Hi!

Happy Holidays from Cyberspace! We're impressed that you've come to this blog, to read our very-first-ever Xmas blog. Welcome.

We're happy to report that everything is well with our families in Charlottesville and beyond, and we hope that your Christmas letter will bring similarly good news.

(Kirk, Libby, Janna, Helen, Krista, David)

It's been a year of exotic travel, changes, and opportunities for us.



Our year started out in Madrid, where we stayed with our great friends Pedro and Pura, and their architect daughter, Irene.

























In March, my mother turned .... well, a nice round number. Doesn't she look great? Here's the whole family. (DTG, Diane, Janna, Denny, Mother, Dick, Lydia, Mike [L's husband], Dennis).

That same month I was asked by UVa to be Academic Dean for the first UVa-sponsored voyage of Semester at Sea, which during the summer of 2007 will sail up and down the Pacific Coast of Central and South America, with 450 students and 17 faculty members on board.















I spent two weeks this summer on an inspection voyage, sailing from Honolulu to Taiwan in order to get a sense of the opportunities and challenges posed by this enterprise. It's very exciting, and I'm sure next year's letter will be full of interesting pictures and stories.














Not to be outdone by my mother, Janna had a special birthday this year, too, and decided to celebrate twice -- once with me on a 10-day Rome and the Mediterranean cruise, and again with a gaggle of college girlfriends on yet another cruise off the west coast of Mexico. I had more fun on ours, of course! We spent three days in Rome before climbing aboard the Holland American Noordam, a horizontal five-star floating hotel, where everything gets done by telephone (as in, "Please bring me...."). It was glorious. (We have a blog full of wonderful pictures at http://www.jbirthday2006.blogspot.com -- check it out). A quick trip to Yucatán came in September (the conference was supposed to take place in Oaxaca, but don't ask), which brought a trip to Uxmal and Chichen Itzá.
Kirk and Krista are both flourishing in South and North Carolina, respectively. Kirk teaches Physical and Environmental Science at a magnet school in Charleston; his lovely girlfriend, Libby (an artist), works in a frame shop as she saves to go back for graduate work in design. Krista is now the manager at an Outback Steak House in Durham; her boyfriend Chad is a budding businessman in Raleigh.






October brought the wild and amazing UVa Campaign Kick-off Weekend (they're trying to raise, gasp, $3 billion). One event was a $2 million dinner at which they asked six people to speak, including (drum roll, please) me! As I spoke about international education to nearly one thousand diamond-bedecked guests, my image was projected behind me over a recreation of the Rotunda. I was too nervous to notice anything, but Janna said it was a pretty neat moment.











As the end of the year loomed, Janna and 6 college roommates decided to go on their own "We're of a Certain Age" cruise to Baja Mexico. Janna says she had great fun; I don't wand to know about it. But aren't they gorgeous!







This has been a banner year for bumping elbows with the Rich and Famous. So here goes: the Annual Superficial Moments of Gratuitous Celebrity Worship is full of stuff. Can you identify these people?! (Answers below).
1.2.3.4.5.6.7.8.9.10.11.12.
1. Spanish Film Director Pedro Almodóvar
2. Football stars Tiki and Rhonde Barber
3. Katie Couric
4. Dave Matthews
5. Dave Matthews
6. Robert Duvall
7. Morgan Freeman
8. Virginia Governor Tim Kaine
9. Patti ("Evita") LuPone
10. Actor Liev Schrieber
11. Cellist YoYo Ma
12. Senate Tie Breaker from Virginia, Jim Webb

MERRY CHRISTMAS AND HAPPY 2007!!!!