Friends, Romans, Family, lend me your ears; I come to regale you with the year's events, not to bore you. The year that has passed was a hard one, filled with much work and angst; yet it is done and we are glad at what has come of our efforts. So it should always be.

The year, of course, began in January. Recall that 2004 ended with Monica's long-awaited graduation from Sam Houston State University with a Bachelor's Degree in Education (Magna Cum Laude, BTW). Thereafter, she quickly began what was theoretically a half-time position at Northampton Elementary. I say, “Theoretical” because it brought all the work of a full-time job with half the pay. Or so it seemed to me.

That same month I accepted a job with the Texas A&M University System in College Station. It rained Texas-style, which is to say dang ol' big drops and plenty of 'em, the entire first week of my new commute and I was wondering what in the heck I'd committed to. Eventually I figured out a route that wasn’t too bad at all compared to Houston driving. My biggest assignment there has been running an ASP.NET/Adabas/Natural timesheet/payroll integration project, a little ditty that just went into production on December 12^th – hip, hip, hooray!

Lifelong Friends

Meanwhile, back in suburbia, a rebellion was quietly brewing. The boys, who had been agreeably in favor of the move we'd been planning for 2 years suddenly sprouted life-long friends from their pores and began to moan about how they loved living in Northampton. With a jolt I remembered being eleven, moving from my comfortable life in Cedar Canyons to the Farm of Perpetual Child Labor and how unhappy I had been for the first several months there. It was a cruel, inevitable realization to know that my boys were feeling the same pain I'd felt then. Yet, the die was cast.

Weekends blurred into an endless list of chores and projects required to make 6403 Allentown presentable. We'd purchased the house in 2000 from Monica's brother "as is" and I have to admit that I let the place go a bit over the years. Suffice it to say that there was plenty to do and far too much of it was on the 2^nd story.

This was the point at which Monica's 30 hour per week job really began to take its toll. Progress was slow and it wasn’t until mid-May that the house was ready. In hindsight the delay was probably a good thing from a marketing perspective – that particular house is completely non-saleable during the school year because of the traffic, parents, and children who blight the area around Northampton Elementary at 8, 12, and 3 like so many plague rats in search of a meal.

In the first week of May I participated in what iron men call a “sprint triathlon” with a buddy of mine from Insource. Presumably there’s some logic behind the term, but I can assure you that I was not sprinting at any time during the event. 500 meter swim, 15+ mile bike ride, and a 5K run – that’s some fun stuff there!

Marc Triathalon

With the house all dressed up and ready to go, we engaged a local celebrity realtor who, in the interests of protecting our paltry fortune, will hereafter be called Wanda Won't. June was wasted b/c Wanda's web site and MLS entries were marginal at best and her promised print ad never materialized. We were at the bottom end of her portfolio and it showed.

Mitchell

David

The boys helped Monica a lot in moving our junk into storage, etc., while I was working. Mitch and Jake finished up 5th grade in good form while David received virtually all A's in 2nd grade. They are all good, solid kids, the kind that you can trust to do the right thing – most of the time. We did have to pay parental visits to the school for Jake and Dave, once each, to, as another friend from Insource put it, "remind the boys that their parents love them".

Jacob

Boy’s 1^st Triathalon

In July we lowered the price of the house and began to get some action. The twins played their last season of YMCA basketball with two kids from the neighborhood and another boy we knew from our old teams. These 5 boys played every minute of every game with no rest, ever. We were 2-4-1 b/c of the lack of subs and really bad coaching (me), but could have easily been 6-1 if we’d had just one more player! While basketball was going on, all three boys ran in the Woodlands YMCA kid’s triathlon (and don’t they look happy about it, too?!). Also, Dave took karate lessons throughout 2005 and worked his way up to an Orange Belt with his original instructor.

Longhorn Cavern

In August we took the boat up to Lake Buchanan north of Austin and had a whale of a good time riding around, tubing, fishing, swimming, etc. We also went on a mild-mannered cave tour to get out of the heat and took in "The Hobbit" on-stage in Granite Falls. Then we spent 2 days tubing on the Guadalupe before returning home just in time to play a basketball game at the Y.

Marc at Lake Buchanan

At last we got an offer on the house, accepted it, wrangled long and hard with Wanda Won't and the other snarky little realtor "lady" over the inspections and sweated blood whilst waiting up to and past the contract expiration point. When all seemed well, we put a big push to move out ASAP so the buyer could move right in – it was all about them, after all, school was only 2 weeks from starting up – when, WHAM!, their financing didn’t get approved. Suddenly we're out on the streets with 2 changes of clothes each, all my relocation money has been spent, and everything worth having is in storage in College Station. Not good.

As a result, we were trying to rent a house in C.S. when we discovered Monica’s sordid past. Seems while we all thought she was studying to be a teacher she was actually dabbling in petty theft and drug dealing! No wonder it took so long for her to graduate! Obviously a case of mistaken identity, but try convincing Joe Blow’s Leasing R Us of that fact, and you may end up behind bars for assault. But just as things were at their darkest (and she was about to get fired, big-time), Wanda pulled a rabbit from her hat in the form of a willing buyer. We told the no-money-having, private-nightclub-owning chumps to hit the road and sold our house on August 31st. Ah, paradise!

Who’s teaching your kids?

Because of all the hubbub and not knowing where we were going to wind up, we decided to home school the boys this year. Monica is doing that with the help of an on-line program called Switched On Schoolhouse. Mixed results so far; the boys like getting done early but miss having some kids to goof around with. We wonder if they're actually learning anything. Of course, I wondered that before, too. Especially with Dave who seemed to get one sorry teacher after another at Northampton. Monica and Monk Boys at Texas Renaissance Festival

El Guapo

All through the spring, summer, and fall I was playing softball with the guys from Insource, 2 games per week. This was a truly enlightening experience, and what I learned was that 39 is pretty darn old when it comes to playing sports! This team had more niggling little injuries than I’ve ever seen and I wasn’t immune from the rash of pulled hamstrings that went around like wildfire. It was fun, though, and I think I’ll find a team in C.S. next year.

Good Riddance!

We're all settled into our rental now. It's on 5 acres with a nice fishing pond and a cool cement basketball court. We play some pretty brutal family games out there: Dad and Dave against the twins. Those two won't even try to guard me but they're like piranhas if Dave so much as touches the ball. I now drive 10 minutes to work and get home for lunch now and again. Dave's got a new Taekwondo instructor and the twins played city league flag football in October/November. Basketball is up next and I suppose I'll volunteer for the whistle one more time, before they get too many skills and too much attitude for me to manage.

We’ve hit Rock Bottom!

We're planning to close on 11 acres near Iola, Texas at the end of the month. If that goes through as planned, Monica will at long last be the queen of my double-wide, a title she’s been longing to hold for more than half her life! It’ll be a bit tight after the size of home we’ve had for the last few years, but it’ll have to do, at least until we build up our homestead out there. This move will allow the boys to go back to school in a small, country environment and we’re hopeful that Iola ISD will live up to its reputation. If not, S.O.S. isn't all that bad. At work I see a hard year of tilting at windmills. It's my Quixotic desire to rid the department of Adabas/Natural and move it into this century, technology-wise. Wish me luck with that - it’s an uphill battle! And yet, someone's got to lead the charge if it’s ever going to get done… That's all for this year. Peace, brothers and sisters, may it come to all of us this year.

Love,

Marc, Monica, Mitch, Jake and Dave Moore