Happy Hanukkah to my family, friends, and any random Jewish readers who happen upon my blog. May the light of the menorah shine brightly in your home during this joyful season. Our rabbi sent an email with some links to Hanukkah You-tube videos a few days ago, which were cute. Pass the candle was my favorite, but Coloradans and Texans will surely enjoy Brokeback Dreidel. And while I am not surprised at what you can find on the internet, I did enjoy a leisurely hour clicking on You-tube videos of Hanukkah music, some wonderful, some less than stellar. I would not have found those clips without the encouragement of the mass email. Thanks Rabbi!

A surprise for me came in the newspaper this week. We have a weekly newspaper, the Wet Mountain Tribune, and sometimes the bowling scores are listed in the paper. So this week, my name was mentioned for some highlight or other in every league that I bowled in the previous week (Dec 8 – 11). I was very surprised, because although on average I have one very good game out of three now, I have been only bowling a little above my average overall. So, I am bragging on myself this week. Yeah me! Bowling slows down during these two holiday weeks, and then we’ll be gone on our vacation for a while. So no more bowling reports for a while.

Stay warm and watch out for those latkes! Happy Hanukkah!

Jay arrived home on Dec 1st, so we have had two weeks of getting back to normal. It has been very easy to get used to having company in the house full time. Jay has been able to substitute on the Wednesday and Thursday mixed leagues and set his average the first week. He has very little handicap, even though he hadn’t bowled regularly for 20 weeks, his form is still excellent and his averages are above 180. Everyone at league is happy to have him back, unless they are his opponents. Oh, you learn so many things while bowling! We found out that the animal caught in the downspout, (see post of Nov.12) was probably a pack rat! I thought they were small rodents like mice, not big ones, but we have been reassured that they have fluffy long white tails, and one had definitely been nesting in the boat, but isn’t there now. So now we know the rest of the story.

We had some days of light blowing snow which didn’t accumulate on the ground, but decorated the trees. On Dec 4th, the trees all looked frosted. But on the 5th, there was measurable snow on the leaves/needles but only on the southern exposures. Very interesting!

Wallace sent us an updated picture of his new baby and Jen on Dec 6th.  His report:  “Jen’s half way done growing our baby so I thought I’d send an update picture I took in our backyard. The weather is about 65 degrees and sunny, so we took advantage while we still could. Everything is going well according to the doctor, and the baby is kicking and spinning all the time now.”  Wallace is on another trip to Japan to make a presentation about his group’s projects and while he is gone, Jen’s mom and dad have arranged time to visit in Austin and keep her company.

Jay got back just in time for our first big snow of the season. Jay says he thinks we got a foot of snow on Dec 8th. There was no snow when we got back from bowling after lunch and by the next morning there was a fluffy white blanket across everything. Jay got to take the big wheel, aka ATV, out with the snow plow for the first time. He was able to clear the road all the way to the county road and was making additional passes to widen and smooth the road, when a bolt broke. It held the plow in place at the angle he wanted and without it, the plow was not very effective. But it was easy to replace the bolt, and he got spares of the spring that is the other part of this mechanism, so we are prepared for the next bolt disappearance. The next day, Wednesday, with the repaired spring/bolt, he made additional passes and really smoothed up the road. Good news was that we didn’t have to miss any bowling, due to Jay’s excellent plowing.

It has been interesting to see the responses to the blog about Jay’s return home from the Academy. Almost universally he has gotten accolades for making the effort and going so far in the program, but everyone has expressed relief that he is not going to be a trooper. Interesting! This week was graduation, Dec 12th. Jay and I got up early on Friday and drove up to Denver to watch his classmates graduate. It was a bittersweet event, we were very proud of his friends, happy for them, and even though we are happy to have Jay home, regret that he was not part of the class anymore and not part of the graduation. All of the cadets were looking forward to seeing him and pleased that he was there to support them. He got as many bear hugs as he gave out. It was kind of odd, feeling like we were “inside” the group, yet sitting on the outside. We had seats in the second row with a good view. Unfortunately, my small camera didn’t take good pictures, so we only have a few. We hope that several of the cadets and their families will come visit us and that we can go visit them in their new duty stations as well. The academy was an intense bonding experience for all of the cadets and we don’t want to lose touch, especially with Jay’s roommates.

While we were in Denver, we stopped in to have lunch with Ted at Chili’s. He is still looking for work, as are two of his roommates. Two have jobs. He looks good and the house was clean, Ted was even talking about vacuuming his room later that day. We were home by 8:30 pm, a full and rewarding day, with a special stop at Dairy Queen for a small cone! Yumm.

We will be traveling later this month, driving to El Dorado to see my family for our annual holiday gathering on the 27th. Our friend, Sue, has again offered hospitality to Amber and Lacy. They are so lucky to have her for a friend. Us too! Wallace and Jen are making plans to join us in El Dorado and will probably stay through New Year’s Eve with us. Molly is moving to Austin that weekend, so she and Matt will be busy in Texas. We are hoping it will work out that Ted and Julia can come too, but still to be determined. After the family visit, I am taking Jay on a 7 day cruise on NCL out of New Orleans to make up for the stress of 20 weeks away from home. We have planned a few days in NO to sight see and reminisce about our former life there, before we board the cruise ship. We plan to drive back through Texas on the way home, stopping in Austin and Fort Worth on the way. I’m sure I’ll have a lot of info about our trip as it happens, so watch for details coming later.

Jay’s adventure with the Colorado State Patrol has ended. As you may know, there was a challenge to overcome, called Redman. Redman involved a physical altercation, a fight, between a cadet and multiple troopers, which lasted for 3 minutes. Jay completed the fight portion of Redman for the required 3 minutes, then had to run to the shooting range and shoot an assailant in a hostage situation. Due to his injured ankle from earlier in the training, he was not able to accomplish this second portion of Redman. According to Academy policy, without completing Redman, a cadet cannot graduate and Jay was offered the opportunity to return to the Academy in July 2009 to join the second cadet class of 2009, allowing ample time for his ankle to heal. Jay declined the offer.

We have mixed feelings about this. Jay gave 110% to all of the demands of the Academy, including a grueling physical training regimen and living in Golden, CO five and a half days a week. He placed in the top of the cadet class in driving and shooting. He was injured in training, a torn ligament in his ankle, and didn’t complain and kept going. He fulfilled 20 weeks of the 22 week program and would have liked to graduate with his cadet class. Yet, he would have been stationed in Leadville CO, two and a half hours from Westcliffe, and a trooper is required to live in the town/county where stationed. There was no guarantee that he would have been able to get a transfer to a location which would allow him to live at home in Westcliffe. Neither of us were looking forward to months or years of split residence again, although we were willing to try to work it out.

We think Jay would have made an excellent trooper and served the residents of Colorado well, but the puppies and I are glad to have him home. And Jay is happy to be home and to be able to look out at the mountains every morning and evening and get involved in life in Westcliffe again. As he said when he started this process in July, ” It’s an adventure, like an extended Outward Bound and I’ll give it my best shot.” He is sad not to be able to finish the program, but knows he gave his best and has no regrets for making the effort.

So we’ll take some time to regroup, get used to living together 7 days a week again, and enjoy each day, maybe even get some bowling time in, more boxes unpacked and his workshop set up. Thanks for all of the encouragement and support for both of us during this adventure, we appreciate it.