Another quiet day. Dick and I did have to go out to buy the "winning" lottery tickets for the coming week and I went to choir and visited with Mother for a bit this evening but aside from that it was quiet.

I cleaned the bathrooms and mixed up the crust for the banana cream pie that I will make for our New Year's Day Dinner. I told Mom that we will pick her up at about three as I am fixing dinner for 5:00. There is just one Mass on Sunday morning again. It will be at 9:30AM.

I wonder if Fr. Gene will be there. His father died today and the funeral is on Saturday. The choir is going to take a collection and use the funds to have Masses said. I know that his Father has been very ill and that the lastest news had been that they were going to have to amputate his second leg this week but he died before this occurred.

Only two days until 2006. On my Dec. 31 posting, I will publish on of the pictures that I took at the Waterford Factory in Waterford Ireland of the duplicate of the Millenium Ball that drops each year in Times Square. When Bart, Barb and I toured the factory we learned that every special order has a duplicate that is kept at the factory as insurance in case anything happens to the original. You will like the picture.

I was doing a bit of writing today and remembering Tara, the black lab that we had while living in Huntington Beach. She was a really beautiful animal. One day Bart called me at work because Tara was sick. She had gotten on the couch and wouldn't get off. I hurried home and she was obviously in great pain and great distress. I took her to the vet. He said that it looked like she had eaten something that was bad for her. It must have been thrown over the fence, because we were careful what our animals ate. Anyway, she died the next morning, shocking us and the vet who felt SO bad.

Bart wanted another dog right away and held a garage sale to earn the money. We went to the Humane Society and after one small disaster that I will tell you about some other time, we found Zero. Zero is legend. He was the sweetest little dog that one could ever have. I knew he was the one when one day as I was attempting to take a nap, (this was a time of great stress and I was exhausted) he climbed up into my arms and never moved until I woke up. I remember too that on weekends when we were home all day, he would turn kind of grumbly by the end of the day. He was used to napping while we were at school and work and found that keeping up with three people ALL day just plumb wore him out. Yes, he was special.

Have a nice Friday. Chelsea gets a bath in the morning. She is going to be 12 years old soon.

Love

Mary