual Christmas ride:
www.sandiegohostels.org/bike.shtml
December 26:
San Diego to Pine Valley, 50 miles. Pine Valley is a small mountain village.
December 27:
Pine Valley to Warner Springs, 55 miles. A great day of riding. Stop for apple pie in Julian!
December 28:
Warner Springs to Palm Desert, 100 miles. Great desert views & riding. Grab a date milkshake!
December 29:
Palm Desert to Hemet, 64 miles. Occasional head winds build character.
December 30:
Hemet to Fallbrook, 50 miles. A fantastic ride along oak tree shaded country roads.
December 31:
Fallbrook to San Diego, 55 miles. Soak up the sea air as you ride along the stunning San Diego Coastline.

400 Miles in 6 days! And it's COLD this year!
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Santa's Blog - Christmas Eve

It's Christmas Eve!!!! I hope you and your family have a wonderful Christmas!

Last year I was lucky enough to find Santa's Blog! We were able to follow his flight around the world Christmas Eve!

Here it is for your enjoyment:
http://clauschronicles.blogspot.com/

You can follow his sleigh via NORAD too!
http://www.noradsanta.org/en/home.html

Lyle: Have a safe trip back to Detroit! I think you're dodging storms on your way home too!
Maybe you'll see Santa in the sky???

Happy Birthday Leslie!
and Happy Day After Your Birthday Cindy!!
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Julian and Lyle Arrive!

After dodging snow and storms all week, Julian and Lyle arrived here safely!
They didn't get to do any site-seeing as the weather chased them every day -- including SNOW in Las Vegas!

Meanwhile, it's been cold (50 degrees) and very rainy here! We need that but, poor Lyle.....

Thursday -- The rain is gone, it's still a bit cool, but the sun is back. I took Lyle on a beach tour of Carlsbad and Oceanside! Here he is on the Pier before lunch at Ruby's:

Friday: The San Diego Zoo, Coronado (and the Hotel Del Coronado) a quick tour of downtown San Diego - Embarcadaro, Gaslamp Quarters, Little Italy, and then dinner in Old Town (Mexican food!)

San Diego Zoo:
We saw snakes being fed rats! ugh! (but cool!)
Zoo Giraffes

Hotel Del Coronado: Julian & NancyA lazy December Saturday in California -- 64 degrees and sunny:

Wild Animal Park:

Wild Animal Park Giraffes roaming around:

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Michigan Trip December 2008

As usual it was a whirlwind tour of Michigan!

In addition to Julian's graduation, and Rick's Birthday, we enjoyed family and friends. Thanks for Jen & John, and Penny & Carl for having some people over while we were there. More thanks to those of you who drove up for Julian's graduation & dinner! I never got to do the lunches with friends that I had planned as we spent half of our trip up at East Lansing.

More to follow...

Here are a few pics.
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Julian Graduates from MSU!

How I Got Young Again - Happy Birthday Rick

For Rick's birthday we were in Michigan and he got to enjoy Buddy's Pizza with his sister Annette and her family, then we had dinner at Andiamos with Julian and Dawn Evola! That's pretty much a perfect day for him!

I thought I'd post this article by Mitch Albom for him.

How I Got Young Again

By Mitch Albom
Published: September 14, 2008 See the Lucky Tiger Grease Stick Band in action. Watch the video!

We were never very good, and it never really mattered. Eight high school guys in a band. Guitar, piano, sax, bass, and drums. Three of us didn't even play an instrument, just stood around singing, "Shoo-bop, shoo-bop." We went by nicknames--"Rico," "Greaso," "Ace"--and we played dances, sock hops, even a local TV show once, singing songs older than we were, wearing hairstyles that were before our time. We practiced in my parents' �basement, and we named ourselves after the stuff kids rolled into their 1950s crew cuts.

The Lucky Tiger Grease Stick Band.

