Back from a week of skiing, knees more or less intact. We went to St. Anton in Austria, a rather high-end place that has set back our vacation budget until about 2008. Nevertheless the skiing was excellent, the friends were great, and I can only heap praise on the hotel-- great food well served and facilities that included a swimming pool, sauna/steam bath complex, and kid care from 4 to 9 PM.

I did serious "off-piste" skiing for the first time in my life, and not only lived to tell the tale but actually enjoyed it. For you connoisseurs out there, a face full of Austrian snow tastes about the same as in the Poconos so don't waste your money on a plane ticket.

Louis rang in his fifth birthday while on vacation, and his primary interest is still doing anything that permits him to go faster than he safely should. Skiing, biking, you name it. I'm thinking of buying him reinforced Kevlar underwear.