The Hargroves
1905 Big Canyon
Austin, TX 78746
“Christmas” 1984

Well, here we are again. Back after a full and pleasant year. Highlights of the year include trips to exotic places like Minneapolis, Fairbanks, and NYC.  We have had a series of foster children during the year, ending up with Roz and Bubba, who are still around. We lost one cat (Grendl) to a fast car and acquired another from a fast talker.  The latter is small but rotund, all black, very affectionate at 5:00 a.m., named Blackjack. Life as usual.

Travels:

Spring break, in March, was the time for our nostalgia trip to NYC. Jim managed to tack the visit onto the end of one of many trips East on business. Linda, C&C, Linda’s mother and Jim’s grandmother arrived from various other locations and we had a joyous reunion in beautiful LaGuardia Terminal. Spent a week visiting old favorites like the Cloisters and the Met. Went to plays: Cats! and 42^nd Street. Ate at nice restaurants. Got cold and wet. Spent mucho dinero. Had a grand old time.

Charles announced, though, that he was glad we had moved to Houston in 1969.

After the obligatory early Summer activity, camp for C&C, we all flew to Fairbanks. Saw our newest relative Panika Marie Dillon and her brother Noah, previously seen only in photos. Spent most of the time in tents. Went first to Denali National Park. Rafted down the Nenana River, water temperature 36 degrees F. One trip was enough. Rode the bus all the way to the end of the road at Wonder Lake. (You wonder if you’ll ever get there!) Saw some nice birds; best was the Northern Wheatear, which migrates between Alaska and Africa. After Denali, we drove up the “haul road” to John Dillon’s geology camp 80 miles north of the Arctic Circle. The drive is a grueling 350 miles of dirt and gravel. We made it in 10 hours, which we learned is very good time. It took almost 14 going back in the rain. Fortunately darkness is no problem.

Spent four days there birding (Siberian Tit!) wildflowering (too many to list) and “traversing” a mountain ridge in the Brooks Range. The experience was worth the drive. Splurged on hamburgers twice along the way at $8.50 apiece. Gas was $2.50 a gallon, but there was no extra charge for unleaded.

Stopped in Minneapolis on the way home. Jim went to the SIGGRAPH convention while Linda and the kids visited relatives. We brought two 10 pound Yukon River salmon on the plane with us. These are supposed to be the ultimate in salmon. They were certainly tasty when grilled with herbs, lemons and onions. Had to invite all of the Data General people in Minneapolis to help us eat them.

The year in Austin was interesting. Had a long drought that ruined most of the wildflower season and all of the gardening. We returned from Minneapolis to find a few parched remnants. Had to forego our tradition of making Christmas presents with the homegrown produce. The drought broke in October, just in time to help the late daisies. Then some early cold in November resulted in the prettiest fall colors in recent memory

Jim has set a personal record for time spent with one company. Data General’s combination of utter chaos, successful products, and financial incentives proved appealing. He finally made Life Master at bridge, a triumph of perseverance and computerized record keeping. Now he has decided to work on birding, where nine more species identified will put him at 500, the lower limit of respectability in the birding community. He managed to slip past his 40^th birthday quietly by labeling it his “second annual 39^th birthday.” No one was fooled, merely tolerant.

Linda worked a lot more than she had planned. She spent most of the time in a Pain Management Clinic at St. David’s Hospital. The long absence of one of the regular nurses kept her busy full time from the week we got back from Minneapolis till the week before Christmas. Housework became a shared experience: We ALL complained about it. Linda, meanwhile, has needed frequent weekend trips to quiet places like Aransas, Utopia, Brazosport, etc., to maintain her sanity.

Charles went to Hawaii the long way—thru China. The Westlake Band toured the PRC for three days as an excuse for shopping in Hong Kong and surfing in Honolulu. Band delayed his driver’s training, but thanks to a fluke loss by the football team that shortened the playoffs he is currently enrolled. Any day now! Meanwhile, he has turned into a handsome hunk who ignores the hoards of girls following him around. He continues to explore the joys of networking with computers, tying up the phone for hours at a time.

Claire went to camp again, came home and decided that horseback riding was the second most important thing in life. She is now well on her way to becoming an accomplished equestrienne. The most important thing in her life is fixing her hair every morning. The competition for a mirror at 7:00 in the morning is fierce. The effort must be worth it; she has almost as many boys calling her as Charles has girls calling him. We’ve put in another phone line to accommodate all this. Now we have two busy phones.

Rosalind (Roz, age 12) came to live with us during the summer, together with her brother Stanley (Bubba). The summer lasted long enough for her to perfect her swimming and learn to dive. By the end of the summer, she had even graduated to the major league games of Marco Polo that our pool is famous for. She also played on a soccer team that was noted more for its heart than its scoring ability. Jim knew exactly what that was like!

Stanley (age 9) Also learned how to swim and dive. During Marco Polo games, he learned to keep to the edges and what “fish out of water” meant. After summer was past, he focused most of his attention on Cub Scouts and “He-man” figures. If you don’t know what the latter are, you don’t have a boy aged 6-10 anywhere around you and haven’t turned on the TV on Saturday morning lately. Both Rosalind and Stanley will probably be with us until the end of the school year.

We hope that your year has been as eventful and happy as ours has.

Hope you have (had) a Merry Christmas. Let us hear from you. _