Mom: 3
Dad: 7
Brian: 10
Dan: 12

Now actually, I'm not sure that I got the order right for Dad and Brian. I might have it backwards. But I know Dan won with 12. So Rob just did 13 to beat Dan. That's all. Everyone I know is insane!  11:43:06 PM    

I'll have to rest all my hopes on Billy the dog to protect us in our slum I guess.  11:28:14 PM    

The first batch of cookies I made was kind of gross. We don't know why. It's the recipe Amy gave me and they're normally really good and I've made them before, but this batch tasted too salty so maybe I screwed something up. Anyway, I saved the day by making another kind of cookie - I don't know what to really call them but it's just a recipe I got from my grandmother so I just call them Italian frosted cookies. Anyway, those came out great and I haven't had them in years so that was exciting. Rob likes them a lot too.

Well, it turned into a white Christmas here. It didn't start snowing in Boston till sometime around mid afternoon, but since then it's been going strong. Really big heavy flakes are coming down so it's accumulating fast and it's really wet and heavy snow. It was even a thunderstorm for part of the time. And while I was making dinner the lights were flickering so we were a little worried that we'd lose power but we haven't had a problem since then. Fortunately though, that little scare caused me to take the time to find some matches and candles. It was dark out when the lights were flickering so we would have been in trouble if they went out.

Poor Billy the dog was having tummy trouble last night and so far all day today so we didn't get a good night's sleep... as a result we slept in really late - till like 11am. For a while today we lost our satellite signal too, I assume because of the storm. It's crazy.

It's funny how silent Charlestown is. Must be that all the yuppies go home for Christmas. All the people in the other 2 apartments in our building are gone, I think. We haven't heard a peep all day.

I'm kind of bummed to be going back to work tomorrow, but I guess it's not that bad because it will still be really quiet - not exactly stressful. I will be able to catch up on more stuff and get my desk cleared off, etc.

Amy called me a while ago - she and Annette are stranded in Pittsburgh because their plane couldn't land in Boston. Hopefully she will be able to get in touch with Stacie and see if they can see her at all while they're there. They are staying at a hotel at a reduced rate thanks to the airline, but not free. Oh, well. I guess weather isn't the airline's fault, but it stinks that they have to spend money on it.

I talked to my crazy family on the phone just now. All four of them - each on his/her own phone. They crack me up. Sounds like mostly their day consisted of eating a lot, except Mom, whose day also consisted of lots of cooking and baking. So tomorrow she's going to rest and be lazy, which is as it should be.  11:18:56 PM    

So... we are stuck in Boston. We were supposed to be driving to Tennessee to see the Martinelli clan for Christmas but our car is the grinch that stole Christmas as it broke. Well, not literally like a piece fell off. Anyway, so we are sad but trying not to be too sad. We were looking forward to the road trip, kind of looking forward to seeing if Billy (our dog) would get along with Casey (my family's dog), and eating lots of cookies and playing video games with my brothers and maybe going to see Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers with everybody, even though Rob and I cheated and saw it opening night already, etc.

Now we have to run around trying to make Christmas here. We don't have a tree or anything. I guess we are going to try to get more lights and/or decorations. We have one string of white lights up in the livingroom around the edge of the ceiling but that's it. We also are going to get something small each on our own so we each have something to unwrap on Christmas Day.

Actually, not to make anyone feel bad, but I didn't really realize how much I was looking forward to the trip till we weren't going. I was kind of in hysterics Monday morning though I toned it down when I called home. But everyone knows I'm a spaz anyway, so that's no surprise I guess. So we are going to plan to go down the next long weekend I think, unless there is some reason that a weekend sooner makes more sense. The next Monday I have off is President's Day, which is February 17th. So this time we'll FLY and we'll stay for the 3 days. In some ways it might be better because we'll be there longer, and since it's not the holidays nothing will be closed, etc. Maybe we can do lots of fun stuff out on the town. Plus, they live near the Smoky Mountains so we can go on hikes, take pictures, etc. It should be fun. Looking at normal ticket prices they don't seem too bad. So, especially if we can find a sale or something, it shouldn't be a very expensive trip.

We also worked on figuring out our money situation last night and thank God we were smart and started saving money from Rob's second job toward the end of last year, because it looks like we can scrape by through the end of 2003 if necessary (if we drastically scale back our lifestyle) just on our savings, my income, and the income from Rob's second job (and we've figured in taxes, so hopefully we did that accurately). Plus, I'm supposed to get a really good raise, or so they say, so it might be even a little better than that. So this takes a big load off our minds. Now we just have to work on the scaling back our lifestyle... we decided to wait on that until after the holidays. Tonight we need to make sure we get to the grocery store before it closes at 6pm. Luckily my office closes at 3, so that shouldn't be a problem. Then we are going to go to someplace like Best Buy and/or Target and try to get one or two small things for each other or together for Christmas. We'll see what we find. Well, it's 2:47 now and time for me to send out 1 package and then leave the office.  12:24:47 AM