When school was out I left for New Jersey. I left on Wednesday and got there on Thursday afternoon. When I got to Anchorage I found out that my airline, America West, quit flying to Anchorage, so there I was without a ticket home to see my family at Christmas.

When I called America West they told me that they had rebooked me on Continental Airlines, but when I went to Continental they told me that I had a reservation but I would have to pay for it again. What a hassle! After about one hour of calling and discussing the matter with Continental and America West, they finally gave me my ticket. I was so glad it worked out. The idea of Christmas in the Anchorage airport really scared me.

I spent Christmas and New Year's with my family and friends. I walked almost every day on the beach. Some days it was really warm, almost 70 degrees.

One day I went to New York to see a play. Before the play I went to a fancy restaurant for dinner. My mother's family is Irish, so the day before I came back to Marshall they had a special St. Patrick's Day celebration for me. This was the first time in seven years I had attended the celebration.

For Y2K I had already bought a lot of food and candles. So I just bought a

couple of boxes of bottled water. I wasn't too worried about it, though, because I didn't really think anything was going to happen.