Thanksgiving is less than a week away and I have a lot to give thanks for. I have a good job, my health is pretty good for an old man, a have a wonderful family and I have my son Jason and my girlfriend Teresa. Retirement is just around the corner and a new and hopefully exciting phase of my life will soon begin. Our new dog Max is starting to become a part of our family and overall I am feeling pretty good about things. Teresa, Kirk, Jason and I will be celebrating Thanksgiving by having brunch at the Bay Breeze Community Center at Fort Monroe where I work. The menu sounds great and it is a beautiful location. With Christmas also just around the corner I have started some Christmas shopping. I hope that I can get into the Christmas spirit more than I did last year. Christmas has always been my favorite time of the year. I am really looking forward to my vacation in Alaska next year and I need to start exercising more to get into shape for it. It is amazing how hard it is to maintain or lose weight at my age. But I have resolved to get into the best shape that I can for my trip. Where I am going I am going to have to be in great shape because it is a very isolated part of Alaska and if anything goes wrong with me physically, it will be the end of a great adventure.

I am also looking forward to the return of Spring so I can continue with my backpacking adventures. I was not able to do much backpacking this year but next year I plan on taking a local trip followed by a longer trip to the Great Smoky Moutains in North Carolina. I should also mention that I will be on leave for a large part of December because I have so much use or lose leave. So The rest of the year should be pretty easy for me if I can find something fun to do with my spare time.