Today I took down the Christmas tree...

Farewell until next December ornaments, lights that will spend the next 11 months snarling themselves into a ball of plastic yarn, itty-bitty pieces of red and green flotsam and jetsam, wreaths and floral displays, favorite books with Christmas themes, garlands, bows, ribbon, 16 boxes of ornament hangers (that are never found until the next box is purchased), replacement light bulbs that never fit the current string of lights I own, snow village with fake, fluffy field of snowness upon which you rest, candles that are for "show" only and shall never feel the spark and heat of a match. Everything has now been properly returned to its storage place. But Christmas memories are never very far away, because I'll be finding needles from my tree from now until next December...

Christmas blues...

and we're not talking song styles here. I don't want to be where I currently am for Christmas. I want to be in NY with my family. I've have failed the "you'd better not pout" part of Santa coming to town and I will probably have a big lump of coal in my stocking, but I don't care. I don't want to just dream about being "home for Christmas". I want to be there! Okay. The whining is now over...at least for the moment, and I will look for positive things to do this Christmas instead of complaining about what I don't get to do. I'm looking... I'm looking some more... I'm really, really looking hard... I think it's time for some fudge!

Dashing through the snow...

in a one-horse open sleigh...well, that's not exactly how moderns shop here in California as the days until Christmas dwindle down. It's more like "racing through the streets in a big, honkin, elevated pickup truck". We don't have snow and we don't have any sleighs that I've seen in the last three one-half years since I took up residence in the Northern California climes. We don't dash either, we full-out gun it down the roadways, scaring small children, all pets, the elderly and the cautious. We do, however, on occasion and in an off-road vehicle "over the fields we go laughing all the way". Actually, it's maniacally laughing all the way, but that throws the rhythmn of the song off. There are no "bells on bobtails ring"ing, but there are some mighty big horns honking and our spirits aren't very bright but that's probably because we spend too much time in our big trucks and most of the citizens here don't think it's fun to laugh and sing the sleighing song tonight or any other time. Here we have gangs and they sing the slaying song--similar sound, completely different thought process and (pardon the pun) execution.

Maybe the crowd here would have a better time of it with "Here Comes Santa Claus", especially the part about pouting and crying and shouting. Then again, if I made that suggestion, maybe they'd just run over me with their big truck, hold up the
7-11, and as they were making their getaway, shout "and to all a good night". Ho, ho, ho!

When toilets run wild...

I am here at home typing away on my keyboard while a plumber is happily disassembling my toilet so it will stop leaking onto the floor--sounds like my toilet might have bladder problems. I am counting the minutes and the Cha-ching involved in each and every one. Hopefully my toilet's malady will not be the equivalent of a plumber's version of "So You Want to Be a Millionaire". It's amazing how vulnerable most of us are when it comes to fixing complicated elements or systems in our homes. I've watched countless videos on TV about "How to Fix Your Own Toilet", but I still feel it is a daunting task with lots of room for watery error, so the most adventuresome thing I do is to change the toilet paper, and, if I'm feeling extra daring, I change from white toilet paper to something patterned or colored! Woohoo!

Well, I can hear my plumber friend flushing the toilet and I am further reminded of the money that is waving goodbye to me as it swirls away and down, down, down, never to be seen again. Easy come, easy go. I'm feeling flushed (pun intended).

And just when my delusional thinking was kicking in--I was beginning to think that having the water leak out onto the floor was actually a bonus because my floor around the toilet was extra clean--the plumber finished his job and I'll have to return to using a mop and eating peanut butter sandwiches for dinner until I pay for the plumber's child's first year at college...

Why little things make a BIG impression...

It's Sunday night and I have a horrible earache. I thought maybe a spidey had jumped into my ear by mistake--like it wouldn't know the difference between my gaping mouth with the drool and my little pink ear with the small opening!--but whatever the cause, I've been whining since Thursday night when the ear achticus strucketh. I finally went to an urgent care facility yesterday afternoon where a doctor proved that masochism is alive and well in this country--as she poked her ear look into thingy around inside my very painful outer ear canal (which was closed for business). She said she hadn't seen such a swollen canal in a very long time. I just love being a "superlative". I'm soon off to bed where I'll put 10 drops into my totally closed ear and will experience about 2 1/2 hours of sheer, torturous pain as the medicine slowly (and I do mean excruciatingly slowly) drizzles its way down my ear canal which burns like a house on fire. I never thought pain medication was a great thing, but I have converted. Unfortunately, I only have Advil, so my pain takes a long time to subside. I've been thinking of hunting down the pain medication given to my Mom last year at this time and taking that, but it would probably just make me more of a lame-brained almost-senior-citizen than I already am. I'm trying not to embarrass my family, my friends or myself, so I think I'll just stick to Advil and hope that it doesn't take the full seven days of ear drops to clear up... My ear is such a little thing, but it certainly can shout out when it wants to. I vow now to never understimate the power of little things and the impressions they can make in our lives (or at least in our ear canals)!

Make up your mind and then you're done...

Did you know that in current political circles and debates and debates about circles that an individual contemplating election to the office of the President of the United States is never allowed to change his or her mind? It doesn't matter if you have matured, found new information that causes you to re-think a former opinion or position on some topic, or that your life experiences have pushed you to re-consider what you once thought earlier was carved in stone. Nope, it doesn't matter why you might shift your thoughts, the media and your arch enemies (or opponents in the race) will call you a big, fat liar and make you feel ashamed and foolish or at least put a dent in your political efforts. It doesn't matter if the opinion you formed was in third grade, or while you were on a roller coaster and feeling a bit nauseated. None of that matters. What matters is that you once said "A" and now you are saying "B". So, future politicians pay attention here! Never, never, never give an opinion on anything. It will be held against you FOREVER! Now I understand why so many politicians don't want to take a stand, offer a definitive opinion or plan for doing whatever. Now it makes sense why so many of the Washington crowd (and at all levels from local politics up) waffle like a giant Eggo whenever they are asked to commit. It must have been easier to vote back in the Old West or just after the Revolutionary War--news didn't travel fast. Mostly it didn't travel at all unless some political gossip monger decided to saddle up and ride from Boston or NY to Philadelphia or Baltimore. By the time anyone could accuse someone running for office of changing his mind (there were no "her" politicos back then), the election was well over and the winner went about doing what he wanted to do in the first place and forgot all the promises he made...well, some things never change.