At my office party this year I won a yoga sculpting video (MSRP $30) that I gave to Becky. At Becky’s office party she won a Canon SD300 (MSRP $399) that I took from her. Seems fair, right? Here’s a few pics and videos I took over the Christmas week with the new camera.

My grandmother had a quilting frame up in her living room that she would use to display cards and letters. At Christmas it was covered in cards from friends and family all over the place. Now my cousin lives in my grandmother’s old house, so my uncle took down the frame and cut it into 5 pieces (for each of the five grandkids) and gave it to us for a present. The first thing I did upon returning to Austin was hang it over the tree and put some cards on it.

One of my resolutions is going to be to watch Slashdot more. Caught a bit in the Economist on Einstein’s Big Year Centennial which runs down Einstein’s big accomplishments of 1905:

1. Explaining the Photo-Electric Effect (for which he got his Nobel Prize)
2. First draft of the Theory of Relativity
3. Explaining Brownian Motion and proving atoms exist

All good stuff. There also was a link to PBS’ The Elegant Universe where you can stream all 3 hours of the program (from the book of the same name )

Went on to the bandstand in the sky a couple of days ago. 98 years old or such. Shaw was a clarinet player that set much of the big-band sound. He was a racial pioneer, hiring Billie Holliday to sing for his band. Served in WWII in a band which played for troops in combat zones.

He hadn’t played music since 1954.