Countdown to My Birthday
* Christmas * -- Sherry / Twas the Night Before.... [wmv] -- Sherry / Light Displays -- Me / Sweet Potato Latkes [recipe]-- Me / Make A Snowflake [interactive] -- RonM / I Saw Momma Kissing Santa Claus --DLit / an Inspirational Christmas Classic -- Me / Your Photo on TIME - Person of the Year [interactive] -- Me / TIME Person of the Year 2005 A -- Me / TIME Person of the Year 2005 B -- RonM / TIME Person of the Year 2005 C -- RonM / NORAD Tracks Santa --
Sherry / TIME Person of the Year 2005 D -- Deb / BAD Reindeer -- Deb / a Happy Santa -- Sherry / Not a Florida Winter -- Flin / 12 Days of Christmas -- Cindy / Snowball Fight [interactive] -- Esther / eCard -- RonM / Holiday Chocolate Source -- Nancy / Snow Globe [interactive] -- Flin / I'm Dreaming of a White Christmas -- Jmse / Santa Converts -- Me / The New Scrooges -- Me / It's a Wonderful ........ -- Meg / eCard -- Kyra / eCard -- Kyra / eCard - Screen Shot -- Joan / What The Kid Said -- Kyra / December Lingerie Pinup --
Me [these links may be overworked and load slowly as they have in the past, unless, perhaps, you have a fast connection] / Live Cams - New Years Eve - World -- Me / Live Cams2 - New Years Eve - World -- Me / Live Cams - New Years Eve - Times Square --
Flin / HAPPY NEW YEAR [interactive] -- BillK / eCard -- Kyra / New Years eCard -- Cyndi / eCard -- Care2 / eCard -- Joan / eCard --
13 December 2005 / Tuesday -- it is 16 degrees outside and is not expected to go above 20 during the day today, snow and ice is on the ground, more winter storms are expected later this week, and I still have ot figured out what Christmas greeting I will make and send, nor do I have my 2005 card list made yet! So I do not want to spend a lot of time filling this page with lots of stuff until I play catchup on these other things -- hang in there pleeze
I was delighted to find that the web site where you design your own snowflake is still up and running -- that was fun last year. I should have remembered what number my flke was last year and compared it to the number I got this time = 1,638,225 -- -- last year my number was 346,275 , and clicking on the link above, it brings you to that simple flake with an arrow saying something like YOUR FRIEND'S FLAKE!
Some twelve+ hours later I just spent 4+ hours making my Limited Edition Christmas cards for this year, an edition of 50 with 5 Artist Proofs, using an old version of PrintShop -- I also made three different sheets of Holiday address labels with the same kewl app -- -- so I can vary what I put on each envelope and even have enough for bills and other things. The seasonal stamps I already got the day they appeared at the post office some weeks ago -- so all I now have to do is write each greeting out by hand and take them to the West Trenton post office, hopefully within the next two daze.
20 December 2005 / Tuesday -- I finally sent out all of my Christmas cards except 6 -- God willing, they will be sent tomorrow. This morning I took a box with a Merry Christmas * TAKE ONE label on it with about 60 auction catalogs on various subjects -- -- as well as some Winnie The Pooh toys, a case of large packages of M&Ms. and a wicker tray to put them in on the counter for the customers. As soon as I put the box on a low shelf on the wall facing the counter, the peeps started taking the books and toys. I left Kyra a note to call me on the phone when the box gets empty and the candy runs out, and already have another 60 catalogues and a larger box of assorted individually wrapped candies ready to deliver the next time I get there. Oh, yes, they sold out of Holiday stamps last week!
Yesterday I made my final run for 2005 to the Salvation Army and donated an 8 foot Christmas tree that was sitting unused in the basement for several years, complete with light sets on it (I have another one down there with bubble lights on it -- some day I may even get to put it up, although I prefer a live tree -- most of my kittys have never seen a Christmas tree!), some cases of candies, the microwave I replaced, a couple boxes of books, a pile of Elvis trading cards and toys. One of the ladies there said she would take the candy to the Christmas party at her church -- they already sold the framed paintings, books, Bernie's old microwave and toaster oven, my older photocopier, some stereo equipment, and boxes of other goodies I took there last week.
