This is 17.2% of my late blackberry. My hypothesis is that the other 82.8% is in the treads of tires or reground to dust. You see when I left my blackberry sitting atop the trunk of my car at a gas station yesterday, it fell to the street as I left. By the time I had driven 11 miles to my home from the gas station,  panicked, and then driven 11 miles back to the gas station, numerous vehicles had passed over the spot in the street where it had fallen. Locating these remains required extensive forensic work on my part…..R.I.P.

On a brighter note, I found a Christmas present today from my daughter, Julie.

I like this because it is red and it has long sleeves. Granted, one might assume I am a Detroit Redwings fan, but in reality I know nothing about them and I don’t follow hockey. Even though I don’t like the idea of wearing corporate logos unless I am being paid to do so, I am completely OK if this helps Detroit in its economic recovery. This could be the beginning. You’re welcome, Detroit. You can thank Julie. (Click on “The Prothros” to the right to see how Julie is also helping the Colorado economy in her December 29 post. She’s got an eye for this stuff.)

I have been thinking about value. One good by-product of a bad economy is you ask yourself more often when you buy something or do something, “Is it worth it?….”Or was that worth more or less to me than “X?”. That line of thinking spawns an appreciation of previously unnoticed value. There’s needs to be some thought given to value grading. For example, a formula could be: Personal Value Grade (“PVG“) = my level of enjoyment (it has to be personal)/cost (could be time or money or hassle…need to work that out…). Maybe put it on a scale of 1 to 100. I think it will be foolproof because it will your personal value grade. Who can tell you were wrong?

Here’s how it might apply to restaurants or gifts:

Restaurants: You go to one of your previous favorite expensive restaurants. Maybe with wine it costs $100/ person. (I know “expensive” is relative but go with me on this…). For that you get a nice wine, great food, great service, great atmosphere etc. For that you pay $100. PVG = 55 An average score for a great meal and experience, but you paid for it to be that great. Remember, the idea is relative enjoyment in the eyes of the one grading. By contrast, you go to a little dive restaurant and have chips and chile con queso…. I mean life-changing, killer, chili con queso. You fight over it with those at the table. You get more. You snarf it all down again. Less than $10 easy. PVG = 90 Way more delight than expected. You keep thinking about that queso…for weeks…

I have to work on this grading system leaving room for something else out there…something nirvana-like that I have yet to experience. I also need to get some R&D help from my kids and their spouses who know what I’m shooting for here. I just don’t have enough gray matter to raise the concept of PVG to the clarity it deserves.

Gifts: Let me say I had two 90-plus, PVG moments yesterday. My son, Luke, gave me a set of these:

I first experienced napkins with buttonholes when I got upgraded on airlines to first class in the early 90s. On occasion since then I have commented in passing to my son and others about how much I liked those napkins. Small things. High enjoyment. High PVG. The airlines don’t have these on domestic flights anymore. Well, enter Luke, my son. After conducting a search for these napkins, he decides instead to make them for me. So, he teaches himself how to sew buttonholes. By the way, he welds, does carpentry, does big church productions, fixes all my tech issues (easily I might add). He has this renaissance man air about him. So, he teaches himself how to sew and makes me these napkins for Christmas.No logos. No plans to make this a business. Just for me. Big PVG.

Then, Meg, Luke’s bride, gives me dulce de leche she made. Meg, knowing how ubiquitous this stuff is in Argentina, knew how much much I missed it. It is rather obscure in the states. A kind of divine nectar. She put it in its own little jar complete with a little spoon. A delight. If I find a picture I will post it later. Again, Big PVG

Somehow I need to figure in to the formula the cost to the giver or provider (in time, money, thought, hassle, etc.) because that kicks the PVG up dramatically. Kind of the idea of the widow who gave two mites (all she had) in the temple as recorded in the Bible story. This seemingly small, obscure act was the one that turned the head of Jesus. It was a delightfully high PVG moment for Jesus. Consequently, it is memorialized for all to read in 2009, a couple of thousand years later.

So give me some help here with the formula.  In the meantime, high PVG moments to you.

Every year we put  together a letter to go out with our Christmas picture/card. This year we are taking one step closer to advancing right into the 90s. This is our Christmas letter that I don’t have to fold and stuff into an envelope! Plus, for those of you who are unable to sleep, there are 67 posts on this blog going back to August of this year. Read enough, your sleep will return.

Most of the blogs relate to our 10 weeks in Argentina. I left Marsh on July 31 of this year and since we had a little time, we decided to go to Argentina. Now we are back in Scottsdale and I’m looking for a way to re-enter the workforce. I continue to hope that however I re-enter the workforce we will be able to spend more time in Argentina.

