Haloranch

All year my mind was greedily assimilating interesting tidbits and stashing them away in the golden archive for this Christmas letter. Unfortunately, I lost the key to the archive and they remain forever unattainable. However, one or two items stick out. First of all, I can’t believe another year has passed in the blink of an eye, along with what was left of Hans’ career. Yes, you read it right. Hans kicked up his heels at the end of August and finally retired. His Happy Days are here and the proof is in the photo. Hans is wearing the latest in retirement finery and hugging Favourite Dotter Alethea who came up to join the delightfully unscheduled party. Being retired made it easy for Hans to spend lots of time with his father and brother Frank (pictured with Alethea) who came to visit us for 2 weeks in September. The balmy weather inspired us to spend an idyllic weekend in Banff warming our toes by the fire and listening to the river sing as it rolled over and around the rocks. ...

Recently Favourite Dotter asked for the piano. She really misses it. Enough actually to pay for its transport to her place. For us, it's just a piece of furniture that holds photos and candles, so we shipped it down to her but it left a huge gap in the living room. And of course no place to put photos and candles. We asked her to pick up 3 black floating shelves at IKEA but the large shelf doesn't come in black, only brown/black. It's a nice colour, but definitely not black and didn't match the other two so hubby spray painted them all to match. Nice, eh?

Just like last year, the weather in Canmore was terrific. Blue sky and sunshine. Perfect!

FD's grandfather and uncle visited us recently from Germany and we spent a weekend in the mountains having a good time. We went for walks, had nice dinners and just enjoyed each other's company.

Hans got some unexpected great news this week. He is one of 12 people who will retire at the end of August! About 6 weeks ago his company said they want to restructure the management positions and if anyone wants to retire early, they have a nice compensation package set up. This has been Hans' dream for years - to retire with a package. Immediately he said, "Pick me! Pick me!" He didn't think they would since he has let it be known he is thinking about retirement and why wouldn't they just wait him out? However, to his great delight, he found out August 21 that he is one of 12 lucky people and his last day will be August 31! Life is grand.

I expect to hear this song tonight. We're off the the Petroeum Club in Calgary this evening to attend a high-falutin' stampede kick-off: Free bar, tantalizing appetizers served to the hungry throng by circulating waiters in white gloves, delicious dinner, followed by dancing to the mellow tones of none other than Ian Tyson I can't wait!

The cousins have gathered around us in Sarpsborg and this afternoon, we're off to a lake cottage where we're all going to party and have a great time. There should be 12 of us. We're all spending the night at the cottage and adjoining annex so we can drink with impunity. It is zero tolerance here and everyone takes that very seriously. Vigdis has been busy this morning concocting a fabulous Norwegian cake which looks way too complicated for me to ever do. My only job was to grind almonds at which, thankfully, I excelled. This will probably be our last post for awhile. No internet at the cottage, we're taking the cousins out for dinner Thursday night and we leave Friday morning for Hamburg where we will also be incommunicado. Then home on Sunday. It's been a fabulous trip. Can't wait for the next one!