Month: December 2018

There may be a number of lesser known, flying-under-the-radar psychological issues that have gone undetected and / for treated for far too long.  Primary among them is what I call After-Holiday Anxiety, or AHA.  There is, to my knowledge, no known cure because I’d surely have seen the medication advertised on the nightly news. Continue reading “After Holiday Anxiety”

My recent Ode to Christmas shopping demands a follow-up.  Ok, not really sure that it “demands” a successor, but I felt like writing it, so this will be a final penance for faithful readers before the holidays.  Baking Christmas Cookies.  We seldom if ever bake cookies during the regularly scheduled year.  Store-bought is just fine, thanks.  Susan likes chocolate-chip, which I like, but I sometimes deviate to ginger cookies or hermits.  At the holiday season, though, there’s a whole renaissance of cookie baking that somehow is just a part of our humanity.  Someday, scientists will identify the Winter Solstice Cooking Baking gene. Continue reading “The Great New England Christmas Cookie Bake-Off”

As the house fills up with new arrivals and takes on an industrial warehouse look obscuring the house decorations we put out in a nod to tradition. I don’t really like to reuse material that I’ve written before, but sometimes events just overcome the need for originality.  So you’ll know, I did add some new bits along the way to make it seem “fresh”. I figure that if J. S. Bach can steal his own best stuff for his Christmas Oratorio, causing us to have a “wait . . where have I heard that before” moment, I can keep that tradition alive. For that reason, and because in rereading this much still works, I’m sharing the joy once again. Continue reading “The Most Wonderful Time of the Year”

Having bought a new printer recently, I’m at a new experience, attempting to print mailing envelopes.  My old printer did this fairly easily.  It smudged its way through. This one, not so much.  You may have inferred from previous writings that I’m not particularly comfortable in the world of technology, having butt-dialed home about 15 times in rapid succession one day from the grocery store without meaning to or even realizing it.  I was having coffee with some friends a few days ago, and one commented that he missed his old flip phone.  I smiled sympathetically.  I totally get it.  All new electronic devices should have a “moron” or “two steps above plant life” setting for people like me, and this setting should be activated by the sales staff before we walk away. Continue reading “Tech II – Accosted by Engineering”