Starting 2012 Off

January was a great month, long and full. Mark and Hilde tend to be mood-influenced by the Packers, so the start was great and the loss in the play-offs a real bummer, but after such a record-setting season, Packer fans should not complain. This picture of Rhi at the Fritz Christmas shows a girl ready to tailgate!

On the health side, both Hilde and Mark had some short doses of flu, but Hilde’s father was the one for concern. He took a fall right onto the last decent shoulder and also landed with the inplanted defibrillator under him, leading to a proximal humerus fracture and lots of pain and bruising on the chest. He was hospitalized briefly and is now in rehab for a while to get him through the worst part, and hopefully avoid more surgery. However, Ray is doing pretty well now.

This month’s travel schedule included depositions for Mark down in Madison for two days and then continuing education credits in Waukesha. This very nicely landed on the 80th birthday of Hilde’s mother Arlene, so while Mark was in a seminar, Hilde, sister Terri and Laure and the new octogenarian had a great ladies luncheon. The four look pretty good and definitely look related!

Although January warmer and less snowy than usual, there were also a few nasty snows including one very slippery day where Hilde carefully drove into Wisconsin Rapids (9 miles) and chaired a 15-member meeting by video-conference from four locations with another on speaker phone, instead of everyone trying to get to Wausau . Those modern communication options sure help life along in bad weather! Jim and Kayme rented an off-season cabin in W Virginia to get out in the snow and then hiked around Swallow Falls, with Rhi bundled and perched happily on Dad.

The end of the month was focused on Mark’s preparation for a trial in Wausau. The pre-trial period involves getting boxes and boxes of documents sorted and all the evidence verified, duplicated, numbered, entered into computers and then all of that checked again. Mark has a very good legal assistant and a sharp young associate, which helps a great deal. So the final week of the month ended with Mark in Wausau. Hilde had a heavy-duty meeting at the end of the month then joined him up there in support mode.

Being away from the computer with all the photo files delayed this posting a little. To include a tad of February news: Hilde was able to do a little genealogy, have a wonderful lunch and visit with her friend Katy and then was in court to watch Mark very careful defense and closing arguments. To top everything off, Mark won the case. It was a good month plus!