A Post! A Post? Yes! A Post!

Bleh. I feel so behind in posting. Much has happened in the past month and I have little time to post about it. Let's see if I can remember the highlights.

Stacy's belly has stretched to amazing proportions with our unborn son. We have settled on the name, Tristram Scott Hawks. The name was inspired by a favorite author of mine, Neil Gaiman, whom I have mentioned a few times before. My initial attempts at getting a Scott Jr. were shot down. On other fronts, Stacy is constantly busy with church, PTO, and HOA responsibilities. Inbetween all of this, she still manages to be a wonderful mother, wife, and friend.

Vicki is in girl scouts and 2nd grade. She's constantly amazing us with how mature and caring she is. I don't remember being anywhere near as conscientious at 7 years old. Zoe seems to be come out of her shell a bit more lately. She interacts with her fellow students and teachers in preschool, and did so faster this year than with her other class last year. It's my hope that she won't grow up being as painfully shy as I was. Scarlett is still a big personality in a tiny package. She just turned 3 and is queen of all she surveys. She's got a real soft, sweet side that many people don't see. We are still learning how to coax it out of her.

Had a fantastic Thanksgiving at the McCoards' house. We cracked our laptops afterwards and threw down on some Diablo 2 multiplayer goodness. It's an old game, but we had so much fun playing it that we've gotten together two more times since then to play some more. I'm looking forward to Diablo 3.

Saw Madagascar 2 and didn't hate it. Some of the jokes were pretty good. King Julian and Moto Moto stole the show.

Saw Suantom of Quolace and enjoyed it thoroughly. Still no gadgets or Q, but Bond was in top form. It was interesting to see the first true Bond sequel, which picked up directly after the last one, rather than a separate adventure to add to the series.

The new phone I want came out, the HTC Fuze. It's a slick piece of technology that may elude me, considering its hefty pricetag. Stacy is determined to get it for my Christmas present, but I'm not sure if that will, or should, happen.

My good friend Jon and I have been watching Riff Trax every week. While I thoroughly enjoy the experience, there are some movies we've seen that were not meant for mortal eyes. To whit, Battlefield Earth, Batman and Robin, Plan 9 from Outer Space, Star Wars Holiday Special, and especially Troll 2 should be cremated and rocketed into the cold recesses of space, never to be seen again.

Participated in a parade mostly by accident. Vicki was in the Manassas holiday parade with her girl scout troop. After they passed by our vantage point, I had to get to the end of the route to pick her up. A couple of groups ahead of her was Karen, a good friend of ours. When I caught up with her, she asked me to walk with their group to the end. As the sidewalks were effectively clogged, the only direct path to the end was with the parade, and good company along the way didn't hurt, I took her up on her offer. Incidentally, her group represented her church. So if anyone from my ward saw me walking with them, no, I have not converted.

Speaking of which, I received a new calling at church. I am now the Ward Mission Leader. That means I get to make sure the missionaries in our ward are taken care of and I coordinate ward member missionary activities. It is a daunting task, one that I'm not sure I'm up to, but also one that I'm going to dive into and do my best.

I recently finished the first phase of a project at work that is going to dominate my working life for the next few months. I'm not especially looking forward to the rest of it, but that's the lot I have for now. My company has yet to be purchased. There have been no rumors of layoffs. It looks like I'll be safe for this holiday season. I'm done with classes for my bachelors degree in IT. I now just have 8 elective credit hours to finish. I will be submitting technical certifications as credit and will hopefully have all that done before too long.

I hope everyone is having a pleasant holiday season. It may be a while before I really get any more meaningful posts here.