Christmas 2022

 

Sat.-Sat., December 24-31, 2022

Christmas was a little different this year than what was expected.

Linda, myself and Marilyn

with our Mother Chuny

a few years ago at Christmas

Our normal routine is to gather all of my side of the family at our house on Christmas day to open presents and share one of Laurie's wonderful home cooked meals.

With our Mother still in a skilled nursing facility in Pasadena and my sister Marilyn, still recovering from the open heart surgery that she underwent threw about three months ago, things just had to be different this year.

This week would be another one filled with daily drives to Pasadena to visit my Mother.

I took a few minutes to drop by

Pasadena's venerable Vroman's Bookstore

As a youngster my Father, an avid reader, would take me to this wondrous bookstore on Thursday nights to find another book for each of us to read in the coming week.

Great memories at this spot . . .

Laurie found this HUGE mushroom

growing in our front yard this week

And these as well

Michael and Jacob built this

gingerbread football stadium

during their shared vacation time

Typical Christmas day weather

in Southern California

This Christmas it would just be Laurie and me, joined by Michael, Vanessa, Jacob and Mary to celebrate the day at our home.

Laurie likes to be creative

Just another delicious example

Princess Mary being dramatic

Jacob and Mary alternated

handing out the presents

A Los Angeles Rams pillow

was the perfect gift for Jacob

It's ALWAYS Happy Hour

for my bride

NFL TeenyMates was another

on the spot gift this Christmas

How did Santa know?

After opening a beauty salon gift,

I was Mary's first customer

She decided that I needed a new shade of lipstick.

How could I say no to her?

Michael and Laurie watching

my makeover in progress

I just had to have some purple eye

shadow as the UW Husky Alamo Bowl

game was fast approaching

Happily looking like a new man, it was now . . .

. . . Laurie's turn in the salon chair

Admiring an autographed baseball

that Micheal found hidden on a shelf

Our smaller than normal gathering was still a good one punctuated by . . .

. . . a much needed Rams win

of a rare Christmas Day game

On other fronts . . .

Laurie now has a favorite dwarf

that Snow White rarely talks about

So true . . .

If you are either a scientist or a

Big Bang Theory TV show fan,

you got this one

My take on any New Year's Diet plans

The Italian DI season will soon

get underway for our beloved

Varese Skorpions

On Thursday night the #12 ranked,

10-2 Washington Huskies were in San

Antonio, Texas to play the #20 ranked,

8-4 Texas Longhorns in the Alamo Bowl

Before driving home from Pasadena, I called Laurie to see if she needed anything for the game as Michael, Vanessa and Jacob would be joining us to watch the bowl game. Mary was with her other grandparents on this night.

Laurie said to bring home some munchies.

So I stopped at Porto's Bakery

in Northridge to get some of their

famous meat pastries and empanadas

Saying no to these churro croissants may earned me a chapter in a new Profiles in Courage book due out next Summer.

The Alamo Bowl was topsy-turvy

In the Second Half, the Huskies

rose to the proverbial occasion

A solid win to finish the season

with an 11-2 record and a possible

Top Ten finish in the final polls

The University of Washington started playing football in 1889. This is only the fifth time in program history that a Husky team has won 11 or more games in a season.

Here is the list of those five great Husky seasons:

1925, 11-0-1 led by Head Coach Enoch Bagshaw

1991, 12-0-0 led by Head Coach Don James

2000, 11-1-0 led by Head Coach Rick Neuheisel

2016, 12-2-0 led by Head Coach Chris Petersen

2022, 11-2-0 led by Head Coach Kalen DeBoer

What a great accomplishment for first year UW Head Coach Kalen DeBoer, his staff and the players!

Still, to put this all in perspective, #5 Alabama improved to 11-2 on the 2022 season with their 45-20 Sugar Bowl victory over #11 Kansas State.

This was the Crimson Tide's 25th 11+ win season since first accomplishing that feat under legendary Head Coach Paul "Bear" Bryant in 1961.

With this year's Sugar Bowl win, Alabama has now won 11 or more games in 13 of the last 14 seasons. The only non 11+ win season in that stretch was the "totally forgettable" 2010 campaign when the Crimson Tide went an unacceptable 10-3.

Hopefully this will be a huge

springboard to the 2023 season

Even though next Monday's 109th edition

of the Rose Bowl game is not part of

the College Football Playoff (CFP), I still

think that the traditions of this bowl game 

make it the best game of EVERY year

PAC-12 vs. Big Ten, the San Gabriel Mountains as a backdrop, usually picture perfect weather, it just doesn't get any better than that.

Of course with the CFP expanding from four to twelve teams in 2024 as well as USC and UCLA jumping from the PAC-12 to the Big Ten the same year, the Rose Bowl may never be the same again.

Sad.

As for those two CFP games played on the last day of 2022 . . .

The Fiesta Bowl was a WILD ONE!

#3 TCU Horned Frogs (13-1) 51

#2 Michigan Wolverines (13-1) 45

And so was the Peach Bowl . . .

#1 Georgia Bulldogs (14-0) 42

#4 Ohio State Buckeyes (11-2) 41

The CFP National Championship Game will be played at SoFi Stadium in Inglewood, California on Monday January 9, 2023, between #3 TCU (13-1) and #1 Georgia (14-0).

It should be a great one too, I suspect.

Reading Is FUNdamental!

Fred Vargas strikes again!

Her Paris police detective character, Commissaire Jean-Baptiste Adamsberg, is interesting to say the least. Her plots make you do some serious thinking about crime of course but also about your own personal life and relationships.

I can't wait to read the next book in this series.