I was surprised on 17 December when the postman delivered a box from Liana in Florida -- inside, carefully wrapped, was a red tin box -- -- filled with really yummy oatmeal raisin cookies -- she never made them before, and they are super delicious! Thanks, Liana -- I shall try not to eat them all before the 25th, honest! Maybe I should hide them somewhere? [munch]
23 December 2005 / Friday -- Dariusz Kardas from Gedansk, Poland -- -- sent me a Polish Christmas card, and a beautiful nostalgic 2006 family calendar featuring photos which he and Jakub Kardas took -- -- of traditional country scenes in Kurpie land, in and around Jednorozec, the town which features prominently in the Kardas genealogy.-- the lower photo credits were enlarged and pasted on the scan for easier viewing since they appear on the lower right in small-ish letters on the original. As is customary in family gatherings in the olde county, he also sent me a part of the Oplatek, the communion wafer which is shared among those gathered to celebrate the festive Holidays -- -- it is embossed with a scene of the Nativity, but the scan only shows the white outline of the wafer segment, so I also had to try to take a photograph with my handheld camera, the light coming in from the top to hopefully show some of the relief design. My hand is not as steady as it once was, so it is not very crisp / sharp, even though I passed it through several filter processes -- what I did in that pic was superimpose the photo on the actual wafer scan. Thanks Dariusz, this brings the family circle much closer, as distant as we happen to be geographically -- my dream is to be able to visit you there some day, God willing.
Denise from Pennsylvania send me a nice card featuring a festive doggie, and a CD with Sluggy's Dance Party (Sluggy is her nickname / aka on the Yahoo Beanie news group we have been on since the last Millennium) -- it features 17 really kewlio dance tunes, just like the ones I enjoyed bouncing to in my more active disco years in Spain. They are all now on my iTunes playlist, and you should have seen me gyrating as I was working on this eMac while listening to them! Thanks, Sluggy, much appreciated.
Esther from Pennsylvania sent me a wonderful animated eCard with a musical background -- -- she likes cats too -- thanks for remembering me, Esther.
24 December 2005 / Saturday -- I was sooooo exhausted that I actually slept in bed with the kittys until 11h!! Half the day is gone already, it is 52 degrees outside and I want to try to do some more painting of the garage doors -- it may rain tomorrow, no snow, but there is still ice and snow from the last winter storm we had.
My next update will probably be tomorrow on Christmas day, I shall not go anywhere because I want to keep cranking out stuff for eBay -- I already have my YES 2006 formatted, so that little chore is completed. This Holiday page will continue until my birthday on 14 January, as usual, which also includes Sylvesterabend = New Years Eve, New Years Day, the Epiphany or Los Reyes -- -- 6 January, the traditional day of gift giving in Spain -- -- on each of those days I hope to have a batch of 99¢ Specials on eBay formatted for the Holidays , after which I again have the task of changing formats for the listings to something more generic -- it is, naturally, my favorite time of year!
25 December 2005 / Sunday --
The kittys were all snuggled up warm in bed, so we did not hear the reindeer overhead. How Santa ever got in, I shall never know -- the felines led me to the study in, and we saw all the presents with a grin. They meowed for me to open them, with glee -- so I did, now let us see --
from Kamiel, the oldest male, I got a pair of low suede Lugx boots -- -- probably because I stepped on his tail too many times with my heavy work boots.
They all pitched in for this one -- -- an automatic self-wind stainless steel and gold tone Seiko Kinetic 5M62 wristwatch, with power reserve! I suspish they want me to remember what time it is to feed them and clean out their litter boxes? I think it cost them a LOT more than the simple automatic Seiko I am wearing, which cost me $10 at Donald Duck's grocery store down the street a couple years ago.
Ziggy, the male with the listing head presented me with a -- -- small, yet very powerful aluminum Luxeon L.E.D. flashlight, like the kind of headlamp I want to get for my mountain bike; it uses 3 small AAA batteries, which were included -- it produces a much more intense light beam than any of my usual larger and way heavier MAG-LITEs.
His sisters, Yakshini and Guichiguiche got me packs of Bic Atlantis and Pilot Easy Touch black waterproof ballpoint pens, to use instead of the gel pens I have been writing with for years -- -- the gel pens smudge when wet, which is not good for my permanent hand written eBay record keeping.
Olga and Blinky, the two youngest females were able somehow to save for three DVDs -- -- War of The Worlds, the new version + Serenity, based on the TV series, Firefly (a film / series by Josh Weldon, who also did Buffy, The Vampire Slayer and Angel) + The Skeleton Key, an eerie tale woven in the Bayous, in and around New Orleans -- they know I like horror / science fiction flicks.
