This Christmas I am one of the most blessed people on the planet. At least that’s the way I feel after everything that has happened since the last time I posted.

First things first: I GOT THE JOB AT F&R!!!! I was sooo surprised you have no idea. I figured that since they said that they were going to do a second round of interviews and they didn’t call me. On Tuesday I was at work doing nothing and decided to run out and get a drink. As I was driving back to Whittemore my phone rang and it was a Richmond number. I guessed that it was Ken Dalton calling me back to tell me that the position was filled. But instead he asked me if I “would like to come work for them”. Silly question. He is giving me 33k per year at first and then bumping me up to 35 in six months pending a review. I was excited and scared at first. After all I don’t know how qualified I actually am for what they want me to do. The job involves ASP.NET and all the .Net platform stuff. Things that I haven’t worked with very much, and not at all recently. So I’m still kind of worried about that. It would be awful if I got in there and have them go “what do you mean you can’t do that?”. At first I offered to come up to do paperwork and orientation on Wednesday before New Years. Ken, who will be my boss, was going to be on vacation all next week but was going to come in special to show me around. After that was set up I realized that I wasn’t doing anything Thursday or Friday and emailed him to ask him if he wanted me to come up one of those days. Meanwhile I told Mom on the phone and she started screaming in my ear from excitement. Michelle and Emily weren’t all that excited but that’s understandable. Mom told everyone in the family before I could get a chance. For the rest of Tuesday and all of Wednesday I felt apprehensive about the whole thing. Especially because nobody was at the office to give my notice to. So I didn’t know when I would actually be able to start work in Richmond. I hadn’t heard much from Ox so I didn’t know if I had a place to live either. I didn’t know how much money I was going to need to move or anything. All that uncertainty slammed into place at once and it was quite stressful. Meanwhile I hadn’t had a time to really relax. On Monday John and I took Ryan out to dinner and then went and visited Mo. So that was a pretty late night after an early morning. Then on Tuesday I went over to Ryan’s house after work to watch movies. So I didn’t really have time to turn around or finish my Christmas shopping. I still had to get Troy and Sarah something. On Wednesday things started to pan out, I got an email back from Ox sayin it was ok to move in with him and to get him details etc. I emailed Mark to let him know I would be quitting. And Ken called me back and asked if I could come down Thursday morning for their Christmas party and do orientation then. I met up with Ludwig and we hung out for a while then got a movie to take over to Jen and Julie’s house. I wanted to say goodbye to them because I wouldn’t see them until New Years. Jen was the only one home so we started the movie. Julie came home a little later and I left before the movie was over. They teased me a little about making more money than all of my friends in Blacksburg. I laughed it off and left. At this point I still hadn’t told Kate. She told me she was going straight home after work on Wednesday and I could call her around 6. Well I called and she wasn’t there so I left a message with her mom to call me as soon as possible. And she called me as I was going home. I gave her the news and she was happy for me. But she wasn’t really coherent, she was super tired from working all day. I swear that girl is going to wear herself out if she’s not careful. But we did manage to set up lunch after I got done on Thursday at F&R. I went home, showered got clothes ready, ate a little bit and then went to bed. They wanted me to be there between 9 and 10, so I had to leave between 6 and 7. I had coffee so it wasn’t that bad at all. When I got there I met Ken and he introduced me to a bunch of people that I have already forgotten the names of. He introduced me to Irving his boss and my ultimate boss. Irving seemed like quite a character and a good guy to work for. The other two guys in the IT department are really cool too. They weren’t the least bit hostile and are bona fide geeks. Not nerds but true computer geeks. I filled out paperwork for a while and then it was time for the Christmas party. They had a neat way to exchange gifts. After that Irving said a prayer for our troops and our President which I thought was very cool. Then we ate the food. After that I finished the paperwork and got a grand tour of the whole facility. There were three of four different offices and three different engineering labs. Lots of people too, people that I will have to relearn all of their names because I’ve already forgotten. After the tour I hung around talking to the IT people Ken and the two other guys are really nice, it’s almost a family type atmosphere. It was a lot of fun and they told me not to worry about anything and they would teach me anything I needed to know but didn’t. I was very excited and pumped up by the time I left. I called Kate after I left and met her at Borders and we went to lunch at a greek place. It was very cool to see her again. She cut her hair again and it looks good. I can’t wait for New Years. After lunch I headed home, I was starting to feel tired at this point but I had a power drink and everything was ok. When I got home I had an email from Mark saying congratulations and we could work out when I would leave. After the meeting I felt really good about the job and it started to sink in that I had finally made it. I also realized that I would be moving out soon and I started noticing all the little family things that I hadn’t in a while. John was home, Betsy and Ryan weren’t, Michelle is cute, Emily is just like Betsy, Daniel is not to be trusted with heavy machinery, and David is obnoxious. And I really started to look forward to Christmas again. On Friday I slept in for the first time in a while and kinda moped around after wrapping presents. We went to the Christmas eve service at church, and I realized that this would be my last service here for a long time. I wouldn’t be there on Sunday and the next weekend would be the New Years party. The weekend after that I would probably be moving to Richmond. When we got home we opened a set of Christmas presents from each other for the name drawing. Daniel made me the most awesome present I think he could have. He mad a rack for me to put my swords on. He burned my SCA name into the wood with a wood burner and then stained it. It looks great. I will put a picture up here of it when I get one. It also has pegs for my hat and I think I’ll put my sharks tooth and medallion on them too. I don’t know if I’ll be able to hang it up at Ox’s, but I know I will hang it up where ever I eventually move. Christmas morning was great too, I slept on a top bunk in my old room. We got up at 6 which was a nice change from 4:30-5. There were a good many presents this year, Mom and Dad did pretty well this year, lots of overtime I guess. I got almost everything on the list I gave them. Which surprised me since they already gave me the Limbaugh letter. I got lost of clothes and all three books I asked for. I gave them links with my Christmas list to places that they could buy online. So they just clicked “buy” and were done with it. I’ll have to remember that. Everyone got some good things and everyone was happy. I feel extremely blessed and content. In a little while John and I are going over to Ryan’s to play on his xBox before coming back here to watch football and basketball. Tomorrow we are driving to Grandma’s house. Not something I look forward too because I have to drive “behind” Dad who likes to go 5 miles under the speed limit to “save gas”. Which I know it doesn’t but you try and convince him. I might just get Ryan to drive his jeep so that I can read and we can have a CD player. But I haven’t decided yet. That’s all for now I can’t promise when I’ll post again but I’ll do my best.