Christmas 2022

We really are lucky. It’s warm inside, we have power and food and each other’s company. This Christmas there are many who are not so lucky. Between the “bomb cyclone” that has frozen the country and the man made troubles of the Ukrane, there is a wide range of pain, fear, anger and hate that seems to abound lately. We are so fortunate to have so much to be thankful for and so little to do with most problems. Every once and awhile we might gripe a little, but it’s not over the big things.

Once again we are all together here in New Jersey. The gals are being “crafty” and we boys are playing with our computers.

For the last month or so I’ve been scanning the photos taken by the parents of a friend. Today I am almost done scanning over 5,000 of their images. They took amazing pictures from everywhere in the world over the last 60 years. It’s incredible to look at all the places they have been.

Christmas tree in Germany, December 1989 - The fall of the Berlin Wall

Of late I think of all the changes that have happened since the times before the Internet and Smart Phones. Back then there was so much that divided the world. Everything seemed so much harder. Making a simple phone call was sometimes a chore. Today we can be instantly connected to almost anyone anywhere in the world for free. Yet we still have some of the same big problems that we had when the world was divided back then. Walls have come down, but still people can’t enjoy what they have without making others miserable with their quest for more. I hope we figure out how to better get along.

The kids are still doing the same things as last year for the most part. Anna is working on a new exhibit at the Natural History Museum in London. Seems that they got a Titanosaur and she is helping to figure out how to get it into the building. Eva is working with an event management company, jetting around the world for meetings to engineer presentations. Maria is in Rochester with husband Greg. She’s doing freeelance graphic work and the two of them do most of the management work at a record store. Monika continues to interpret in Polish for the NJ Court system, and I am a computer geek as ususal, involved in all kinds of projects.

I “project managed” the emptying of this giant office building where I was working. The pandemic made this space unneeded. It originally held several hundred cubicles and offices. We removed all the technology infrastructure and then the furnature. The place was so big that I could fly my drone inside the building to show our progress. Most of the building’s contents went into dumpsters. The world is changing and the open offices of the past are dwindling.

Monika and a friend at Goblin State Park in Utah (Click for the whole album)

Monika and I had two adventures this year. In late April we flew to Utah and rented an RV. We went to Walmart and fully furnished it and then drove around for a few weeks. I took pictures of every different wild flower we saw. It was a wonderful trip. We had great weather and saw many beautiful sights.

Bill and Dali at his house in Portlligat, Spain (Click for the whole album)

In late September we flew to Barcelona, Spain and then did a quick trip to Kraków, Poland to see Monika’s mom. We drove all over Spain, including a trip to Salvador Dali’s house. It was a great roadtrip!

Christmas 2023

Christmas 2021