The two Russian kittys, Zews and Kappora, thought I might enjoy watching the new King Kong movie -- -- this package is a Limited Edition, containing two DVDs, an illustrated production memoir -- -- and 4 exclusive production art prints, with an individually numbered Certificate of Authenticity!
Last, but not least, Fabiola, the original female who made my first breeding pair with Kamiel -- -- surprised me with something I really wanted, the DVD set of the world renowned childrens' books by C. S. Lewis featuring a king cat, having a supposedly subliminal religious story line, The Chronicles of Narnia, a three disk set including several extra delights! She and the rest of my kittys cannot wait to see it.
As an extra special treat I gave them all some raw chicken wings, which I cut up with kitchen sheers -- they really love them and gobble them down rapidly.
Oh, yes, and one last thing ............
My gift to myself were three freshly painted white garage doors to match the snow that still lingers -- -- complete with replaced handles and lower kickplates, outside and in!
After cleaning the kitchen I rested and watched The Skeleton Key -- a tale of voodoo and mysterious intrigue, with a totally surprise ending. I took a shower, then Bernar called me on the phone saying he was coming over -- he brought me a case of -- -- 2003 vintage French red wine, twelve 750 ml bottles -- we had some while we chatted about how the sale of his place in West Trenton was coming along and about acquiring some of my art works and antiques that are stored there. As usual, business at the liquor store he manages was extremely busy for the Holidays -- he worked 13 hours a day! (GAWD, that is fewer hours than I do stuff on my web sites and eBay) Thanks, Bernar, much appreciated -- it was a very rare extended yet welcome visit. Incidently, that wine goblet I got at the $ Store, monrhs go, four of them, but they are sooooooo fragile I already broke three of them by basically sneezing on them! Maybe I shall have better luck with this one?
As a final Turkish Delight on this special day I watched another movie -- I never watched two movies the same day on a computer before, and I have dozens of unopened DVDs screaming to be opened and viewed -- The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe, the first of the Chronicles of Narnia -- incidentally, even with my highly imaginatively programmed mind, I noticed absolutely NO subliminal religious connotations of any kind in the flick --
it must be spectacular on the theatre screen because it was totally engrossing on my 16" eMac monitor! So even if you do not have a magic wardrobe at your house, watching this flick will open the doors to new vistas of imagination, fantasy and adventure for you, young or old.
I hope that your Christmas was as exciting and joyous as mine has been.
27 December 2005 / Tuesday -- today a surprise package arrived from Robin in Illinois, packed to the gills with all kinds of kewl gifts -- -- three varieties of my favorite fruit in chocolate (raisins, craisins = dried cranberries, and cherries) -- she made her own very professional looking Christmas card -- that blue eyed Santa Cat on the upper left -- -- has a felt framed card holder around its cute little neck -- I was curious what the card with the cat on the front was, so out it came -- it is a Wal-Mart = Sam's Club gift card worth a generous $50 -- Robin, you should not have gone overboard again this year -- I thank you sincerely -- it will provide the kittys with an ample supply of food and litter, which I always get at Sam's. You are amazing! Tonight they will have some of my salmon gourmet delight, a simple stew-like concoction with carrots, broccoli, french fries, tomatoes, garlic and probably some basmati rice or cuscus thrown in to absorb any left over juices -- I make a cauldron full which usually lasts me / us about 3 days.
