Brrrrr!  It’s actually cold as we write this on the morning of “Turkey Day” here in Houston.  For weeks we’ve been… well, yes, the proper word would be complaining… about the weather.  “24ºC in November”, we moan, “that’s just not right!”  Thankfully last night a front came roaring through, much to the delight of the kitties as they ran from window to window to catch all the smells on the wind.  So we have weather, and friends gathering for dinner and more to be thankful for on this day of cool air and sunshine here in Houston.  Hard to believe this will be our tenth Thanksgiving here.  Sure we say that every year, but considering that our original plan was to come here for three years, it seems significant that we’re about to hit our 7th anniversary that third year.

It’s been a year of travel for us both – Lynda mostly to Vancouver, and Joe mostly for work.  Lynda actually greeted 2007 in the customs line at Vancouver airport.  She’d headed up there to visit with her mom while Dean, Lisa and family were out of town for vacation, so she could house/dog sit and keep her mom company.  It was a good (though cold!) visit and she enjoyed spending time there and seeing all her family again.  She also got in a visit to Parksville with Rose who was home from London for a visit – in spite of the snow disrupting transit.  It was great to kick back and chat by a roaring fire as it snowed outside, and just talk together in person.  Soon Lynda returned to “normal” life in Houston – laundry, cleaning and her job at Barnes & Noble.  She was pleased to be kept on after the holidays and planned to work 2 days a week while still volunteering at NAM.

Our only “renovation” to the house this year was installing some shelving units in the garage to finally have more storage there.  Since there are no basements here, the garage becomes the default storage place.  Lynda was pleased to finally be able to park both cars inside, even though we rarely do.  We were getting our house in order for our first family visitor to Houston.  Rosemary came down in early March and stayed with us for a week, and though the trip was cut a little short, we were able to experience the Rodeo and a museum, and made a trip to a local winery (yes, we do have wineries in Texas), and she was able to see where we work and meet our Houston friends.  It was lovely to have her here and we’re hoping she’ll make it a yearly event.  Lynda actually flew back with Rosemary as her mother had requested her to come up to help her out for a few weeks.

Meanwhile, Joe was traveling to exotic locales.  There was Dubai with literally thousands of skyscrapers under construction; London, so busy and cosmopolitan; and the Louisiana coast, with a sign nailed to a tree in the swamp advertising “Want to buy alligators.  Best price!”  While Lynda was out of town, Joe started feeding a skinny stray cat, much to the chagrin of Smoke who wanted to murder the interloper.  The cat was a very friendly gray neutered male (so he once had a home) with only a stub of a tail.  Joe exercised every ounce of his creativity and dubbed him “No-Tail.” He never came indoors, but was extremely friendly to anyone who ventured into the back yard.  We eventually carted him off to the SPCA and he was adopted shortly thereafter (and hopefully given a better name!).

In April we had another family visit, from River and Roni and their two daughters, Ronan and Harper.  It was lovely to have little kids in the house and, after so many visits to River’s place, to host them in our home.  Our visit with River and Roni was mellow and relaxing – just hanging out with Lynda’s sisters.  It was great, although we found it ironic that while we have two cats in our house, the only photos of our guests are with No-Tail.  Two weeks later Lynda was on a plane to Vancouver to see her mom again.  Helping her mom settle into her new accommodations made everyone feel better, and Mom’s room was set up and comfy in time for Mother’s Day.  Joe came up a couple of weeks later in time for our 11th anniversary and we celebrated with a lovely day in the Vancouver sunshine, and dinner out at one of our favorite Japanese restaurants.  A couple of days later we also attended the opening night of the Police reunion tour, before joining Rose and her sweetie Haythem at a beautiful resort outside of Parksville for a couple of days.  Lynda drove down the Vancouver Island Highway while Joe tested the Bell Mobility cellular coverage with a 3½ hour conference call, much to Lynda’s chagrin.  (Results: the cell coverage is good, and Lynda’s evil eye does not appear to affect the signal.  Joe paid for it with lunch on the balcony of the Aerie Restaurant, at the top of the Malahat.)  We had a wonderful, though short, visit with Leah and Ross in Victoria.  Of course we had to eat at the restaurant where we ate after getting engaged, and Joe observed (after getting the bill) that we live very well when we are on vacation – much better than we do in Houston!  We made it back to our Texas homestead for a week before heading up to St.  John’s for Joe’s mom’s 65th birthday. 

