Samba Into 2009

There is nothing to be gained by looking backwards. Savor this moment and then move forward. That's my personal plan and my best advice on this New Year's Eve. You may quote me.

So that's it – no retrospective look back at '08, no best of /worst of lists, no maudlin regret  that another year has passed. I'm not entirely opposed to the tradition of summing up the year in a too-brief limited example so  I would suggest to you that this is the best comment anywhere on any piece written anywhere on the internet.

In a jezebel piece on mid-century food writer/anthropologist Clementine Paddleford,  commenters responded to the line "Tell me where your grandmother came from and I can tell you how many kinds of pie you serve for Thanksgiving". Among the many personal recollections of grandmas and their relationship to pies is buried this gem:

My grandmother came from Las Vegas by way of Rio. She doesn't make
fucking pies. She makes Bloody Mary's & Russian Quualudes, gets
everyone drunk, dances the samba in her seamed stockings, and then goes
home when it's time to clean up.

If I were to make anything approaching  a life plan for the coming year, this would be the template I would use.

Happy New Year.

Well, You’d Better Look Under The Bed Because Somebody Is Either Coming or Going*

*Punchline to a 3rd-grade level joke that involves a biblical refernece to “Remember,  man you are dust and to dust you shall return” and a mommy. It is implied that the mommy is a poor housekeeper and that, of course, is the joke

Is that important anymore – housekeeping – in these times of social unrest and economic stress? does anyone think less of me because I admit that I don’t have a regular cleaning schedule, let alone the desire to implement one? Or the will to stick to it if I did?

Anyway, I’m cleaning now so what’s the big deal?

Also, I wish vacuum cleaner manufacturers would stop making see-through dirt canisters. This is something I do not wish to see at any point in the game. Isn’t it bad enough that when I used the steam carpet cleaner and poured out the extracted fluid, it looks like I gave the once-over to the bottom of a coal mine? At least in that circumstance, one can choose to turn one’s head away.The clear canister is entirely too in-your- face and does not promote a climate of wanting to vacuum. So maybe this attitude is not of my making after all.

And now for some a capella Freddie Mercury, whom I deeply love.

It Pays To Know Somebody With A Very Good Camera

Steggie At Xmas

All the cool 5 year-olds call him "Stegman". Long car rides and icy conditions limited his activity but overall, he was a very well-behaved holiday guest considering the vast number of forbidden things he had in his mouth that did not get destroyed. The worst thing that happened to him … ever, apparently … was when we played Dominic the Donkey in the car. Canine flip-out.

B’rak You

Gosh, who could have predicted that the blog reading public would be so turned off by the visual of PEBO's stiffy?

HE POSED FOR THAT PICTURE, PEOPLE. That's the image he wanted you all to see – SCREW YOU,  AMERICA.

I guess people don't mind the notion so much as the actual sight of it.

From the Office of the President-Elect:

A special holiday message to the people of America -