28 December 2005 / Wednesday -- I heard such a doorbell clatter, I sprang from my computer to see what was the matter -- and what to my wondering eyes did appear, but my brother, his wife and three of his five kids, oh dear! I think I am going to make this a pictorial guide --
the last time I saw Bill in south Jersey he looked like a skeleton, but now he's a bright cheerful jolly old elf, much more positive than he used to be, and as you can see, he still attracts pussy
this is the first shot of my recent haircut, an awful spikey styling as only they can do it here in Trenton! It is not the way I wanted it to be, but one gets used to it, I guess
he took a lot of pics with his oldish Sears film camera -- after I took a batch with my Kodak DC3400, I showed them how I process the photos using several older apps, just to make sure they turned out well enough to use -- only one was not quite good enough to appear here
I gave each of them a USB memory stick to use with their computers, and Peter's was used for the first time to stash my original photos taken today for his own use on the laptop he has, both in original large couple megapixel format and after I processed them to cropped jpeg images which are much smaller files, basically as they appear here -- and he still had over 200 MB of space on the memory stick
naturally I had to have a photo of me at the chair that I spend most of my waking (and sometimes sleeping) hours in, typing away at my puter gizmo -- Fabiola, my oldest female Sphynx, enjoys the rare temporary roam of the apartment to snuggle up to me as she always wants to
I do allow them out of their rooms more often than before just so they know they are not forgotten and unloved
Well, after scraping off the 12 lottery tickets I did not win a cent -- they told me that Peter was the only one of the clan to win something like $30 on his set. I finally was able to share the Kardas family Oplotek, shown above, which was sent to me by Dariusz Kardas from Gedansk, Poland, so now the circle of sharing this traditional ritual is complete -- we also looked through the marvelous photos of the Kurpie calendar, also sent by Dariusz. Matt got one of the LED flashlights that Ziggy gave me -- you can see mine hanging on the bulletin board on the left in the photo of me and Fabiola, above. I also gave them a DVD -- they would have gotten more, but my brother said they do not watch them very frequently (neither do I, but having them is useful for when I am in just the right mood and not bogged down in other things). Peter also received a tin of Chinese Green Tea, which he said he likes -- I fished through the tons of things that Ken gave me from his closed tobacco and candy wholesaler shop across the street and found several sort of unusual things which his friends might know what to do with, filling a small box with them, appearing below the white ceramic bowl of popcorn, above, A bottle of French red wine completed my gifts to the gang.
They brought me an Italian hoagie, which I had not had in many months -- I gobbled that down after they left, with red wine of course. I was actually delighted and amazed at this totally unexpected visit, but I always did like surprises. It was not one of what were his usual 10 minute quickies, as if he were double parked in front of a ho house or something! We leisurely chatted, mostly about family stuff -- they showed me a couple photo albums of pics -- some from Mandy's recent trips to California and Greece, and of her work as observer on commercial fishing boats in the New England area where she now lives -- they visited the Russian cats in my bedroom, taking several photos -- Billy was clicking the shutter constantly during the visit. The only one who somehow did not appear in my photos was Chris, the mommy of the clan, and I was so distracted with everything that I did not notice it until now. She is still as eternally young, vivacious, gorgeous and well stacked as she always was.
They stayed several hours, which was super kewl, with not a complaint about anything from anyone -- Bill even joked a lot more than usual, Chris was generally the quiet one. We all had loads of fun and excitement, and after we did the usual European style huggy kissy farewell thing, they were on their way, already after dark. Thank you all for making my Holiday extra special with this family gathering -- I am sorry not to have been able to make the family dinner again this year. Oh, yes, I already had two large slices of that yummy cake you made for me -- and you forgot to take the snowman frock!
One last Christmas pinup for your collection -- save them, they are highly collectible, and will increase enormously in value in the coming years!
29 December 2005 / Thursday -- the cake Chris made for me is half gone already, and I only have 4 more of her yummy cookies left! I added a couple live web cam links to New Years Eve celebrations around the world, above, but since I only have a dial up modem, most of the ones I tried to connect to in past yuears were either really slow to load or I got an error message saying that I should try again due to the inability of the servers to handle the increased traffic -- you may be lucky this year and find one that is working as it should.
31 December 2005 / Saturday -- get ready for the 2006 edition of
* J A N U A R Y *
1 January 2006 / Sunday -- one of the things I always watched on TV were the New Years Eve festivities in Times Square hosted by Dick Clark, but as you know I have not had a television hooked up where I am now for at least 6 years because I find it distracting -- I tried watching it online, but, as usual, did not get a connection, perhaps because I am using dial up and / or their servers were already overloaded. When my eMac chimed midnight I popped the grapes and started finishing up my first 2006 YES entry, getting that online shortly thereafter. I then slept in bed with the kattys until just after noon, finding the December trivia winner Hall of Fame winners in my email box, so those pages had to be updated.
One thing I do not think I mentioned yet are the shopping bags filled with all kinds of things that I have been leaving on the front entrance of the shop downstairs facing the main street every morning after midnight for the last two weeks. I always have panhandlers ringing my doorbell even at 03h in the morning looking for handouts, but since leaving the bags of stuff not a single one has bothered me. The bags contain several handfuls of candy and other stuff that Ken gave me from the now closed candy and tobacco wholesaler across the street, some of the kitchen towels that I have way too many of, a t-shirt or other smallish clothing, shop rags / dusting cloths that I had a pile of but do not use them since I discovered the new microfiber variety, soup and sauce mixes that I also have more than I need, many of the open bottles of liquors, vitamins, supplements, cleaning supplies, and some other goodies that Bernar left at the place in West Trenton, a can of Coke from my stash as well as whatever else I could find that just seem to have accumulated over the years. I have yet to add bottles of Diet Coke -- a case is sitting in the garages -- I am going out now to get that before it gets totally dark outside. I do not have a clue who takes the stuff, but it always disappears before daybreak. In the last seven days I have trashed at least twenty empty boxes of all sizes which puts a minuscule dent in my stash of things squirreled away because I thought that they might come in useful some day.
