Subject: Weekend Update: January 15-17, 1999
Date:    Mon 1/18/99  9:18am

Not a few people have been commenting that just about the only
email they've been getting lately is the regular weekly bits
they get from me!  So, start sending out the email, folks.  It
usually goes like this: You send some, you get some.  So update
a friend, or relative.  My "Life's Little Calendar" says "Call
two friends this week and tell them how much they mean to you."
Not bad advice; spend some internet capital.

Winter weather washed work out on Friday.  For the benefit of those
outside the New England area, Pepperell got peppered with a weather
system that took me back 35 years to Butler, New Jersey.  I can still
remember a snow long ago that was followed by freezing rain.  It was
very curious to a 4-year old to be able to walk on top of the snow as
I did back then.  We got a similar one-two punch but the most curious
thing about this past weekend's snow is that it supported the weight
of this 39-year old.

Our side yard has a gentle slope, and so I set up Andrew to slip down
the ice on a sled there.  I lept off the porch onto a small bank of
snow thinking surely I'd break through the crust and into the snow up
to my ankles, but the ground did not give and I ended up on my
backside.  Joy chuckled from behind the study window.  It took us an
hour to go six inches in our driveway.  We're hoping the wachy weather
has enough heat (50 degrees today but rainy) to melt us back to
normal.

My brother John has a birthday today.  I don't know if he observes it
today or not anymore.  He has threatened on more than one occasion to
celebrate it on a warm July day instead of January. (I'll bet most of
you on the Weekend Update don't yet know that John has more dogs than
children - and he has three of the human type. Maybe he'll get his own
puppy for his birthday.)  My nephew's wife, Erin celebrates her
birthday tomorrow.  My daughter Emily's is on Superbowl Sunday; I
guess we'll have a party!

This year, I decided to get in on the pine car frenzy at church.
Caravan children have a pine car race competition in February but in
years past, there has been an unofficial adult competition that has
been growing in popularity.  I made the mistake of leaving it out when
Paul Hunt came by the house.  He said he's been working on a pine car,
too, but offered this information only after he got a real good look
at my top secret design. What do you make of that!?  Stay tuned.

Mark
Surfin'   ***       Mark Metcalfe
 the    ***  \o     Cadence Design Systems, Inc.
'Net   **** \ |\    270 Billerica Road, MS04
      ****** <<     Chelmsford, Massachusetts 01824
     *******  \     Phone: (978) 446-6451
-----------------   Fax:   (978) 446-6351