Hi, everybody: A very merry Christmas to you all. I'm off to work, to change some backup tapes -- and use the T-1 line ALL by myself! My children and I exchanged gifts day before yesterday, and my son has flown to visit his mother in Phoenix. My daughter is recovering from working the last few days, and will spend the day at friends, whenever she decides to get up. We have a BEAUTIFUL white Christmas here in the Chicago area, although most of the native Illinoisans are tired of winter already. Still, it reminds me of home in Vermont. I think I'll take some pictures outside at work, too. The property has a small forest preserve on two sides. This is the first Christmas since the early 1800's that the old Dutton farmhouse in the Dutton District of Springfield, Vermont will not have anyone living in it. Since there is nobody to carry on farming there, my aunt has done the only sensible thing and sold it. My grandfather and great-grandfather were both born in that house. . . . I can still taste the doughnuts my grandmother cooked on the old wood stove there. She could regulate the temperature on that thing to a tenth of a degree, I think, and she wouldn't give it up even though my grandfather asked her many times if he couldn't buy her a gas stove. I think he may have been trying to get out of chopping wood <grin>. I realize now (having been exposed to Dunkin Donuts and Krispy Creme) that if you put three of grammie's doughnuts on a rope, you could anchor a rowboat with them; but what I wouldn't give for the taste of one now, and a view out the farmhouse kitchen window toward Mount Ascutney. Just rambling, and getting a bit misty eyed. I would like to remind everybody, not that you need it really, that this is the time of year that brand-new computers get hooked up to the Internet and many newbies decide that this is the time to "do their family tree", expecting to get it all done by New Year's. We know how hopeless that task is, but they may not. . . . Have patience and mercy, and put up with their foibles in the same spirit as the One who started this whole Christmas thing by sending us the most precious gift possible, in spite of our attitude toward Him. And a happy New Year, new century, and new millenium to all as well (no, it WASN'T last year <big grin>). Darrell Rootsweb List Admin for VTGEN, VTCALEDO, VTLAMOIL, VTORANGE, VTWINDSO, FELCH, FORBUSH, LAMSON, LOWER, ROUSSEAU, and RUSSEAU [email protected]