Post Holiday

Happy New Year and a belated Merry Christmas to all of you.  I was fortunate enough to have the entire week of Christmas off, so we headed south for Georgia after I got off of work on Friday the 21^st.  We drove all the way to Smyrna, TN (south of Nashville) before pulling over and getting a hotel for the evening.  We continued onward to Atlanta Saturday morning and met some of my “car friends” for lunch.  It was great to see all of these guys; I still miss our monthly, first Friday of the month dinner outings.

We spent Saturday evening catching up with my parents at their house and went roaming around downtown Athens, GA on Sunday.  We had a nice lunch at The Grill, a tasty 24 hour local restaurant that seems to require every member of it's staff to have a minimum of at least 2 tattoos and or extra piercings.  As strange as the staff is, the food is really good.  We still rate their milkshakes as the best anywhere… not sure what they do, but they are really good.  We also  did some shopping, including my favorite downtown stores (the UGA apparel stores) and the CFO’s favorite jewelry store.  Much to her dismay, we didn’t make a purchase there... I already had her gifts wrapped and ready to go.  Monday was full of my family’s typical routine:  Christmas dinner on Christmas Eve (because who wants to have to cook/do dishes on Christmas day?!) and homemade donut making and decorating that evening.  NOTHING beats dad’s fresh homemade donuts!

Dad's made from scratch dinner rolls

 

Back when I was a kid (damn, I sound old!) my dad woke us up really early on Christmas morning to open gifts… he was as excited about it as we were.  This year, though, my oldest nephew (7 yrs old) insisted that any time prior to 7:30 am was too early.  WHAT IS WRONG WITH KIDS THESE DAYS?!  Who can sleep in when there are PRESENTS to open?!  Surprisingly, my dad went along with the plan and didn’t wake the house with loud, hallelujah choir music until 7:30 (yes, he cranks it up and tries to rattle the windows throughout the entire house with it).  The rest of the day was spent playing with the nephews, playing games with the adults and a little bit of relaxing.  Wednesday and Thursday followed a similar format and low activity level, although the ladies did venture out for a few after Christmas bargains.

 Play time included time with Dad's model train set up

 

 The older nephew directing train traffic

 

And the youngest refusing to allow me to take a decent photo of him

The CFO and I made the drive back in one swoop, covering the entire distance, plus stopping to eat leisurely meals for breakfast (mmm… Chick-fil-a!), lunch and dinner in around 12.5 hours.  If we hadn’t eaten inside the restaurants for each meal, we could have shaved some serious time off the trip, but we weren’t in any hurry.  She spent the next few days writing stuff for work and I tried to keep myself entertained by doing my yearly, sorting/purging/organizing of our household documents (bills) and organizing the garage.  We also managed to hit the gym 3 times to try to burn off some of the homemade cookies and donuts and other treats that were consumed the previous week.

The extents of our Christmas Decor this year... 5 wreaths. We will have to do better next year.

As per my usual habit, New Year’s Eve was uneventful…  Surprise, surprise, I’ve never been a huge New Year’s Eve party person; I’d rather stay home and avoid the crowds and the chaos.  The CFO really wants to go to Times Square for New Year’s Eve at some point… However, I’m not sure that will ever happen with me, as I can’t imagine a worse place to be.  I have no desire to stand around for hours outside, in the cold, on a street, amongst a huge group of inebriated strangers waiting to see a giant ball of lights drop for 10 seconds in order to ring in the New Year.  No thanks, I’ll take the title of “party pooper” over that.  Besides, the Chick-fil-a Bowl game is usually on that night and I would much rather watch that.

New Year ’s Day was mainly spent playing in the kitchen and sitting on the couch watching football.  Of course, I was rooting for my UGA Bulldogs and, as usual, the dawgs started out flat and were behind by one point at half time.  However, much to my delight, they came roaring back in the second half and soundly beat the Nebraska Cornhuskers.  Overall, I was quite happy with the team’s performance for the year, too bad that they came so close to being able to play for a national championship… Based on this year’s performance, I would say that our team has the potential to be a dominant force next year, unless we lose too many guys to the NFL draft.  Now I will be anxiously watching the sports headlines to see which of our junior players decide to forgo their senior to go into the draft. 

As for the kitchen, I made French onion soup for lunch and a super tender, cut it with a fork, pork tenderloin for dinner.  I thought it was the best tenderloin that I have ever prepared and the CFO agreed with that evaluation, except for disliking the fennel seeds that were in the rub recipe that I used.  Luckily, the bed of sliced apples and onions that I cooked the pork on made up for the fennel… she LOVES baked apples.  

The only problem with having a nice, long holiday vacation is the fact that you eventually have to go back to reality and get back to work…  Good thing we have one more trip coming up soon for me to look forward to!