Some say adolescence is a time for angst, but eight buddies in a band will help you fight that. My teenage years were spent greasing up, tuning up, and cracking up. All I really remember from high school is laughter.

Maybe that's why, decades later, when I was approaching my 50th birthday and my wife insisted that I do "something special," I felt a rush of ennui. I've always been a reluctant grown-up. I have no interest in suit-and-tie affairs, a few raised wine glasses, everyone so...mature.

"Well, what do you want?" she said.

The truth? I wanted my old basement back.

And so began the best birthday I ever had. It started with seven phone calls and seven anxious responses. "You're kidding?" "Heck, yes." "Count me in." It continued with a visit to my old neighborhood in South Jersey and a request to the McCutcheon family, who now live in my old house.

"Would you mind," our drummer Marc "Rosey" Rosenthal asked, "if we borrowed your basement for a day? Oh...and could we clear out your furniture?"

Incredibly, they said, "OK."

Old song lists were dug out. Instruments were brought in. And finally, on a beautiful Saturday in May, one car after another pulled up to a familiar house. Out stepped Howard, Victor, David, Marc, Sandy, Mark, Perry, and me.

For the first time in 34 years, we were all together.

"Look at you!" "Ayyy!" "Man, you got old!" Although some of us were now physicians or businessmen, we were back to teenaged insults the moment we laid eyes on each other. We rumbled down the steps to the low-ceilinged basement of my youth. We ran the familiar grease through our hair, donned sunglasses, rolled up our sleeves. We plugged in and tuned up.

We were never very good, and we weren't good now. We had less hair. Wider stomachs. Occasionally, we had to pull out glasses to read the lyrics. And it was pretty obvious that "Action Jackson," our guitar player, was not going to do the flying full-leg split he used to do on "Splish Splash." He's a doctor now. He knows better.

But if you love music--and we loved that music--it is always inside you. So, when my piano started plinking and Rosey's drums began banging and Sandy "The Kid" began plucking his bass, I can't explain it, it all came back. At our ages, we can't remember where we left our car keys, but we can still remember who sang what on "Silhouettes." We played only for ourselves and a few family members. A private basement concert. And we laughed until our ribs threatened to snap.

Now, our band's best memories were never of excellence (we didn't have much) but rather of screw-ups and shenanigans. Like the day we played on a beach and got attacked by bumblebees. Or the night when we pulled off a highway ramp and ran across the top of Big D's car. Or the gig where we sang "Sixteen Candles" and, when we got to the part about "Blow out the candles," one of us hit a light switch to darken the room--and all the power went out.

At best, such stories are cute to others. But they are priceless to us. So we told them again, for the thousandth time. And we cracked ourselves up. We sang "Teenager in Love," "Jailhouse Rock," "Great Balls of Fire." We did nearly 30 songs, many from memory. And when we finished, we didn't wash the grease from our hair. Instead, looking like Sha Na Na's retirement party, we piled into our cars and drove to the local diner where we used to stuff into booths late at night and punch songs on the jukebox. We ordered cheese�steaks and fries (the salmon and grilled veggies of adult life were put on hold), and the laughs went on for hours.

Stephen King once wrote, "I never had any friends later on like the ones I had when I was 12." That pretty much sums up my Lucky Tiger Grease Stick pals. It was nearly midnight before anyone heaved a sigh or looked at his watch.

It was the best birthday of my life. And the kicker is, the whole thing made me feel younger, not older. After all, every good memory is a notch on your life belt, and every happy song you sang is still somewhere inside you, if only in the "twiddle-lee-dee" backups on "Rockin' Robin."

I love my bandmates. I missed them all those years. And I came to realize something as we hugged goodbye in the parking lot and promised another reunion.

We were never very good, but we were always good for each other.

And we always will be.

See the Lucky Tiger Grease Stick Band in action. Watch the video!

View photos of the Lucky Tigers at Albom.com

PARADE Contributing Editor Mitch Albom is the best-selling author of "Tuesdays With Morrie" and "For One More Day."