Atlantic City Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving is an American Holiday and our kids take their kids and go to their in-laws to celebrate it and come to us at Christmas. The last couple of years Sue and I have gone to Atlantic City for the holiday break. We leave on Wednesday and come back on Friday morning, lovely jubbly. This year we went, even though we're both sick as parrots and stayed in the Tropicana Casino. The pictures are of Sue and the Christmas Tree and a couple of the French Quarter where all the best restaurants are. The tree is interesting, they have a snow machine in the ceiling so every now and then it's snowing inside, very Christmasy!! Between us we managed to come away a couple of hundred up on the trip so that was a good result, even though Sue was convinced we were going to hit the big jackpot. Oh, well, there's always next year for that........

Tommy

Young Tommy with his Nan

Emily Rose

Emily looking very grown up and tres chic !!!

Michelle & Family

Michelle's Family

Grandkids

Tommy, Jack and Maggie Marte

Casino Royale

The last James Bond movie, Casino Royale, was a great film. When we were in the Bahamas we made a point of going for a drink in the Ocean Club where a lot of the filming was done. The Ocean Club was where Bond parked the bloke's car, and where he watched the girl and her horse from the sea.

The first photo shows the Ocean Club hotel from the ocean side.

In the second photo, of Wayne and Cheryl, you can see how crowded the beach gets..... just like Southend really!!

The third is of me in the beach-side bar..... Dowler, Bill Dowler, double-oh-eight-and-a-half.

Dinner with Debbie & Andy

Had dinner with Debbie and Andy and Wayne & Cheryl on Friday night. Debbie cooked.... great food as always, even better when shared with good friends !!!

Swimming Lessons

Maggie and Jack have swimming lessons (with the Water Nazi) every Saturday....

Marte and Zumchak (all half Dowler though)

Lots of pictures of the Twins lately, so I thought I'd put up one of the rest of the grandchildren, otherwise I'll be getting into trouble!!
From the left: Jack, Tommy, Emily and Maggie..... Good looking kids, they take after their grandparents on their Mother's side (and their Father's side too, actually we're all splendid looking old farts!!!!).

Twins - Nov 1st

Katie (top) and Olivia (bottom) on November 1st 2008.

Who needs pictures on the wall?

One of my favourite photos from our trip to Lisa's in the Bahamas. Sue took this pic from Lisa's living room sofa. Awesome!!!

Evaluation of the Peg Draw in the WCC

My friend Wayne and I fished in the World Carp Classic up on the St. Lawrence River in New York state. This picture should make it clear what we thought of the peg we drew..... after 5 days and two fish!!!!! The organizers, in their wisdom, scheduled the event to coincide with all the carp moving out of the river to spawn. We fished a desert for a week and spent a fortune on beer.