Christmas Party 2000. Richfield, Minnesota

 December 9, 2000  Posted in Uncategorized

Our Christmas Party at Bridget’s house. Saturday Night 7:00pm.

The annual party contiunues as the year 2000 comes to an end.

Party attendees include Bridget, Iwona, Bill Northrup, Kasia and Alfreido, Dougie, Dan, Mark Gardner and his friend, Brett and Savannah.

The Christmas Tree at Bridget’s house. Bridget and Savannah decorated it.

The night before the party… Savannah dancing with her stuffed animal “Sleepy”, which I got for her in Japan on my last trip with my mother…

I left for the airport to pick up my good friend Bill (Wilson to some people)…
Next morning… arrived Bridget’s at around 11am and started the project of moving the tree to its final location… where the computer table was…

Savannah is shutting the computer down so we can move the desk out of the way…

Bill did the HARD job – to clean out the roof so we can hang Christmas lights…
While my job was just to sit around and take pictures… THANKS BILL – next time you come over I will make sure you don’t do any work! 😛
Okay all done – now we are ready to go have some GOOD Vietnamese Pho noodles…
After the quick lunch, Bill and I drove to that famous Mall in Minnesota… on the way there we saw a cool PT Cruiser… NOT!
I thought Bill would freeze in Minnesota, but he is tougher than I think… windchill makes it approximately 0 degrees F. NO JACKET!
Yup – Here it is, the Mall of America… or to us Minnesotans… the MegaMall.
The famous Knotts Camp Snoopy INSIDE the mall – including a ferris wheel, a roller coaster, and a lot of other rides.
Hmmm I wonder how the network at Merck is holding up…
(10 minutes later)… “NOT ONE PAGE since this morning. Something must be really wrong! I need to call Pascal NOW to make sure everything is all right!”

Calm down Bill. Maybe everything is just fine and you need to enjoy the blistering cold in Minnesota, hehe.

There’s always a new fad, and here is one I predict will fail real soon. Get someone to lie down… put waterproof bags over him/her… and blast water on their back.

I wonder if some prison inmate invented this after being water blated by guards…
Oh yeah did I forget to mention that you get to listen to RELAXING music with the package? M—-e—–h!
Okay fun is over, back to work Bill.

Bill: “Lewis – the lights don’t seem to work… they’re too DIM to be normal!”
Lewis: “Just a minute, there’s this other plug with a red X
 over it… let me plug it in…”
Bill: “ARRRRRGGGHHHH! Turn it off! Turn it off!“
Bill’s gloves welded to the roof from the heat in sub-zero temperature… note that he is STILL not wearing his jacket.

Just kidding – Bill was not hurt during the preparation of the party.
Savannah and Brett making funny faces.
I had Savannah behind me…
And Brett in front… my workout for the evening…
Savannah tries to hide behind me while someone takes a picture…
And Brett tries to rip my arm off.
Dan moving around, while Alreido and Kasia chats by the kitchen table…
Savannah wakes up from her nap, while Brett tries to trip me…

POST-PARTY… Bill and I met when we both attended Rochester Institute of Technology, living in the same dormitory floor.

Being new in this country in 1990, I was amazed by the availabilty of 24-hour non-stop television… but mostly by the as-seen-on-tv commercials after midnight…

And Bill was amazed by the availability of MSG-filled Chinese ramen noodles that I have stocked up in my room.

After the late-night dinner… I passed out on the couch while Bill watched “The Gladiator” on DVD…
Here is the true definition of a GOOD GUEST – Bill washing the dishes at 4 in the morning!!! Wow we need you over again, SOON!
Meanwhile Lewis is still passed out on the couch.
The modern day party is never complete without that one table filled with techno-gadgets… here we have 5 Nokia 6100 phones, a Sony MD recorder, and a Motorolla pager…
I promised to show Bill the gas station next to my house serving 100 octane gas… hehe for those special days when you want to drive faster…

At this moment I want to thank everyone at the party for cheering me up at a sad time in my life. My mother had passed away two days before this party. Maybe I needed this to temporarily forget my sadness, and concentrate on living again…

Thank you Bill for coming to Minneapolis and hanging out with me.

Let me know when you have another few days off and I will treat you to the best CHINESE HOT POT you’ve ever had!