Christmas 1998
Hello Everyone!
Once again, it's almost that time of year ... Christmas! My favourite time of year ... and really, it's not just because of all the food, egg nog, and presents! :-) You'll be happy to hear that this year I am definitely going to make this Christmas letter shorter! If it doesn't fit on 2 pages, I am going to mail myself with your letter! That's a promise! :-) I can't promise not to use both sides of the page though! :-) So anyways, here is a bit of a summary of what I've been up to over the last year:
I'm playing for the Mississauga Chiefs in the women's AAA league again this year. Last year we lost in overtime to the North York Aeros at the Ontario Provincial Championship. This season we're in 3rd place out of 8 teams. This season is even more exciting than last because we have 3 teams from Montreal and a team from Ottawa in our league. This means more team trips! Yes! :-) My injury is feeling much better than it did in the past. I was the Chiefs' "Player of the Month" for October 1998! :-)
This year we went in 3 inline hockey tournaments (Sacramento California,
Atlanta Georgia, and Las Vegas Nevada). The highlights of the
Sacramento tournament were: my friend Bizu from Switzerland flew over
to join our team; Manon Rhéaume invited us to her place for a BBQ; and
we had a fun day in San Francisco before flying back to Toronto -- a
fisherman took us to see the Golden Gate Bridge and Alcatraz! Here are
the tournament results:
* Rinko de Mayo (Sacramento): 1st place
* North American Roller Hockey Championship (Atlanta): 2nd place
* USA Inline Cup (Las Vegas): 2nd place
My personal stats were 17 games played: 45 goals & 12 assists.
I was asked to play for Team Canada at the World Roller Hockey Championship in Argentina in November, but unfortunately Canada decided not to send a team because too many of the players who were asked could not commit because of commitments to the ice hockey national team. Oh well, maybe in 2 years time in Germany, if my injury holds up.
This year I had visits from Monika Profos who I met when I was playing hockey in Switzerland, my friend Rich Arakelian (a Computer Science classmate at the University of New Hampshire (UNH)) who now lives in Dallas, my former roommate Hiroko Seya who is a professor in Japan, and my friend Janet Cameron who lives in Edmonton.
Last spring our friend William Quon took Marc & me to the first ever CIAU Nationals for Canadian women's university hockey, which was held in Montreal. We watched Concordia University beat my former team, the University of Toronto, 4-1 in the final game. Hmmm, that would be fun to play at a CIAU National Championship ... I wonder if it's worth going back to university for a PhD? .... not a chance!! :-)
Some of the highlights of the summer were playing a bit of softball, a
BBQ at the Toronto Island with the Computer Science Dept. at the U of
Toronto, and a BBQ with our good friends Sylvia & Brien Holmes who had
returned from Al Ain, United Arab Emirates for a few months. We had an
excellent weekend with a group of U of T women's hockey players at
Hilary Korn's cottage in Smith Falls in July. We also made it up to
our cottage on Louck's Lake (near Apsley) and we drove to Sudbury for a
weekend to visit Marc's sisters Raymonde (& her husband Marcel) and
Pauline for Raymonde's birthday. I went to Windsor for one week in
August to instruct at the Ultimate Edge hockey school. In September, Marc
and I went to the Niagara Grape & Wine Festival in St. Catherines and to
my Grandma's 90th birthday party in Grimsby, Ontario.
We saw two concerts during the summer. We saw Garolou at the St Jean Baptiste's Day concert and we saw La Bottine Souriante at the Canada Day concert. This was good practice for my French! :-)
At the end of August I moved into a house with 3 hockey friends (Sue
Ann Van Damme, Heather Richardson, and Stephenie Summerhill). I must
say that you don't realize how much junk you accumulate until you have
to pack up and move it all! Please update your address book with my
new address and phone number. My new address is 275 Delaware
Avenue, Toronto, ON M6H 2T7, and my phone number is 416-538-9617.
My e-mail address is andria@whockey.com and my web site is
www.whockey.com. If you've sent anything to my old address, it will be
forwarded until February 1999.