Here’s the recap:

• Cynthia’s tutoring and working at Macy’s and mentoring young women…when she’s not hangin with me…(See “My Girl” post).
• Luke, Meg and Colin are the fun little family experiencing some rich years of life. There are great pictures of them on Julie’s blog (Click link to “The Prothros” to the right and go to December 7 “Brother amd Company”. Julie’s blog will also get you to Meg’s blog. Meg is quite the writer.)
• Julie and Evan (and Molly our grand-dog) are living the dream in funkadelic Austin, Texas surrounded by the core of Texas culture (see post “To other places starting with A”).

Another cool thing: My dad and I went to Ireland and Northern Ireland back in May with the excuse of tracing our heritage. Doing that with my dad was on my bucket list. Loved it. My dad gets sweeter as each year passes. He is 84 and he is close to my heart. He even tried a Guinness to appease me (He doesn’t drink.)

Well, we really hope you have a great Christmas and that it sinks in a little deeper that this story of Jesus really happened and that He is unambiguously telling you and me to trust Him. This sweet little baby grew up and clearly said that no one can come to God but through Him (John 14:6).

Feliz Navidad

So, I was standing in line at the post office along with about 20 other people waiting to get our mail after being away for Thanksgiving. Waiting patiently along with the rest of us was Randy Johnson:

At 6′10″, he is hard to miss. The Big Unit.

Billy Hallstrom invited me to my first Diamondbacks game. We sat right behind home plate about five rows back. Randy Johnson had just arrived in Phoenix for the first time and was pitching. He was terrifying to watch. The speed. The scowl. 6′10″. His left hand seems to reach half way to home plate. He looks crazy when he pitches. Nolan Ryan once said it doesn’t hurt if the batter thinks you’re a little crazy. Once I saw RJ, I was amazed at what it takes to willingly stand next to the plate with him pitching.

As he left the post office I said, “Mr. Johnson, you’re the reason I got interested in baseball again”. He smiled and said , “Sorry about that”.

Yesterday, a lady I did not know stopped by our house to tell us that Juan Rodriguez died Saturday morning. Juan has taken care of our lawn and bushes for 15 years. Juan was honorable and reliable. He was skilled. He had dignity through his work. I will miss Juan. I wish I had taken more time to know him.

When you sample 6 famous pizza places in Buenos Aires in two and a half hours late at night and film it, this is what you look like. This is Marcos Bongarra. He filmed the attached (see youtube address below) documentary which I promised in my previous blog “Tour de Pizza”. He’s good.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kZLQGP9XWPE

However, Marcos’ greater claim to fame is that he is married to the beautiful Lilia (see my blog “French Flies”). Last week they became proud parents of these twin boys:

We had threatened to do it for years….leave before 6am on a driving trip. We finally did it today as we left Austin. That is also why I was having breakfast at Mel’s Diner in Giddings while my bride was sleeping in the car in the parking lot. Our car was easy to spot as it was the only one in the parking lot. The other twelve vehicles were pick-ups. The sign said, “MEL’S DINER FINE FOOD”. Note the emphasis on FINE. It was written just like that. I knew right off that this was the right place to be at this time on a Wednesday morning.

A nice lady I will call “Mel” was in charge. Not sure if she was really “Mel” but she was clearly in charge: took the orders, brought the food, greeted the customers, brought them used newspapers, poured coffee refills, knew everybody, and ran the register. Occasionally, in the background the cook shouted, “Order up!“… a very clear means of communication between the kitchen and the waitstaff. The waitstaff (Mel) could hear the kitchen (the cook) because she was about 6 feet away.

Eggs over easy, sausage, hash browns, biscuits, gravy, butter, strawberry jam, and the big surprise was that the coffee was really good. I am one raised on Texas truck stop coffee that generally was either weaker than tea or it had boiled down to a burnt concentrate. I am a recovering coffee snob and I was impressed.

Go to Mel’s in the event you’ve forgotten what real Texans are like.

Austin. Although it is home to the arch-enemy of the fightin’ Texas Aggies, I still love this city. The common motto is “Keep Austin Weird”. The residents are doing a fine job of that. I must tell you that any place that has a public statue memorializing Stevie Ray Vaughan has my respect. They know something special when they see it. The live music here is among the best anywhere.

Eclectic food. Perhaps unrivaled in the number of trailer restaurants, Austin delivers a tasty variety very affordably. Although “Frank” is not a trailer restaurant it has a niche offering.

http://www.hotdogscoldbeer.com/eats.html

Here’s what I had this afternoon.

