As usual, we went back to Chicago to visit my in-laws for Christmas, and then headed to North Dakota to visit my side of the family. We ate a lot of pizza and drank a lot of beer. That’s what we do. That’s how we roll. We’re good at it.
This year, we had Lou Malnati’s a couple times (this time we tried their thin crust in addition to their deep dish — both good, but I’m still in love with the deep dish). We also went to Vito & Nick’s to try their fabulous-looking roast beef pizza (they roast their own beef). It was quite good, but I’m still in love with Lou Malnati’s deep dish. Eventually you’ll see a bunch of pictures of the beer on the other blog when I get around to it.
We got our wedding photo albums (and we got copies of our wedding photo albums for our various sets of parental units), and they turned out super nice. KrisDi’s parents gave me a Craftsman air compressor, which turned out handy yesterday when I put it together, because KrisDi’s tire was down to 10 psi. I got a couple flashlight things, which also turned out well because I used them to break KrisDi’s car and then she used them to fix her car (people at work laughed when I told them my wife was at home working on my car; then they realized I was serious).
Not a lot of wacky antics to report this year. I made a snow angel. It was fun. I made a couple children cry (or almost cry), but I apologized. Northwood and I were horsing around with our future step niece, holding her upside down so our step-brother’s dog could lick her face. This was going fine until the dog jumped up and got his claws on her face. The other time, one of Wilmy’s little nephews was being a brat, and apparently didn’t believe me when I told him I was going to throw him in a snowbank if he kept it up. He’ll probably believe me next time. You should have seen how excited his brother was, though, wishing he had it on video so he could watch it over and over and over…a few minutes later, he dragged their little sister over to show her where their brother had been tossed into the snow.
Wilmy’s New Year party was pretty quiet this year, but still fun. Always good to see the northern folks, even if I don’t get to see all of them. We’re all getting old, though. At midnight, everyone’s shouting “Happy New Year!” with gusto, and then everyone sits down and stares dumbly at each other for an hour and a half, not wanting to admit that we all want to go to bed.
I got to spend part of a pretty frigid New Year’s Day (-15ºF) digging my dad’s truck out of a ditch. Dad was the one that got us in there. Somehow, my family apparently thinks I’m incapable of driving in snow (or in reverse).
I actually got to see both my brothers for a pretty good amount of time! Eldest was in town for three days or so. Northwood arrived about a week before us and ended up leaving the day after us (even though his flight was scheduled just before ours). D had a busy job this season getting all of my wayward relatives to their intended locations (especially my step-sister, who ended up spending Christmas night in Denver, which turned out to be a good thing). Special thanks to her once again!
Of course, I can’t see my brothers for any length of time without making some kind of trouble, so here’s a video of what happens when you microwave jalapeno stems long enough. Apparently carrots do the same thing, but failed to perform in Wilmy’s microwave.
Of course, I also have pictures.
Chicago, Chicago, Chicago, Chicago, Bismarck, Bismarck, Bismarck, Bismarck, Snuggie!