Road trip to Vegas

Since the New Year managed to sneak up on me this year--and then run me over like a Mack Truck--I'm getting a late start to the resolutions. However, beginning with this post, I plan to update this blog at least twice a week. Like with all resolutions, we'll save judgment on how well I do until later...

As has become custom, The Wife and I took a road trip to Vegas to visit my family over Christmas. However, since we didn't get out of Lander until noon we knew we were in for a long haul. The roads were miserable but we were in no hurry.

Karta is quite the trooper on the road. What you can't see is that my eyes and facial expression mirror hers.A few things stand out each year from our Christmas in Vegas. First, we all attend Christmas Eve mass to sing carols before returning to Ma's house for a fondue party. Over the years the fondue party has become the stuff of legend.

The party never really gets started until Walt takes up the piano.Think of a cross between National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation and an old West piano bar--with too much food.A second thing that sticks out from each year is that my other grandma, Mary Dale, has everyone over to sample the latest batch of Mary Dale's Maddening Margaritas. While the margarita bash usually follows Christmas, we did things in reverse this year. What's more, Mary Dale's Maddening Margaritas must have been especially potent this year because both The Wife and I forgot to take any pictures...After a little under a week in Vegas, it was time to head home. We had gone skiing in blizzard conditions at Brian Head, I got to watch my dad split queens in black jack--and win, I demonstrated my lack of skill in tennis, we threw the football around until my shoulder was ready to explode, and I set a new personal best in bowling--170. Pretty successful all in all. The drive home, on the other hand, was not so successful:Oh yeah, one final bonus picture of the pooch: