Last night was my first official function as master of Walden Lodge. We had our annual officer's call at the Steak and Ale. With one exception (he and his family were out of town) all of my officer's were in attendance, along with the head of the charity committee. All in all there were 18 people. I was quite pleased with the turnout.

I gave them a quick overview of how I would like things to go next year and where I would like us to end up. We had a good meal, and some fine fellowship. I think we will have a very good year in 2006.

Merry Christmas!

Luke 2:6-12
...While they were there, the time came for the baby to be born, ⁷and she gave birth to her firstborn, a son. She wrapped him in cloths and placed him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the inn. ...And there were shepherds living out in the fields nearby, keeping watch over their flocks at night. ⁹An angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified. ¹⁰But the angel said to them, "Do not be afraid. I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people. ¹¹Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is Christ^[a] the Lord.

And so begins the greatest story ever told.

I wish you and yours a Merry Christmas, and a joyous new year. God bless you all.

Yet another incredibly busy week has come and gone.

I am having Christmas sneak up on me this year. Normally I do my Christmas shopping and am finished before the week of Christmas. I am not one of those who is done before Thanksgiving, but I like getting it done and over with before Christmas Eve.

I have gotten the majority of my Christmas cards in the mail. Thanks to Christine, I am sending out some great ones this year!

I have scheduled out a busy week ahead. I will have to make some time for shopping in there somewhere as well.

More and more of the town is recovering from the ice storm and returning to normal. However, still quite a few homes and businesses are without power. I have seen several power trucks out and restoring power to neighborhoods, and am lucky that we didn't lose power.

This has been a very busy week.

I have had lots of work to do during the day, and then more to do at night, so time to update my blog was not really available.

Today has been busy as well. I met Jack and Scott (from Canada) at the office at 9:00 am and we went to Paris mountain to run a new trail there. Jack had run the trail before and was raving about it. I hate being cold and it was very cold this morning. We met at the office and it was 35 degrees. Luckily there wasn't much of a breeze blowing, so it was manageable.

The trail took us down to the lake and around it and Jack was right. The view was great. I did fine of the run down, but ran out of gas coming back up the hill. We came back up to a trailhead and started down the mountain for the last easy stretch of the run and made it down to the road. Jack told us that once we crossed the road, the trip back up the hill was the tough part.

His words couldn't have been more prophetic. We hadn't made it more than 10 yards into the woods when he went down hard. He had stepped on a rock and twisted his ankle. I could tell that he was in a tremendous amount of pain, and went to get the car and bring it back down.

I ran and walked up the mountain until a car came by and gave me a lift to the parking area, and drove back down to pick up Jack and Scott. We took Jack back to Greenville and left him in the care of the doctors. I'll call him later today to see what they had to say.

I have a very busy week ahead of me and had a busy weekend behind me.

I traveled to Columbia and Camden, SC on Saturday attending various Masonic meetings. I had a great time and met a number of very good people.

Sunday morning after church I put up my Christmas tree. I had intended to put up the outside lights as well, but it was pouring rain. Once I had the tree up and assembled, I realize that I didn't have any hangers for the bulbs. Not to worry, a "quick" trip to Wal-Mart would solve that problem. However, there is no such thing as a "quick" trip to Wal-Mart this time of year.

We had our annual Christmas party this year at the lodge with 20 or so children enjoying the refreshments and Santa made an appearance. I had the bright idea to video the event, but the battery on my cam corder was exhausted, so I doubt anything came out. I'll check to see, but I'm not holding out much hope.

Tonight is the annual Christmas party for our Toastmasters club. I'll have to leave it and head directly over to the lodge to see my last two officers installed.