Aaaaah, travel in the States at the height of summer: not fun.  Newark airport: less fun.  With summer thunderstorms: the worst.  President’s Club membership: priceless.  When we arrived in Newark with storms going on, we knew our flight to St.  John’s would be delayed.  Lynda never thought we’d be stuck overnight, but Joe was more pessimistic.  Sure enough, they delayed our flight repeatedly until it was too late to fly and then cancelled it.  Joe went to the President’s Club desk to beg them not to send us back to Houston as flights for the next three days were overbooked.  (He convinced the agent that no, we couldn’t fly to Halifax and take a quick drive the rest of the way.) Meanwhile Lynda started calling hotels; once it became apparent that there was no room at any of the local inns, she called her friend Sarah.  Luckily Sarah is one of those friends whom when called, not only offers her home but sends her husband to pick you up!  Our savior!  We were able to shower and sleep in a bed before heading to the airport for the flight to Montreal that Joe managed to get for us, and then to St.  John’s.  Our luggage, including our gifts for Lyn, had other plans and went touristing without us.  So we spent the first day looking for clothing warm enough for the 6ºC weather (yep, that’s St. John’s in June) and checking on our baggage status.  Of course, once we bought some cool weather clothing (hard to find in June, even in St. John’s!) the weather turned lovely and warm.  Luckily we got our luggage on Friday – though we had to wait all day for it to arrive.  But Joe was not displeased with watching TV and surfing the internet the whole time.  Sunday marked Father’s Day and Lyn’s birthday celebration so we joined lots of family at Lyn & Joe’s place for a wonderful dinner and visit and birthday get-together.  It was so good to see everyone again and get to visit for longer than on our trip last year.

Back in Houston, things settled down into a more ordinary routine.  Lynda worked a couple of days a week and Joe kept busy with his manager stuff, trying to keep control of a growing staff – he took over a department of less than 50 people in late 2005, and it is now close to 80. 

Palm trees sprouted in our back yard, thanks to birdies depositing (pooping!) the seeds and to an extraordinarily rainy June and July, and we waited impatiently for Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows to come out.  Lynda worked the release party (what a treat to get paid for that!) and the release weekend and then sat down and read the book in 12 hours.  Joe eventually got to read it, after Lynda finished it.  The second time.  At the end of the summer she increased her hours and finally decided to stop volunteering at NAM.  Many of her friends there had retired or moved on to other jobs, and after 9+ years she was ready to go too.  Nonetheless we found we had less time on our hands as we’d finally been cajoled into joining Facebook by Joe’s sister and found lots of time-consuming fun on there.  It turned out to be a great way to re-connect with old friends and with family too. (And if you’re on it, Friend us!)

As the summer ended the geckoes decided it would be good to try to get in to the house when Lynda went outside for her morning paper and though Smoke was successful in his hunt one weekend while Lynda was away, they had no luck on the following three occasions as Lynda discovered their evil plan before they managed to kill one.  Imagine if you will: early morning before work.  Lynda brings in her paper and discovers cats hovering over a spot on the floor.  As she approaches, Smoke takes off running with a gecko in his mouth.  She gives chase (in robe and slippers), scolding “Drop it! Smoke! Drop it!!”  Then when he does drop the poor gecko, it wants nothing to do with being rescued, so Lynda has to crawl on the floor to wrangle it into her palm and out the door.  All before a single cup of coffee…

In October, Lynda went on her third scrapbooking weekend with her buddies (still working on the trip from 2006!!) at a place in Cleveland, TX.  When we arrived, there was an adorable little kitten sitting on the porch who was scrawny, had some scrapes, and was extremely friendly.  She followed everyone around and purred loudly and cuddled whenever she was picked up.  She was quickly dubbed “Scrappy” by one of the scrapbookers.  The owner of the place had no plans to keep her, and the speed limit on the street outside the property was 60 mph, so Lynda volunteered us (without discussion with Joe) to take her home if nobody else would.  Two days later Lynda returned home with a kitten.  Well, as you can imagine this did not go over well with the furry residents of our house – there had been no discussion with them either.  There was much hissing and growling at the door to the guest bathroom where she was staying while they got used to her smell.  We weren’t sure if the experiment would take at first – it wasn’t until the second week that they stopped hissing at her.  Now they’re cuddling up and getting along (mostly) nicely.  Lynda observed that she’s taking everything that belonged to Smoke and Spot before she came along. Joe says that’s just like a girl.  But then they claimed that everything was theirs, and Lynda says that’s just like boys!  She’s still a little too much to deal with in the mornings but the sight of a 3 lb kitten chasing a 12 lb tomcat around the house at full speed is priceless.  She is a grey tabby, so her markings include the trademark “M” on the forehead.  It stands for “Maniac”, or perhaps “Mayhem.”  Joe is quickly turning her into our second dog (Smoke being the first) by teaching her how to fetch, which she loves.  She also wags her tail in doggy fashion… 

Now as we’re looking at the close of another year, Lynda is heading to Vancouver again in three days to see her mom, who is not doing too well.  Joe needs to start bringing in oranges from the tree in the back yard.  We are looking forward to the coming year, celebrating Joe’s admittance to the Executive MBA program at Tulane University and the tenth anniversary of our move to Houston.  We never would have thought we’d still be here but it’s becoming home.  Of course, sometimes it’s still hard to believe, especially when we are still wearing shorts through most of November.  We hope for more guests in 2008 and we wish all y’all a wonderful holiday season with your loved ones.