It's that time of the year again: the snow is falling, parking lots at the mall are packed, horrible musak Christmas music is being played everywhere, and dozens of Christmas form-letters like this one show up in your mailbox. Chalk it up to the hustle and bustle of living at the end of the 20th century.

And another year filled with activity it has been. I'm still working for Bristol Technology here in Connecticut; it's now been almost two years since I moved from Michigan. The company continues to do very well--we've nearly doubled in both size and revenue since last year. My job is usually fun and almost always challenging in some way; this past year I spent most of my time working to bundle our software for the first time with a vendor's operating system (Digital's OpenVMS). Things continue to look very bright for Bristol; 1996 should be another exciting year!

The nature of being part of a small company like Bristol is that everything seems to revolve around the office. This isn't always bad as we do many non-work activities together (only a small number of the employees are from Connecticut). In addition to the usual things such as a company picnic and a Christmas party, we spent a Saturday at Great Adventure in New Jersey. Early next year, we're all going skiing, (snow, not water) together. And we have foosball and ping-pong tables in the office.

While I do spend a considerable amount of time at the office (although not entirely in vain, considering the nice bonuses), it's not "all work and no play". This spring I bought a towing vehicle for my boat--a GMC Jimmy. It was a long 18 hours on the road bringing my boat from Michigan to Connecticut, but the great weather this summer made it worthwhile. Some weeks I managed to go water skiing almost every day; I'm definitely no Sammy Duvall, but this summer I finally felt comfortable slaloming. I was also hoping to improve my running this year enough to finish the New York City Marathon; as fate would have it I was accepted into the marathon, but couldn't get over a spring knee injury. The good news is that I'm guaranteed entry into the '96 race.

Unless you've been living in a cave, you know the big news in computers this year is "the Internet". As one who's been "surfing the net" for over seven years, I find all the hype and accompanying misconceptions rather amusing. But, if you're out driving on the "Information Superhighway", stop by and visit my home page at http://www.bristol.com/~dan.

Except for grandma, most of you are probably bored by now. So I'll end by wishing you a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!