Lair Christmas Letter 2004

Another semi-interesting year in 2004 has come and nearly gone

Early part of 2004, Herb had his 60^th birthday. There were several people at church who thought we should have a big party and celebrate the event, all at our expense, I might add. We were still amazed at how few of those people showed up. Even our preacher, who lives next door, found a way to conveniently be out of town. There was a lot of good home cooked food for the event using some of Sandy’s special recipes - you know, hiring a caterer to do it all. We also had PowerPoint of Herb’s life running on a TV, much like you would see at a funeral home visitation. CD Rom copies are available for a nominal charge and slight shipping and handling fee, we’re still trying to pay for the event. We had a contest to see who would best to handle Herb’s eulogy. Since Herb would obviously not be around for the final event, he used the Apprentice ala Donald Trump format. There was no clear winner, or loser depending on how you would like to “view it”. Herb decided it may be best to just videotape his own eulogy.

Razorback basketball and football has not done well this year. Herb recently wrote a letter to the editor expressing his frustrations. Herb always attempt a little humor and satire. He started by pointing out, “ In a state where dysfunctional actions are considered the norm, it makes sense that the first firing after a 5-6 football season would be a well-respected basketball radio analyst”. There are a lot of people who don’t understand his letters or humor, but there are a lot of silly things happening that Herb doesn’t understand either in sports, government, and the media.

Sandy continues her full-time, one day a week, job at Big Cedar. Same people who own it also own Bass Pro. She helps with their gift shop purchasing and displays. Sandy also helps decorate homes including Christmas. Reason that she has no time to contribute to this letter. Herb always enjoys watching her spend other people’s money. We celebrated our 40 years of marriage in September.

Christy continues to be the most normal person in our family, holding down multiple jobs with kids in daycares and babysitting. She was too busy to write the Christmas letter this year.

At this point, you may have sensed that our family is too busy to write our Christmas letter or we just don’t have a lot of interesting things happening. So if you are too busy to read this, we won’t be hurt too much, if you just stop reading this and do more important things. This is a test to see if you read this far, as well as our friendship. That’s what friends and Christmas letters are all about, that is, testing patience and building long-term relationships.

Our picture with our grandchildren is the only good one out of about 50 shots. We did have a fun family outing in Florida this year with our children and grandchildren. Herb tried to teach Cooper the old Eddy Fisher song – “O My Pa-Pa” on our trip to Florida.

Cooper has started first grade and recently told his parents he had learned some really bad words, they finally got him to say what they started with – Cooper said they start with “S” and “D” so they thought the worst. Then he told them you never call anybody stupid or dumb.

Sophie is now a year and half and quickly becoming a favorite of her Papa.

Got to close, Herb has to dress up like Santa today for Good Works event for singles, widows, and widowers from our church who are coming to our house.

Happy Holidays and best in 2005