December has been a busy month. My Mom arrived early in the month and we have been spending quite a bit of time together. A week or so ago we saw the Carmen ballet at the Opera and it was amazing. The dancers were in general so young and I never would have imagined them to have so much talent - especially considering the harsh conditions in which they practice.

On Sunday my Dad also arrived. He was on the Amsterdan "race" and we were happy as this was not one of the early AM flights. It seems as the Armavia plane that had departed Armenia early on Sunday, however, had made an emergency landing in Ukraine... no reasons given. So in the end his plane arrived at 4:27 AM on Monday morning.

Work is good. Staff preparations for the new years have begun and we will be having our christmas party tomorrow night. It should be interesting to see "secret santas" revealed. This year everyone is particularly careful in ensuring that no one knows who's secret santa s/he is. Many even arrive to work early to stuff stockings to ensure no one sees. Mystery at it's finest I tell you.

Other than that I am preparing for a month long trip to the US. I will be in DC for two weeks and then off to California for another two. This should be an interesting trip as I haven't been for about a year!