Christmas went well for me today, got a few things I needed (and wanted) – and I got to spend time with my family. The last bit is clearly the most important as the chances that I am home for Christmas in 2007 are slim to none. For Christmas Eve in 2005, I was in uniform – though it was desert camo, and I was on duty. The evening’s festivities last year included at least three 82mm mortars, and two 107mm rockets (one of which blew the generator powering my tent into many small and large pieces.) This year, I was in uniform again, but in the calm and quiet safety of our church in Katy. Hopefully next year I can enjoy Christmas without explosions, but I think that’s a little far fetched.

Anyway, back to this year. We had midnight mass at 2100hrs – on the logic that it was midnight somewhere. By my calculations, that somewhere was right in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean, but I suppose that is not important at all. Present opening occured sometime after we got back from church. Technically, the majority of our stuff was opened after midnight, thus actually ON Christmas – so we didn’t really cheat that much. After the hunting trip, I was in need of a meat grinder – for Christmas, I got one. I also scored some new clothes, a bunch of gift cards, a DVD, some things I can use at NTC next month, a calender, a poker set, and a 2GB microSD card for my GPS.

I posted the photos to my flickr account, as usual.

For Christmas dinner, a bunch of family and friends came over for what will henceforth be known as TheBestDamnedStandingRibRoastEVER(tm). I may not have any idea how to cook rabbit food – but I do wonderful things to meat. Given the fact that I love eating meat, that’s probably a really good thing. All in all I had a pretty Merry Christmas, and some great food.