Merry Christmas (and to my mom - Happy Holidays - she hates that!)
In fact, despite my initial impressions towards blogs (waste of time, narcissistic indulgences, a chance to voyeuristically snoop on their opinions) I find that blogging is easy to do, a chance to be yourself, and - if you keep it out of Facebook, keep control of your postings and ideas. I'm using it for teaching in a big way and have done a complete about-face with my opinion. I also put ads on the teaching site, the proceeds of which go to a student scholarship ($100 in three months, woo!). Also, I can inject some media into this, which is a neat connection, especially for our friends from Oklahoma who see our kids grow in yearly snapshots. (Tim is thrilled that he's now taller than his mother. He won't get taller than me because I plan to tamp him down with a mallet if he grows much more).
Last year Tim and Erin got into Round Up Band in a big way. It's the feeder band for Stetsons, which ultimately leads to the Calgary Stampede Band (who are, this year, participating in the Rose Bowl Parade which is an invitation-only event). The kids view Stampede Band as the pinnacle of marching / show band performance. They felt the doldrums of practices and were setting up P and me with "You won't be too disappointed if we finish this year and then quit band?" statements. And then there was Tour. In Seattle. I guess if I wanted to start my own cult, I'd get my followers to dress identically, perform together, and then stay for a week in a distant city. The kids are avid band members and practices have taken on an entirely new importance in their lives.
Here's the field show that Tim and Erin did last summer. This performance was done in Red Deer. The theme is "The Muppet Show" and the name of the tour was "CRUB takes Seattle" (from the Muppet Movie The Muppets take Manhattan)
Note: for all YouTube movies, you can click on the YouTube logo at the bottom left side of the window. This takes you to the YouTube page and you can view it full screen at even higher resolution.
After the tour last summer, we stayed with Penny's Aunt Jean and Uncle Ken in Bellingham. It's a trip we love and was just a short drive from Seattle, so everything worked out perfectly. Because we had the instruments, Tim and Erin graced us with Manamana:
Erin is now a Drum Major in Training (a DIT, which is apparently different from a DERP - the name we call ourselves when we make a foolish mistake). She and Tim were both in competition for this prestigious position, and we worried about fallout if one and not the other were to get it. In fact, Erin was the successful candidate and although we were proud of her for this, we just about burst when Tim was generous with his praise and sincere congratulations along with a very quiet "I'm so proud of my sister" comment to his mom.
Tim was made section leader for the saxophones, which was also a point of pride. But interestingly he won't be playing sax during the field show. He tried out, and won, a spot as the "Hero". Details are still being worked out, but look for a new video in the coming months of the Round Up Band field show with the theme "Video Games". Tim will do battle against a "Boss" - I suspect he'll win every time!
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| Todd and Penny at the Seattle Harbour. The kids were probably within several kilometers, but we had no idea where... they were in the throes of tour with their good friends and wonderful leaders. |
As for non-band stuff, we had a rather severe scare this summer when Penny started losing the vision out of one eye and was getting numbness in one arm. Long story short, after multiple MRIs, a CAT scan, and a brief stay in hospital, we were able to rule out the proposals of "metastatic brain tumor with a drop tumor in the spinal cord", MS, and pituitary tumor and settled on the very treatable neurosarcoidosis. The baffling part was that Penny had no lung involvement, making her case rare (about 15 in all of Calgary, a city of over a million people). She's doing just fine, and my thanks to all who've passed along their best wishes for her! Round Up Band played a great role in this: their day-long practices were a few blocks from the hospital which gave the kids an important distraction as tests were being done and we were able to give Pen the support she needed.
As for work stuff, our summer gave us a better perspective on what's important in our lives. We still work hard and take pride in our careers, but they're not the most important thing (I don't think it ever was, but we view things a bit differently now). Penny's in her fourth pre-tenure year - she'll be applying for tenure next year. I'm going to hear if my application for full professor will be accepted by the end of January. I'm sure pleased at the cool opportunities that have presented themselves: I'm working on some textbook products and am an invited speaker to a Toronto educational meeting in January. Penny and I will attend a conference in Orlando (it's P's conference. My job is travelling companion and I'll test out the rides in the Magic Kingdom while P is getting educated on current topics in nursing).
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| T and P at a Calgary Stampeder's football game. My head isn't actually twice the size of Penny's. |
Oh, and the youngest, furriest member of us, Fry, is doing just fine (for those who haven't been introduced, he's a three-year old Golden Doodle. His hobbies are riding in the car (there's no unrestrained glee so evident as Fry after the words "want to go for a car ride?"), cleaning dinner dishes, and chasing rabbits. This last hobby usually occurs only in his mind as he naps (the quiet grunts and legs twitching give it away) except for one time when we hooked through the metal coil holding his tags to his collar instead of the robust ring. We were walking at night and a field full of rabbits was too much for him to take and he wrenched the metal ring into a wire. We lost dog and tags that night, but eventually reclaimed the mammalian part of the combination. I believe that no rabbits were hurt - or even contacted - during the adventure.
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| Fry: wannabe rabbit slayer |
It's been a good year. I hope this online Christmas Greeting isn't impersonal. I think I'll do this again next year. It's easy to put together, and an emailed invitation with a personal message seems to fit my style!
Merry Christmas from us, and we wish you a wonderful new year!
...Todd, Penny, Tim, Erin, and Fry
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