Happy New Year

This year's resolution: make no resolution.

Shoot. Failed already.


For our New Year's Eve, I missed a doctor's appointment because we got a flat on the van. It's been leaky for a long time, and Walmart wouldn't believe us so they wouldn't fix the leak. Now it's bulgy and scary, so we had to put the spare on. They could have saved themselves some money patching the leak--instead we'll probably get a new tire out of the warranty.

In the evening, we took the kids to ride on the city bus. This might not seem so great to you, but the kids have never been on a bus before, and we have big gold double decker buses here. And for 24 hours (from 6:00 New Year's Eve to 6:00 New Year's day), the busses were free. So we loaded all the kids onto one and rode across the Strip--up on the top deck, right on the front row--and then back. It took 2 1/2 hours because the area around the Strip was a MESS. But the kids had fun--except Benji, who wanted to run around in the bus.

Anyway, we came home and ate home made ice cream (made with chocolate pudding and crushed candycanes--really yummy) and watched videos. Tim fell asleep on his office couch at about 10:00, and I went in to tell him happy new year at just about midnight and found him sleeping. So I poked my head outside to see if we could see the fireworks they were shooting off up and down the Strip. I couldn't see the fireworks, but I could hear the booms and see the yellow glow--it honestly sounded like someone was exploding the casinos.

Then I heard the screaming and cheering on the Strip at it struck midnight proper. We live 4 or 5 miles from there, but there were supposedly nearly a million people down there partying, and they all cheered at once. Now I know you can hear a million people cheer from much farther than 4 miles away! And the Strip wasn't the only noisy place. Even in our little quiet neighborhood, there were shouts of "Happy New Year" outside.

While we were on the bus earlier, Anda asked what New Year's Eve was, and I tried to explain that it's the year's birthday. She understood, but then said, "Why are we celebrating that?!"

Good question.