Post Christmas Ramblings

Consider this entry me cheating on my blog diet. After three days of "starving" myself, trying to write less, and/or to write "healthier" things (like love letters to my wife, Christmas poems for my kids, ballads on the guitar, and my name at the bottom of credit card slips), I've resorted back to by primary staple of indulgence--blogging about nothing and everything.

Merry Day-After-Christmas to everyone. A day possibly involving putting toys together, cleaning up wrapping paper and packaging materials, standing in line in return lines, or jockeying for position on the "Black Friday II" items, or if you're my physical therapist and/or newspaper person and/or wife . . . WORKING! Whatever is going on at your end today, I hope you are still riding high on the waves of the holiday merriment that is upon us and looking forward to the sister holiday of New Year's Eve and not yet fallen back into the humbug drudgery of everyday living.

Speaking of being down, I heard on the High-Def news this morning that holiday sales are down an estimated 8 percent this year, which means our holiday shopping half-life is about 8.31295, or about 8 years, 3 months, 22 days, 15 hours, 53 minutes, 29.681 seconds . . . . about. The pathetically boring mathematicians crunching those numbers (curses to those geeky guys) are obviously not taking into consideration the Christmas my surgeons and doctors have had at my expense this year, nor are they taking my OWN Christmas spending into account, one that saw me retaliate against the mountain of doctor, pharmacy, and hospital bills by spending a little of that earmarked money on lavish gifts for my family. From looking at the post-Santa debris around my house, you would think I went broke buying trash bags just to hold all the used wrapping paper from the gifts now littering every corner of the house.

Here's a partial description of our Christmas "booty."

My daughter got 10 of everything "Hannah Montana," 9 pairs of earrings, 8 necklaces, 7 baby dolls, 6 outfits, 5 golden rings, 4 purses, 3 packages of temporary tattoos, 2 pairs of shoes, and 1 of absolutely nothing.

My son got one nice pair of boots, two video games, three pairs of pants, 4 calling birds, 5 AA batteries, and 6 warnings about not being grateful.

My wife got one beautiful bracelet from the kids, two, yes TWO syphygmomanometers, each with their own aneroid manometer, three pair of undergarments, four hugs and kisses from me, and a high five.

I got one happy wife and two wonderful kids.

Gotta go assemble some toys . . .