The Christmas letter for 2008

Christmas is here and New Years soon follows. We have been getting Christmas letters in some of our cards. So, let's fire up the wayback machine like Coach Ray and see what happened in 2008.

The year started off by getting very close to attending a National championship. One more made take out in the Club playdowns and it was off to the Club Nationals. Won’t forget that shot for a long time.

This here blog started in February. Mike over at InTheHack was cleaning up the site and decided to not have blogging anymore. I did get to rescue a few of my old ones which are now archived here. It was a pretty painless transition and now it has expanded to four separate blogs. Thank you Google.

The curling season ended at Nutmeg and it was another successful year as we continued to grow our membership. Of course that means that the World Curling Championships were in full swing. Jennifer Jones team won the Women’s Worlds and Mrs. JH was one of the first people to call her buddy Cathy O to offer congratulations. We also took a trip to one of the flattest places on earth, Grand Forks ND. This was for the Men’s Worlds. It was a blast as always and the arena is one of the best in the world.

Spring brings the Kentucky Derby and the beginning of baseball. As usual, I picked the winning horse and then decided not to bet on him because he was the favorite. And of course Curlin then stepped up and shot down Big Brown.

When Mike got rid of blogs at InTheHack, he must have had this in mind. One of the first and best curling chat sites on the internet closes up shop. A big loss for those of us with nothing better to do than argue the merits of playdown formats.

Summer is here and my Dad gets sick. Less than a month later he passes away. Enough said.

Fall brings some emotional recovery with the start of curling season and reconnecting with a lot of good people. We put in ice a month early and it was very successful and used a ton. It also brought about a wonderful joyful event, another historic collapse by the Mets. Not only do they drop out of first but also miss the playoffs. My beloved Phightin Phils take the division and enter the playoffs.

The GNCC decides to start a curling tour for prize money and somehow I get talked into being the chair. I still blame it on the beer that Derek bought me. We also lose my cat Domino to illness after 18 years. I had him before I ever met Mrs. JH and he was definitely my cat. So, we had to replace him because two cats is not enough. Enter the kitten. We think the spirit of Domino has entered the kitten sometimes as he does some of the same things, like drinking water out of a glass.

October – the fall classic and guess who is playing, why it is the PHILLIES. Anybody want to guess the outcome? PHILS WIN!!!

Finally we return to the scene of our first meeting ten years ago. This coming year will be our 10 year wedding anniversary. That is the paper present right? Guess I will buy her a book or maybe a calendar.

Christmas and the end of the year have arrived. It will be tough without Dad. He would always take his tree and fill in any "holes" that were missing branches by drilling into the trunk and adding an extra branch. His tree was always perfect. We did get a lot of his antique Christmas stuff so that is a nice reminder.

Have a safe, healthy and happy Holiday season everyone.
Later,
JH