The wind chill for the past few days has been hovering around negative fifteen degrees. Tomorrow is supposed to be warmer.

Nicholas was supposed to fly in to Pennsylvania on Sunday, but the weather in Seattle was frightful. So, he ended up getting in last night. Kind of stinks, but it could have been worse.

Molly’s mom and grandmother (on her her dad’s side) are coming up to visit with us tonight. Her grandmother lives in Texas, so this will only be the third time I have seen her. It should be a pleasant visit.

Tomorrow, Molly and I are heading out to PA. Earlier, the weathermen were predicting freezing rain. Fortunately, they’ve changed their prediction to plain old rain and a high of forty-four. The driving won’t be too fun, but hopefully it will be less dangerous.

I’m really excited. I can’t believe Christmas is only two days away.

Obama chose Arne Duncan to be his Education Secretary. Duncan is currently the CEO of Chicago Public Schools. One attribute being mentioned about the wisdom of this choice is that Duncan has run the nation’s third largest public education system since 2001. What I haven’t heard mentioned is that CPS is also one of the worst public school systems in the nation. It’s possible I don’t have the complete picture, but the initial reaction is that this was not the best choice.

The Federal Reserve lowered their interest rates to 0%-.25%. Haven’t they been paying attention to what happens every time they lower interest rates? Stocks soar for a day or two and then they go back to being terrible. Their tactic of lowering interest rates has been eliminated. If they go any further, they will be paying banks to take their money. I’m very interested to see what happens next.

We visited Molly’s parents for Thanksgiving. It was a nice relaxing time. Except for when we played Pictionary Man; things got a little crazy then. Allen’s representation of Lady Godiva and Molly’s attempt at Sigmund Freud were pretty interesting. Oh yeah, and if you are ever playing Pictionary with Molly and she starts drawing Godzilla…it’s supposed to be the United States.

We had Chipotle for the first time while we were out there. It was pretty good and very filling. A good tip to remember when eating there is that you can save 330 calories by getting your meal without the tortilla. It’s still very tasty in a bowl.

This past Sunday, we went to Qdoba with some of the Zieglers after church. It’s practically the same restaurant as Chipotle. Even though the food was just as filling, I found it to be less tasty.

Lately, I’ve been playing Tetris on Facebook a lot. I first played to beat all of my friends, but they eventually beat me. So, now I just play to reclaim my title each time someone passes my score. Molly kept wanting to play on my account, but I made her get it on her own profile. She didn’t want to because she wanted to keep herself from getting addicted. I think she played for about an hour last night.

As of yesterday, most of my holiday shopping is done. All that remains are gifts for my aunts and stuff for Molly’s stocking. I’ve been counting down the days until Christmas. Every morning I ask Molly what day it is and then I exclaim “Do you know what that means? It’s only X days till Christmas!” Some days she smiles, some days she rolls her eyes, and some days she does both. Oh well, I enjoy it.

Molly is volunteering for the U.S. Figure Skating Championship that is taking place here in Cleveland in January. Her first meeting was Monday night and I went to the library. It felt good to spend my time that way instead of wasting it on the computer or watching tv. I want to try to spend some time studying at library more often.

That’s all I have for now. Back to work.

I had a dream that I was in jail. The warden had a claw like Wolverine from X-Men and stabbed me in the leg because I was on the cell phone with my lawyer after lights out.

We had a church service that all the inmates attended. They served communion with one cup. It didn’t contain wine or grape juice, just water. I got some murderous looks from the inmates who would be last to get a sip because I drank more than my share.

It all worked out, though. I found an alien fetus in a can of green beans, so they let me go.