Pearl beer. I didn’t think they made it anymore. It claims to be Texas’ oldest beer. Pearl was a much maligned beer by Texans I grew up with, but I must say this is a pretty good drink for $1.00. (We waited 15 minutes for happy hour to kick in.)

My dog. I elected the “pork it” option for my Chicago Dog. That means they split the Vienna beef dog, stuff it with white American cheese, wrap it in bacon and deep fry it. Then, they build the Chicago Dog which consists of a poppy seed bun, the Vienna beef dog (prepared as described), pickle, tomato, onion, day-glo relish, sport peppers (those “sporty” yellow things on top), celery salt, and mustard. About 965 calories a bite.

My girl, Cici, went for the plain dog with sauerkraut and onions. (The healthy option). It looked great but how could I have missed out stuffing a hot dog with cheese, wrapping it in bacon and deep-frying it? I might not get that opportunity again.

1. Don’t count Argentina out. In my post “Turn out the lights…” I said it looked like Argentina was out of World Cup 2010. I was wrong. Subsequently, Argentina played Peru  in Buenos Aires and El Milagro de San Palermo (the miracle of Saint Palermo) occurred. Argentina coach, Diego Maradona, came up with this phrase. The game was tied 1-1 near the end of the first half. There was lightning and a torrential rain when right before half-time a crazy goal was scored by Palermo, one of the Argentina forwards. The storm was so bad, the game was declared over by the officials. Consequently, Argentina has now qualified for the World Cup.

2. Pizza tastes better if eaten at a place that’s been in business continuously for more than 50 years. All eight of the places in our Tour de Pizza were more than 50 years old. Here was our last leg of the Tour:

El Fortin is the favorite place of Velez fans. The Velez soccer stadium is nearby. I would put any of the eight places we visited up against any I have been to in the states. I have never been to a pizza place in the states that was over 50 years old.

3. Hospitality can change the world for the better. People ask me why I love Argentina. It is the people I have met and the hospitality and kindness they have shown me. It has been overwhelming every time I have been there. Sure, it is an exciting, beautiful place with great food, awesome resources, well-educated, warm people, an intriguing history, and a promising future….but it has its problems like everywhere else. Other people’s experiences in Argentina may be different, but I love it and the people I have met there.

Hebrews 13:2 says: “Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for by this some have entertained angels without knowing it.” Notice to those in Argentina who have shown us kindness and hospitality: we are not angels in disguise. However, my sincere hope for you is that angels will visit you and that the One they serve will touch your lives.

It is common knowledge that the transition from a foreign environment to one’s native environment requires some form of decompression. For example, anyone who ever watched Seahunt knows that if you come up too quickly from scuba-diving in the depths of the ocean you can get the bends. Without proper decompression you can croak….and that’s bad.

Coming back from Argentina we needed such decompression. We stopped in Dulles airport (Washington, DC) at 6:30 am for 10 hours. When you fly on points sometimes you get to enjoy longer layovers. In our case this was literally true. It was the perfect decompression for us. We got to visit our long-time friends, the Sheas, in nearby Falls Church, VA.

Eggs for breakfast…a simple thing that does not happen in restaurants in Argentina other than on an exception-basis. Cecily and Lance served us this tasty egg casserole and mimosas. Yum and amen. (Check out the cool stove).

This is Lance. He knows all about elephants. He knows how to find wine values. (Thanks to Lance, years ago I got a Screwpull wine opener way before they became widely popular.) He grills experts about environmental and pharmaceutical issues. He knocks heads with big time lawyers. He knows how to host a US presidential inauguration overnighter. He plays guitar. He shoots skeet. He sings…and he knows about fixing up old houses…and, more importantly, he is married to Cecily.

You examine every little knob and faucet and delayed-drawer-closer in their home and you experience delight. This is well-done.

This is Cecily and her daughter, Kallen, helping Cynthia decompress. Cecily and Lance are originally from Scottsdale. Cecily gave Cynthia the lay of the land before we moved to Scottsdale in the early 90s and made our original entry a good one.

Today, Cecily is hangin with the big dogs in DC. She is connected. She knows people.

One key to our decompression was Thai spice and heat. The Sheas sensed this and took us to the right place. Finally, after 10 weeks, I got food that made me sweat. It is commonly known that if you’re eating Thai food and it doesn’t make you sweat you should ask whether you’re really eating Thai food. It did the trick.

I did not get the bends. I did not croak.

Later in the evening, back in Scottsdale, my grandson Colin was holding my hand, leading me around showing me my house.