Well, we had the get-together today, and it was a rousing success. We met at Ryan's "steakhouse" and had a big, huge buffet. For those of you who have never been to Ryan's, imagine a big, huge dining hall with a buffet running down the middle. They had salmon, beef, tacos, everything. I won't say that it was fantastic, but it was pretty good in a Golden Corralish kind of way. You know, it is kind of like going to the friend's house who had the Commodore 64 when you really wish that you were at the friend's house that has the Nintendo Entertainment System. You know, that was pretty cool of Nintendo to call it an entertainment System. I mean, they did try to make is a whole system, with the Duck Hunt gun, and Robbie the Robot (or was it Gyro? I can't remember that well). But it was almost as if they were trying to make a franchise out of it. Which, aside from the point, they did do a remarkable job of. Who doesn't know about Mario? They did a fantastic job of marketing that strategy. But the cool thing is that the games (even today) are really, really good. It isn't like the Friday the 13th franchise where they think millions of kids are going to go see a movie just because Jason is in it, even though the movie sucks. The Mario games today are just as good if not better than the games when the NES first came out, and I commend them for that. It would be really easy for them to be lazy.
Anyway, everyone ended up coming over to play Cranium, and if I remember correctly, Emily and Kaleb won. That is the cool thing about Cranium. Playing the game is much more memorable than who actually won. Aside from trying to decipher Billie's monotone humming (Honey, that was "I got you babe!"), we had a blast. Chandler and Jeremy made a great showing (although Jeremy just watched everyone else, which kind of made it cheating, but we cut him some slack because he's gay, I mean, partnered with a 7 year old. :)   ¶ 8:32 PM 0 comments

  I know I haven't exactly been the best blogger in the whole world, judging by the date of my last post. But, I am here to tell you that things are looking up! A friend of mine and I are about to launch AlexPKeaton.com for our own thoughts, feelings, etc. You can go there if you like, but you may not always like what you read. That is why I separated this out for just the family, so there would be a shiny, happy webpage for everyone to visit. You will notice that there is a photo album available, so there are a ton of pictures in there for you to peruse. There will be much more stuff to come on the horizon, but that should suffice for the time being.

So, what has been up in the Hoekstra household? Well, as you probably know, I am leaving Frolic very, very soon. I only have a handful of shows left with the band, so this is a big time of change for me and the rest of the family. Chandler is doing very well in school, having made the A-Honor roll last six weeks, of which we are very proud. Alexa walks around the house like she owns the place (she does), and Billie does nothing but watch Law and Order:SVU all the live long day. Well, not all day, but that is what it seems like. It is starting to get cold in Texas, which we were kind of excited about. I am sure that will change when it gets really cold and windy, but for now, we are enjoying lighting the occasional fire.

Thanksgiving was great! We went over to Patti's house (Billie's Mom) and had the normal Thanksgiving fixin's. We also played a new game called Cranium, which was quite a lot of fun. Phil and I won, which was expected. You can't put that kind of brain power together and expect us to not pummel the crap out of everyone involved. This Sunday, my family is meeting at a restaurant for thanksgiving, which is cool in some ways, but it stinks because we can't play games afterwards, and that is what getting together is all about.

We are getting all fired up for Christmas. Presents are creeping up under the tree, and Chandler keeps inching his way towards them. The tree fell over the other day. Billie found a garage sale special on a fake tree, and not three hours after she put it up, one of the legs broke on it. We got it fixed, and all is well now, but caveat emptor, I guess.

Feel free to drop us a line. There are about ten different emails that you can email me at, so use one of them!  ¶ 2:18 PM