It was so nice being at home. We got in a good snowshoe after a fall start. We both had sock fails that required us to go home and change. Even so I ended up with blisters from my new boots.… It was beautiful snowshoeing we went way up around Honey Hollow into some territory we’ve never seen. The snow is still quite thick despite the warm weather.

Later that evening our friends Paul, Ellen and their dog Giorgia came over. Paul brought his brand new tenor guitar and serenaded us all evening. He’s such a great musician and great storyteller. I’ve known him longer than anyone else i’ve known in Vermont

Just being around them brings back such great memories

nite all, nite sam

me

Friday it was a super busy day.… We (beta) Pig pig board meeting next week. My team it’s doing the “studyhall” projects are trying to show off one of our creations at the meeting. We had very full workday on Friday.… But not before the team gave me a little birthday celebration. It was so sweet. I love the people I work with there !!!

It was a strange evening… It was in the 50s… with very cool cloud patterns

Our good friends Tim and Priscilla came over for a quiet dinner. It was so nice to actually see them in person !

It’s so good to actually be able to get together face-to-face a little bit more freely

nite all, nite sam

-me

Thursday was just a travel day. We packed up all the scanner Steph, say goodbye to my mom and head into the airport…

It had been a very good visit.

Travel home was uneventful… I have been largely off-line since Sunday so it took me the entire trip back to try to catch up with my email… Can’t say I got all the way through it.

The one nice thing is that we had a long delay in Chicago so we took a really long fast walk around all the terminals just to get some exercise. Fun to break a sweat in an airport

nite all, nite sam

-me

Today was my 63rd birthday… It was really nice having the family around. Dan and I started with a nice run in the morning… It was surprisingly warm… In the 40s I think. And we spent the better part of the day going through some really interesting photo albums. These were the ones that had names and dates of people who came before us. Dan was super helpful in being able to take the things out of the album so that we can get them scanned and put back in the album so I didn’t make a lot of work later. Really nice. Later on that night we went to see our nephew Theo’s hockey game

and then went back to the house for a really nice sushi dinner. They had a nice Birthday party for me with decorations, a sash and a cake!… It was really fun !

It was great hanging out with ‘Mary, john, ellery, Jake and Theo… Theire dog skye also made me feel very at home

Also get some good news on my birthday… I’ve been elected to the national Academy of engineering. I was happy )and surprised) to get in… It’s always been a dream of mine. I’m really looking forward to working with the rest of the Academy

What a really great birthday!

nite all, nite sam

-me