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IT'S FRIDAY, MY FAVORITE DAY!!

HAPPY NEW YEAR! Don't ask me where the year went because I know one thing for sure and that is time is flying by too fast for me!

I have had a great week. After our Christmas celebration with our daughters and their families on Sunday, we brought our two oldest granddaughters home to stay with us for a few days. We had a great time. On Monday afternoon, Dave had to leave for Portland for a Blazer game, so I drove the girls up to Seaside where we met my friend Cathie and her granddaughter and all of us went to the movie theater to see "The Princess and the Frog". Seaside pretty much rolls up the sidewalks in the winter, so there wasn't a whole lot more to do than just see a movie. The carnival rides won't be open again until spring. Afterwards, it was a trip to Candyland (oh yeah, THEY were open!) to buy some sweets before we headed back home.

Ashtin and Paige usually get very homesick while visiting with us old folks, but with the Wii, they were entertained for hours. In fact, they played for so long that Ashtin complained that her wrist hurt! Paige broke her record on the hula-hoop exercise and almost bowled a perfect score. When they got tired of the Wii, we turned to good old-fashioned board games and got in a couple games of Old Maid and Yahtzee.

As I mentioned last week, I have jury duty for the month of January in Tillamook County and I had jury orientation in Wednesday morning. I had to be there by 8:30 in the morning and so I left before everyone else was up. The jury duty is for a month and I have to call in every day to see if my number has been picked. So far, so good. I called in last night and there is no court today or Monday...so the next time I have to check in will be Monday night for a possible Tuesday trial. It is really an inconvenience more than anything because I have to plan my life around the court system. It is only for a month and I would much rather get it done now than delay it until later. There were lots of people summoned and I ran into a couple of people I knew while I was at the courthouse.

We were also heading back into town for another Blazer game on Wednesday so we were on a time schedule to get everyone packed and ready to go by the time I came back from Tillamook. Anyway, jury orientation lasted about an hour and so I was back home by 10:30. Dave had the girls up and got them organized enough to get their suitcases packed and ready to go. Since it had been snowing to the east of us and we didn't know what we were going to run into up on the Coast range summit, we were anxious to get started. No problems though, the road was clear and we made it into town in plenty of time.

Speaking of snow, I guess the surprise snowstorm earlier in the week in town messed up everything. The forecasters missed on this one and when the snow started falling just before people got off work, no one was prepared and they were stuck in traffic for hours. We heard several reports of a half-hour commute turning into five or six hours! I am sure glad I was home safe and sound. I really do get fed up with the TV coverage though. They had to show the same things over and over for hours and it really got old. There was nothing new to report but they felt they had to be posted at their various spots on the freeway to let everyone know what they already knew. What really ticked me off was that they pre-emptied my favorite show "Jeopardy" to just tell us the same old thing. Good grief.

We spent New Year's Eve in West Linn babysitting our three youngest grandchildren. The oldest two got their hair cut a few days ago. They've been letting it grow long since earlier in the year so they could donate their hair to "Locks of Love", the program that provides wigs for kids undergoing chemotherapy. They each had 8 or 9 inches cut off, so there was plenty to donate. They got cute little "wedge" cuts and they look great! Anyway, Lara and Greg had a chance to go out for the evening, so we volunteered to stay with the kids. There wasn't a whole lot of curiosity about the New Year's celebration, so they went to bed at the regular time. That means I was in bed fast asleep long before the new year rang in too! Been there, done that. We will stay in town through Saturday, as there is another Blazer home game on Saturday night. Right now, we're planning to drive home after the game Saturday night, but we'll wait to see what the weather looks like before we decide for sure.

I THINK I have a new cell phone. I say "think", because Lara found a great deal on phones on Thursday, but the deal expired on the 31st. We had been thinking about upgrading my old phone anyway, but we really wanted to take a little more time to consider our options. Anyway, she called while we were out to dinner on Thursday evening and told us about the deal. She was getting a new phone for herself and another for Greg, and she thought I might as well get in on the deal too. The problem was, the store was closing in 20 minutes and we were a half hour away! She got the store to agree to upgrade to a new phone on Thursday, and if I don't like it, I can take it in and exchange it when they're open again on Saturday. So, I'm pretty sure I have a new phone; I just don't know what it is or does yet! I'll let you know what happened next week.