UPDATE: To any member of the Lubbock Marine Parents – the requirements to get me to take a side trip to visit with ya’ll are hereby waived. I am more than willing to take the side trip needed to meet with you and shake hands, hug necks, and hold each of you and your offspring in prayer. That would be on Friday, January 18. Please let me know if any of you are willing to meet with a road weary old Marine…

Travel: I leave the fair environs of my humble abode on January 14th, 2008 (gotten used to writing that yet? me either – it took me three tries…) at about 0700 MST for a short flight to Denver International, where I have a four hour layover. Cheap tickets are one thing, only one flight that will get me to a connecting flight four hours later is something else. Luckily, I have cousins in the area, and they plan on visiting with me while I am there. If you are in the Denver area on January 14th, 2008 (two tries!), between the hours of 0843 and 1240 MST, drop me a line and I will forward contact information.

Once I leave Denver it is but a short hop to Tampa International, arriving at 1800 EST. Once I get my rental car, I’m off to my Uncle’s house, where I will visit and gather my Grandfather’s genealogy files for my other blog. I will be in the Tampa/Clearwater area until the morning of January 16th, 2008 (first time!), when I depart on my road trip home. Yes, I am driving home with the files, because they are original documents, including letters from ancestors, and there is no way I am allowing Brown, or White, or Yellow, or any of those guys the chance to misplace one or two of the boxes. While I don’t have a lot of stops planned, I will be traveling north on I-75 to I-10, then west to Lafayette, LA (bypassing NOLA, unless someone has come to their senses and decided to rebuild it where it won’t flood the next time the tide comes in a little higher than normal) where I will be jogging north on I-49 and picking up I-20 in Shreveport. Continuing west, I plan on spending the afternoon/overnight on Thursday, January 17th, 2008, in the Dallas/Ft. Worth area (TMBWitW’s adopted mama’s mother lives there, and GG is really taken with MEG. I will be delivering Christmas and Birthday photos). The morning of the 18th, I continue my travels and spend the next three and a half days crossing the expanses of Texas – OK, not really. I pick back up on the I-10 and carry on into Arizona and home. Maybe Friday night, maybe Saturday morning. Depends on how hard I push it.

I tell you all that to say this – if you would like to be a part of my “People and Places” entry/entries, with photos (if you are camera shy or blog anonymously, you will be photographed from the back), please drop me a line. I would like to meet any and/or all of you along my travel path, even if it is only for a minute or two to get the photographic proof of my being there. If you are not on the direct path, I may be persuaded to deviate slightly if there are home made baked goods involved, or a genealogical link.

Work: I spent all day yesterday surgically cutting several sheets of 3/4″ cabinet grade birch ply into parts for an entertainment center for my latest client. After only three trips to Lowes for this and that (I’ve got to start making a list!) I finally got to the point where it was too dark to make any more cuts, and I only needed one more trip to Lowes. Of course, they were closed by that time, being New Year’s Day and all. As soon as MEG wakes up and has some breakfast this morning, guess where we’re going?

Homelife: TMBWitW is up to her pretty nose in month end/quarter end/year end at her place of employment. She is also about three classes away from her Bachelor’s in Accounting. Yay! She will be finished in April, and walk in May. Talk about a party – she will finally be finished with all the crazy schedule stuff. By that time, also, the plan is for me to be working enough to support us so she can back off and maybe do CPA stuff from home while she spends much, much more time with MEG. That will be a good thing.

Gotta go – someone is waking up.

Thank you for stopping by, God bless you all, Wear Red on Fridays, and support Warriors for Innocence!