It was supposed to be warmer; but the march has begun to negative temperatures, although we are not expecting a great deal of snow. Of course we aren’t expecting it – Fate loves the surprise factor. I don’t know why I am so pissed off about it getting cold and icy; it could be I am looking for an excuse for the mood.

My eyes grew tired while reading just a few hours ago, so I closed them. Now, it is just past midnight and I am awake. Oh. Good. Uh . . . there’s that mood again.

I did wake up to find a nice email from my cousin; made me smile and feel warmth.

After I pushed Publish just a while ago, I looked at my email and saw an offer from Shutterfly – quite a handsome one – and I looked. I should not have done so because I came face-to-face with calendars and this year I did not make the one I had intended, the one that featured Shane. Why am I so distressed by that dog’s death? Obviously, it has linked itself to deep psychological issues in my brain/mind that are gut-wrenching. I could have said visceral, but I might as well be blunt.

It almost doubles me over; my breath is caught between in and out; my throat tightens painfully.

Of course, it is not wise to write such revealing things on the Internet, but then I am not young and looking for college admission or for a job and don’t have to worry about an potential employer seeking out any weaknesses. )Actually, I certainly have given anyone a good enough look by now, what with Poos and Bears and UDO’s.)

They say anything on the Internet is there forever; I hope so, because no matter what the world is made of, somewhere, somehow, I want Shane to know how much I loved him and how much I cherished whatever links to others he had.

Yes, it is January 2nd. I figured it would be, seeing as yesterday was the first. I looked at yesterday’s post, by the way, and see that I used a wrong verb tense, quite probably because I altered my sentence and didn’t proofread. One of my many faults. Well, so be it. I may actually go and open the edit section and change it or I may not. A dratted chore, dontcha know.

I suspect whatever higher powers may be did not like that attitude, because when I took a drink of cola, it tickled the back of my throat and it was all I could do to keep it from spraying across the keyboard as my reflex kicked in – or spat out, as it were.

And so, what now? Well, I don’t know; I’m sort of blah with not even a hint of the idea of a fresh start, a resolution, a determination to put my nose to the grindstone and just get on with it. I believe this could proof to be a problem, one that down the road could lead to my being in tears, gasping through sobs how sorry I am to have been so irresponsible, lazy, unmotivated, whatever.

That was an uplifting thought . . . but that sarcasm did not have a motivating effect. Goodness. I am at a loss. Have I tried entering one of my other latent potential personalities yet? Might be a bit risky, not to mention being assumed to be dementia by those around me. Who IS this nice person? Obviously, doctor, she’s gone round the bend. Then again, there might not be another personality, which is stretching my imagination as does physics. Is the cat dead yet? Sorry, inside joke with Der Bingle.

Well, tomorrow is the third and maybe three is the charm.

It’s January 1st, new month, new year and one of the omens aren’t good. Omen isn’t the right word because that implies a sign of something to come. We don’t need a sign; it’s here. It is cold and we are going to be having snow and slick conditions and more COLD. It feels like 2 degrees out there.

Now, if you want omens or call them indicators if you scoff at the former, look at the time just before midnight and just after last night – the time that horribly tacky looking ball came down on Times Square. I remember remarking it looked like something from The Price is Right. I started to open a can of Diet Cherry Coke – so wrong, it fizzes all over my pants, not because it had been shaken by a New Year’s reveler, but because it was almost frozen. When I relieved the pressure, it geysered out as COLD slush. I don’t know why I am capitalizing COLD all the time now; maybe I am just peeved.

That peevishness could be related to a Words With Friends game I started before midnight and was flattened by soon after. Oh, it was horrendous. And I have to live with it for the next 365 days – unless I die and then it won’t be that long. Someone may put it on a tombstone, though, which is a good reason for the scattering of anonymous ashes.

Now, granted, when I saw the handwriting on the wall – or the pixel tiles on the pixel board, I thought, “Oh heck, blocking is just going to delay the inevitable.” Maybe, but it turned out not blocking was like throwing myself off a cliff. It went downhill from there; I believe that pun was definitely intended.