I have been staying very busy with work as usual. I work for my own company called ALH Computer Solutions. I do a lot of private tutoring in the Java programming language and internet related contract work. I also do some teaching work at the University of Toronto for a first year programming course. I'm still volunteering a ton of time to work on my Women's Hockey Web (www.whockey.com) Internet site. A friend of mine, Wayne MacIsaac, is helping me to develop a new interface for the web site, which we eventually plan to market for advertisement.
We attended 2 weddings this past summer. My cousin Dean Bolton got married to Diana in July. My roommate, teammate, and good friend Keely Brown married Walt Coburn at her parents' cottage on Lake Huron in September.
A few years ago I was writing in my Christmas letters that everyone was
getting married, now I have to announce that everyone is having a baby!
* cousin Kathy (née: Todd) & husband Jeff Zajac
* cousin Colin Todd & wife Debbie (baby boy, Caden, Dec 5)
* best friend from UNH Heidi (née: Chalupnik) & husband Tom Kubichek
* cousin Jamie McCollum & wife Brenda
* former teammate Laurie Taylor-Bolton & husband Kerry
* friend Cathy Coughlin
Okay, well, you're never going to believe this, but I do have one other wedding to announce. Yes, you might have guessed it, Marc & I are now officially engaged and are planning to get married sometime in the summer of 1999! The engagement happened on the evening of December 4th, 1998. He invited me over for a candlelight dinner, and surprised me afterwards with a rose and a note that read, "Veux-tu m'pouser?"
On the weekend before Christmas, my hockey team has planned a skiing
weekend in Collingwood, Ontario. This is one of the few weekends where
we don't have any hockey. My birthday is just before Christmas, so a
few of my friends are planning to come to the Hunter Farm in
Peterborough for a day of fun in the snow (if there is any!) a few days
before Christmas.
We'll celebrate Christmas as usual by going to the Lakefield United Church for an evening service on December 24th and then we'll head over to my Uncle Allan & Aunt Pam's for a little egg nog afterwards! Hopefully Santa will find the Hunter Farm on the morning of December 25th. After we open our presents, we'll go to Bill's (my sister Leslie's husband) parents' place in Toronto for a visit, and then we'll continue to St Ann's, Ontario (Niagara) for a Christmas turkey dinner with my Aunt Sunny (my Dad's sister) & Uncle Neil and their family. On December 26th & December 27th, I'm right back into hockey, with 2 games in Mississauga & one in New York at Niagara University. Marc's heading home to Kapuskasing (9 hours straight north, but still in Ontario) to be with his parents and sisters for Christmas, so I won't see him for a full week! We plan to go to Bill's parents' cottage for New Year's Eve.
As many of you have probably heard, my Dad unfortunately left my Mom for another woman shortly after Christmas 1997. As you can imagine, these were particularly tough times for my mom, and I would like to thank everyone who has supported her throughout these hard times. The good news is that my Dad is no longer with this other woman and a reconciliation with my Mom might be possible. Please keep both my parents in your thoughts and prayers.
My Mom is busy as usual with her Bed & Breakfast on the Hunter Farm. She had the flowerbeds looking incredible during the summer, and tidied up the barn so much that you could almost eat off the floor! She extracted the honey and has started selling Christmas trees. Her health is better than it has been in years!
My sister Leslie (who lives with her husband Bill in Etobicoke) competed in a ton of Mountain Biking races across Canada and the United States as usual. She was ranked 9th overall in Canada, and she placed 5th in the Canada Cup series. My younger sister Nancy is keeping busy as usual. She and her boyfriend Dave just got back from a vacation in Mexico. They have been playing in a ball hockey league together and have taken up Tae Kwon Do. I just knew it would happen ... she's going to practice some moves so that she can beat me up for all those times I used to pick on her when she was little!
I wish you and your loved ones a very Merry Christmas, and all the best for the New Year!
Take care & God bless! Love,
Andria & Marc 
XOXOX