Hey, everyone! Here I sit, done with classes for the day, but I have a half hour before I can go home, so it seemed like an opportune time to say hello to everyone.
I found a new use for my feadog d today: they are the perfect tool for prying out guitar pegs to change the strings. 
Less than a month before the Rocky Mountain Boys make their world premier with the Chieftains! Sarah, the lovely lady in my life, is really looking forward to meeting all of you! Methinks this gathering will be one for the bards to sing of far, far into the misty future.
Put a friend of mine to rest yesterday, and gave the eulogy at his funeral. It was quite hard. Though of Arapahoe decent, he was a lover of a well-rendered highland pipe tune. No piping nor Indian singing at the service, unfortunately.
I’ve greatly enjoyed the discussion on LOTR. I’ve read the books at least 4 or 5 times, and can’t wait for the movie. I plan on taking my mother, the ultimate Tolkien fan (when I was in school, my family traveled to Oxford. She insisted on making a pilgramage to the “Eagle and Child”) if the movie happens to be in Worland over Christmas. My favorite Tolkien characters, by the way, are Legolas (perhaps because he too is tall, thin, blond, and shoots a bow?) and Sam, who seems to symbolize the triumph of the seemingly insignificant. Good news for some of us.
I’ll close by thanking all of you for all the laughter, information, inspiration. And like Ron, I hope to meet more of you at some point. Perhaps a Chiff and Fipple World Convention. We could have it here, in Lander. (we have two hotels, and a campground) 
Merry Christmas, and may God bless you all with your soul’s needs and heart’s desires.
Thomas