I started out with a reference to an easy December – not too cold, easy travel. Well, that’s over. The weather prediction is not good for someone in rural Northern Indiana. Now that Shane is gone, I am tempted to put a jar of peanut butter in a basket, put on my red riding hood and camp out by the heat source at the LaGrange house – as long as the cellular connections continue working. Just my Sprint phone, my Verizon ipad and my Kindle with 3G – and my Moo blanket:

What is this? I post on Christmas and then don’t do so again until New Year’s Eve. I guess the daily circumstances of my life are changing. Oh, well, onward with a new path.

I did lose Guido for a few minutes today; black blends in so well, dontcha know. I think he is getting even with me, because as my advisor in Words with Friends, he let me made a big mistake. BIG.

I hope everyone has a good year and I hope I can stay up until midnight. Oh, shoot, I just ate a Christmas delicacy and did not chew 35 times. Well, that bummed me out for the end of the year, because it was the last one and it tasted so very good.

We put the bubble lights that LZP sent on the little crooked tree. And then I added some flat, transparent ornaments that are each embossed with a holiday scene and inherited from my mother. The picture does not do the tree justice:

Oh, I also hung another old ornament on the the lower branches – a Raggedy Ann with a missing leg. And the Homeless Pet ornament and one that says JOY but still has the GoodWill price stamp on it. It’s the little touches, dontcha know.

The drive down yesterday was pleasant in an unusual way. It rained for a good bit of the trip, but the temperature was in the 40’s and climbing and I had no fear of ice developing, plus I had just recently purchased super-dooper windshield wipers. I listened to Christmas carols and the GPS lady’s instructions and made good time, not stopping once.

We spent Christmas Eve grazing on all sorts of little delicacies and some cheese to which I kept adding horseradish. We watched episodes of Foyle’s War, talked on the phone with LZP and somewhere around 10 pm, I nodded off. I think Der Bingle kept on reading. He left me tucked in on the sofa, which is just as well since I always wake early and now don’t have to worry about bothering him while I wait for sunrise.

Time for a soda and Christmas peanut butter . . .

I was going to post and then I was interrupted. I was really busy sewing. I had to go out looking for a tree for Fairborn. I needed to take some people places. Uh, I absolutely needed to read a couple of books. I needed to waste time fretting. The usual stuff.

But I am here now . . . and aren’t you glad? Yes, I’m laughing at myself; my little laptop is jiggling on my chest/tummy as I giggle. Not an out of control Anderson Cooper giggle, but a short little one. It’s over now. Well, except for that last bounce of the keyboard.

But, being here, I find that I have no stories to tell. Okay, there’s one. I was going to run up to the LaGrange house and hike out to the marsh and, using my special pruning saw – a gift from Der Bingle who knows me so well – grab a Charlie Brown volunteer tree for Fairborn. However, I did have to go to Auburn and the Home Depot was right there and so I figured I’d just look in their garden department.

I found a Frasier Fir – tabletop size, with its own little plastic stand. It is a little crooked; we may leave it that way or we may try to tilt it in a compensatory manner. I don’t know. But we will put on the bubble lights LZP sent and maybe I’ll tuck Guido in the branches. It was a joke, Guido!!!! But then again, he would look so cute . . .

I’ll be back, don’t know where, don’t know when . . . some sunny day.

Hello there. This is the one with small hands typing from a bluetoothy keyboard I got as a Christmas present from Der Bingle. This could be liberating.

But here I am again, turning up like a bad penny, or whatever cliche you wish to use.
One week to Christmas!!!!! Whoa, how did this happen? Well, no mind; it has.

Oh, I got an email notifying me that someone had tried to access this blog, which might have led to some interesting posts for a change. Heck, I can barely remember my password.

But never mind that. Here’s a video from The Greene in Dayton. Totally unedited, as you can see from the view of the ground at the end; and totally off-the-cuff, as made obvious by the off camera direction.

I was not wearing my elf bells that hang from a ribbon that sits on my head like a fallen halo – but they were in my purse. You never know when the Elf Alert may sound.

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Oh, drat. I guess I’m going to have to go the YouTube route. Crossing my fingers for luck.

Der Bingle and I went into GoodWill after lunch yesterday and found this ornament. I think it is priceless; but then what do I know.

I do know it will have a place of honor here on our little apartment tree, along with the vintage bubble lights that LZP sent. I will probably do what I did when I was two (so they told me): sit in a rocker and stare at the bubbles. This year I will be thinking of Shane, who is not homeless . . . who lives in my heart.