14 January 2006 / Saturday -- OK, today is finally my birthday, and the end of this action packed page -- I received three birthday cards through the US Postal Service, four virtual eCards -- eCard, -- eCard2 -- eCard3 -- eCard4 -- a dotMac iCard -- and a surprise Mexican eMail -- there are thirty-four birthdy related emails / instant messages in this years birthday folder -- not too bad I guess. Maybe if I included all categories of related stuff together the results would be much more positive, you know, like how politicians usually do their statistics, hypothetially proving that we are all living in paradise, with the absolutely best leaders that money can buy.
Summing up the Christmas season 2005, I sent out 63 cards, received 29, so the grinches turned out to be 54% -- it could have been worse! Two of the cards I got were self made, which was extra kewl -- card 1 -- card 1a / Robin in Illinois -- and card 2 -- card 2a / Nan in New England (made by her son) -- on the lower back right of each card I write the date received and in a circle, its consecutive number, the same as I have been doing for over 50 years already! The added personal touch of a self made original greeting exhibits an attention to detail and friendliness which seems sort of rare these days, where commercialism appears to be becoming more rampant and the norm, with a disregard for the True meaning of the HolyDay. Making an original card is much easier to do these days with the help of these damn puter toys, so they really are good for something worthwhile, I guess! Throughout the year I find images that might be appropriate for the following year, scan them, and keep them in a TO USE folder, as I do with many other virtual images. This is my card, but the dumb scanner refused to register the cream yellow parchment - like colour background for some reason -- my card / my card a -- that is the third version of four remakes until I got it more or less the way I wanted it -- some 10 trials were numbered as artist proofs.
I have 180 email files in my Christmas folder which contains anything even remotely related thereto, plus my replies -- compare that to the 2003 folder which has 21 files, and the 2004 having 155 -- this suggests that more peeps are using the InterNUT to connect with family and friends rather than expend the extra effort to be a tad more close and personal -- it is sort of sad -- in 10 years will they have computer programs that automatically send greetings to everybody on their computer mailing list, thus allowing the senders more time to go out and buy more doorbuster specials as gifts (or order them online, which will, naturally, be sent automatically from the business to the receiver?) Maybe I am olde fashioned or something, but this perspective sucks!
This is my Christmas setup this year, about two feet to the right of where I spend most of my waking hours at this computer table -- -- I made the photo larger than in previous years so that you might easier be able to find the card you sent me -- they are NOT arranged in a particular order. There is a small green artificial tree on the right side of the right window ledge -- little on the bulletin board has changed position in 10+ years (a couple smaller things on the upper right are in the same place since I was a teenager!) except the 2006 calendar and the updated light green-ish 2005 list of phone numbers, which I shall hopefully update in the near future.
I had loads of work / chores to do this year totally unrelated to the Holidays, thus I am totally worn out and will be for the next couple weeks until I can get my stuff out of Bernie's place in West Trenton -- he gave me until Monday, January 23 to be totally out., but the same day within hours he switched to Friday, the 20th. I asked if he going to help me, but no reply.
Thanks for sticking with me through 2005, and let us hope that 2006 will be yet more positively productive despite the seemingly uncertain world and national political / economic news we keep being fed by the sloppy media.
P/S : although 14 January was dark, dreary, foggy and rainy all day, after I gobbled up one sixth of this yummy cake with gobs of icing, I fell sleep at my puter desk for over an hour -- although that is not a major surprise, the biggie is that when I looked out the window there was at least 2 inches of blowing glistening pure white sinless snow on the ground! Now that is a fitting close to the action packed, fun filled, frolicking birthday bash I experienced!
That's all folks !
YES 2006
YES 2005
God Bless !
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Christmas Pages - Index
Christmas - 2005
Christmas Thoughts - 2001
Christmas - 2004
SunCat's Holiday Cheer
Christmas - 2003
A+B Holiday Exchange - 2001
Christmas - 2002
Christmas - 2001
aapl Holiday Exchange - 2002
Christmas - 2000
A+B Holiday Exchange - 2002
Christmas - 1999
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