Hi there!

I am sitting in my new office at work, now that I am finally situated. I don't think I mentioned it, but we've basically been playing cubicle shuffle around here. I got moved two offices down. Supposedly I needed more room, although I've always claimed they could cut my office in half and I'd be fine. Anyway, it's a change, which is something I always have a hard time with, but I'm pretty much fine with it.

I think I also forgot to mention that last Thursday we had our home inspection for the condo. Everything looks pretty good. The dishwasher will need to be replaced, which is a small expense, and in a year or two, we'll probably need to buy a new water heater. If that's the worst of our problems, I think we're doing just fine. The delay of this short sell seems to have been working completely to our benefit. As it turns out, the condo was appraised for $40k more than we are paying for it. Cha-ching. That means that if real estate prices fall, they probably won't fall any lower than our buying price. That's good news, although it was never much of a concern to us since our main goal in this venture is stability, rather than profit. Also, since the delay lasted for two months, the interest rates have fallen over a full percent, which will be saving us lots of money per month. We even qualify for our loan with such good credit that we don't have quite so much paperwork to deal with. Everywhere I look, it's blessing after blessing. Our escrow is set to close January 31st. The owners will have three days to move out, and then we can start moving in. We'll probably work on paint and some boxes the first few days, and then make the major move date February 9th.

Friday I had a short day (and it was the moving day at work), so Jenny and I went shopping for several hours, in search of that always difficult-to-find gift for the grandmother's birthday. After dinner with the folks and some Wii play, we went to my house and watched The Misadventures of Merlin Jones, one of my childhood favorites that I got for Christmas.

Saturday was the father-in-law's birthday. I worked out with Ruth in the morning, then went home to rest before the big day. We went with Ric's parents to see the Kings play vs. the Dallas Stars. It was an awesome game, which ended with us winning in a shootout after overtime. La Barbera made one of the best saves I've ever seen him make. We were glad for a great game, and went home to have a Mexican meal and homemade cookies for dessert. Ginny and I watched The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, and then I joined Todd and Ginny in watching an episode of Lost. We have gotten them addicted. They're watching all three seasons this month in time to watch season four when it begins. :)

We skipped church on Sunday. Terrible us. The music pastor was speaking, and he isn't our favorite, so we opted to meet up with Liz and spend some time with her. The rest of the day was pretty lazy. I watched some Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers movies, napped a few hours, went on a short walk with Ric, and watched the new Terminator series, which sucks big time so far.

Up this week: more escrow details. That's about it for now!

Gamers everywhere are crying about the news that Microsoft and Nintendo can't work out a deal for GoldenEye to be released on XBLA. Thankfully some people are doing something about it. In addition to a petition you will find email addresses for folks at Microsoft and Nintendo that you can (tactfully, please) send your opinion to. This whole thing seems so simple to me. Release it for both the Virtual Console and XBLA and make an insane amount of money. What's the problem, guys?

It's that time again. The Office was the clear winner in the "What show will you miss the most?" poll and we're definitely feeling that now. So it's now time to choose your best movie of last year. I started it off with ten picks but feel free to add yours if it isn't on there. I'm trying to decide between No Country For Old Men, There Will Be Blood, and Juno. I haven't seen Atonement yet. I've heard it's good but no one I've talked to has liked it more than those three movies. It seems to be the critical darling though and won the Golden Globe for Best Drama last night. After this poll has run its course we'll do our annual most anticipated movie poll. That should be a good one.