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Santa, I need you to do me a huge favor. Can you please take your name off your phone? The boys
and girls went through my phone, and may be calling you. Take your name off your phone. Just have
it as a number on the voicemail. You got to do this for me.

Ho, ho, ho«ho, ho, ho, ho, ho, ho, ho, ho, ho, ho, ho? Exactly, how many is that?

Christmas-ish 2009

We hope this card finds you and yours in good spirits. 2009 has been a great year for us. Everyone
is healthy and happy, our bank didn·t fail, and we got to see a Seinfeld reunion on Curb Your
Enthusiasm. We are truly blessed.

As someone never said, TV is the window to the soul. If that is the case then the soul for our
family would be Gilligan·s Island and we would be its castaways. Although only 68 episodes aired, I
think I·ve seen every one about 6-8 times. I think of it as my contribution to maintaining popular
culture as a modern form of performance art. Like a good soldier, I fell on the grenade so that
others may live.

Anyway, on to our family and Gilligan·s Island. Megan (16) would be somewhere between the
Professor and Ginger. Like the Professor, she·s always figuring out new things for our family to do,
and planning how things will generally go. For example, she produced this Christmakwanzakah card.
I guess that means I executive produced it, i.e., wrote the checks and did what I was told. Very
little gets by without input/edict/mandate by the Professor. She·s also like Ginger, well, because
she·s Ginger. She lives the life of a modern day, 16 year-old Brooke Astor. Last summer, she was in
NYC (twice), Nantucket, Hawaii, Hamptons, and LA. Next summer, she hopes to get to travel a bit
and not stay home as much. She is a sophomore at the Menlo School, and actively involved with the
school paper, bridge club, student council, lacrosse, golf, and endless Facebooking. She is
apparently very busy because I·m often told that I don·t even understand how busy she is. Since I
don·t understand it, I can only take her word (edict). Almost 450 days have passed since my first
Facebook friend request, and still nothing. Crickets. You·d think I might rate as one of her 784
closest friends, but apparently not. I·m hopeful that by the time she passes a couple of thousand,
I·ll be among the chosen. I said I·d go down in flames trying to get friended by Megan, and right
now, my butt·s on fire. I·m telling you right now that if our dog·s personal trainer (an issue for a
later time) makes it in before I do, I·m suspending her driving privileges. By the way, she·s started
driving. I guess that means she·ll be busier than I can even understand in other places.

Back to our island, Peter (12) would be that Japanese sailor who sneaks onto the island in a WWII
sub. No one really sees him come, and no one sees him go. If you can·t find him, he·s likely sitting
upstairs playing Xbox Live screaming into a headset to his friends that are equally addicted to
videogames. (When he gets a kill, the lyrics ´na na na, hey, hey, goodbyeµ can often be heard
reverberating through the halls.) When he·s not there, you can usually find him sitting on his
computer looking at YouTube videos about people playing video games or stupid human tricks. God
forbid he should ever read a book, and if he does«.yep, you guessed it«.µCodes and Cheats, 18,000+
tested codesµ for video games. A riveting read. He recently said he wanted to be a doctor. I think
it·s a great choice as long as it doesn·t involve physically seeing any patients, and you can shoot them
with a grenade launcher whenever you want. Is that part of the new Obama healthcare plan that I
keep hearing so much about? If I·m going to pay more than half my income, I want to get a grenade
launcher when I see a doctor. Sigh, never mind, don·t get me started.

Anyway, the other night, Peter was performing in his 6th grade holiday sing. Peter was cast as Linus,
a principal role that he was dreading from the date of announcement. In a strange twist of fate,
Peter was brilliant. He might be the most natural Linus since, well, Linus. Peter Yang, reluctant
thespian. I wonder if Shakespeare ever wrote a play featuring a kid who looks like a stick with a
headset playing Call of Duty, Modern Warfare. ´Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow, creeps in
this petty pace from day to day«switch to ray gun (blam, blam)«na na na, hey, hey, goodbye.µ He·s
really an interesting paradox of personalities. One minute you can·t get a word out of him, and he·s
as passive as can be. The next he·s mischievous and verbose. Amy had to affirm to him yesterday
that spreading Purell on his sneaker and lighting it on fire was not okay. See what I mean?

Kevin (10) is definitely Thurston Howell, III. He loves money. He·s always wondering how much
something costs, and injecting commentary on the value/cost delivered. ´That seems very
expensive for what you get, don·t you think, dad?µ If you stop by on a random Saturday, you might
catch him counting the money in his bank«.again. He·s reminds me a bit of Mr. Mooney from The
Lucy Show. All of Megan·s friends want to marry him. He thinks it·s kind of gross.

He·s eating up the 4th grade, which is not unusual since he eats everything else. His growth remains
unabated. Gigante, Enormosaurus, and Jumbo Shrimp are just a few of his nicknames. Get the
picture? However, the most unexpected of nicknames came from a guy named Paul who works for
us, who wrote on his shoe bag ´Kelvin.µ Kevin ran in smiling asking how Paul could misspell his name.
I told him that it·s not obvious where to put the ´Lµ in Kevin, and that one could easily end up with
Klevin or Kevlin. (Puzzled look.)

Lizzie (6 and a dog) would be Mrs. Eunice ´Loveyµ Wentworth Howell. She·s spoiled, lies around the
bed, and is treated like the wife of a millionaire on a deserted island. Someday I·m going to
introduce her to a real dog, one that lives outside and chases squirrels. That will rock her world.

I, of course, would be Gilligan. I try my best to help the castaways, but somehow I always screw it
up. But, each day, I come back for more.

Amy, well, of course she·s Mary Ann«except cooler«and from La Jolla, not Kansas.

Happy Festivus from our island to yours. Having said that, happy Christmakwanzakah!!!. We·ve made
a donation in your name to the Human Fund (if you don·t know what this is, look it up on the Internet).

Xxooo, Ä

Ä (aka Yang·s)