Normally I don’t bother with this. Why set yourself for failure? Still this year, a couple of things occurred to me that would be good to stick with.

Here we go.

• Throw out all the socks that creep under my foot and pool in the bottom of my shoe. I was dealing with that all day today. Every single step that stupid god damned sock slipped further down. It can make a person suicidal.
• For that matter, I’m throwing out all the single socks in my laundry basket that I’ve been holding on to. I keep thinking the other one will show up eventually and I’ll marry them up. Clearly, this is never going to happen. Out with the extra socks.
• I’m going to finish writing the damn book. I’m also going to up my encouragement to Ava until she finishes her book. This is the year.
• I’m either going to stop getting magazines subscriptions or I’m going to read the damn things. I have seven Vanity Fairs piled up around my chair and they make me feel bad about myself. Who has time for that shit?
• No more television shows. Honestly, I can’t adopt anymore shows I HAVE to watch. I have enough already. This may be the hardest of the resolutions to keep. Someone is always coming to me with some new must-see show. I can barely keep up with the ones I love. I’m already behind on Orphan Black, House of Cards, and Orange is the New Black.

There. That ought to keep me busy for a while. Besides the normal stuff like losing weight and other unfulfillable nonsense, what are you going to shoot for this year?

I just love this. Really, really love this.

Remember how I told you my dad was staying with us this week? Well, I did and he is.

I drove him out to his house to check on stuff, because he was nervous about it. I drove him way the hell out there because I love his dogs-all 47 of them. Anyway, the house was fine. The dogs were fine. We left covered with hair. It was fabulous.

On the way home he wanted to stop for donuts to have in the morning. I didn’t want to stop for donuts. My brother is always trying to get him to eat more healthy. Besides that we feed him big dinners and such when he’s at our house, there’s still also always plenty of snacks too. Things aren’t working out exactly like they’re supposed to.

“I got Grandma Cook’s coffee cake recipe. How about if I make that instead?” I asked.

My grandma’s recipe is really, really yummy. It was always a really huge treat when she’d make a pan. The recipe has been running around in my aunt’s custody for years. I know my cousin has made it plenty of times. How hard could it be?

I’m stupidly ambitious.

My aunt gave me notes and hints on how to improve the recipe. It calls for 1/2 the batter, then sugary topping, then batter, then more sugary topping. I followed her instructions about the batter being hard to spread cause it’s thick.

HO! She wasn’t kidding. I needed a trowel. And then spreading the batter on the second layer was damn near impossible. Impossible, I tell you. Sassy came in and offered rude and unhelpful advice. How does one smear half-set concrete over loose sand? I wanted to call my aunt, but it was late at night-too late to be making emergency cooking calls. I did my best and then shoved it in the oven with a “let’s see what happens” sort of attitude.

Turns out things went well! Who’d have thought. I’m sort of a disaster in the kitchen. Not sort of, I’m totally a disaster. Even under the best of circumstances something goes wrong. But this? This smelled incredible!

It came out looking gorgeous — exactly like Grandma’s. I’m certain it’s going to taste just as awesome!

Is midnight too late for coffee?

Ava and her branch of the Brights saw the movie on Christmas day as part of their tradition. My limbs and twigs of the family tree would never allow such nonsense on Christmas. While Ava was oohing and ahhing over special effects, I was stretched out on the living room floor putting together Lego models of Star Wars with the Bandit and avoiding the internet.

It was all rather oddly satisfying. The boy and I both squealed when we found a Lego model of Greedo in the kit. For the record, the boy and I are both of the opinion that Han shot first.

My Honey and I got tickets for the four of us and my dad who’s staying with us for the week. We got XD3D tickets with the THX surround sound and leather seats. We were even able to choose our seats for perfect viewing - dead center in the theater.

I’m not sure who was more excited about it - me or my son.

He wore his new Star Wars shoes and Star Wars shirt. Unbelievably, I don’t own a single item of Star Wars clothing. I borrowed a pair of my boy’s socks. I chose the ones with a Storm Trooper on them. I don’t know why, but I’ve always dug the Storm Troopers aesthetic. We got our 55 gallon drum of popcorn and took our perfect seats.

The previews were AWESOME. We have so much to look forward to in the coming year!

We all loved the movie. I sat next to Sassy and my father. She played theater police and shushed me every time I got too excited - like over the first glimpse of the Millennium Falcon and, later, General Ackbar. I was glared at for saying, “It’s a trap.” She told me to hush while I gasped during important scenes. She also frowned when I clapped as the credits rolled. Don’t think she didn’t enjoy the film - she did. What she didn’t like what that she viewed me as making a spectacle. She’s twelve, you understand. I am not to exhibit enthusiasm for anything. Sometimes it seems she’s clearly not met me. I’m very enthusiastic about a LOT of things.

Based on those previews, 2016 will probably find her wishing she was adopted.

We’re hoping it’s going better for you than it is for this cat.

Except Hedgie Santa in his wee sleigh…

Hey, here’s something I want for Christmas. I didn’t even know I needed it.

When we stayed at the hotel for the Sisters company Christmas party, there was one of those mirrors on the accordion wall mounts. One side was normal and the other side had a magnifier.

I approached the thing innocently. I pulled it from the wall and glanced at the first side. Nothing that exciting. I’ve seen my face before. Nothing special.

Then I flipped it over.

SWEET JESUS! I screamed and shoved it back against the wall. No one’s face needs to be that big. It was terrifying.

I ignored the thing and set about redoing my makeup for the party. I encountered problems immediately. The counter was much deeper than I’m used to at home. I was like 12 feet away from the wall mirror. I’m also old. Forty-six doesn’t seem that old until you can’t see your eyelashes without your glasses. Hell, from this distance I couldn’t even see if there were any eyelashes at all. I’m not 100% sure I had eyes.

I looked at the offending mirror with suspicion. I flipped it back over to the Hubble Telescope side. Now that I knew what to expect I approached it slowly, sort of coming up on it from below, like a sneak attack.

It was a marvel. I could tell my eye color for the first time in years, it’s hard to get the distinction with my glasses on. You don’t have to believe me, but I’m telling you the truth here - my eye color changes from brownish green, to green, to blue. They were very blue on Friday. And I could see every single short, stubby eyelash.

I was stunned.

Ava’s been telling me I needed this mirror for years and I resisted. It just seemed so over the top, that I scoffed at her.

But now… I’m embracing the Hubble Telescope!

I went to Walmart the other night. I had no choice. That’s a lie. I guess I had a choice, but I didn’t have time. Anyway, I was a Walmart with the rest of the rabble.

I was poking around looking for a shirt for someone who shall remain nameless until Friday. I was trying to decide on a size so I chose a likely candidate and shook it out. Nope, that one wasn’t right. I pinched the shoulders and tucked the sleeves behind. A quick flick of my pinkies and the bottom flipped up. I placed the refolded shirt back in the pile.

“Oh my God. I love you.”

I looked up to see a Walmart employee standing on the opposite side of the table. I raised my eyebrows at her.

“No one ever folds the shirts when they put them back,” she said with a huge smile.

“Oh,” I smiled back. “It’s left over from years in retail. I also straightened some racks over there.” I pointed to the back of her department.

She beamed at me. “Wow! Thanks. When we’re done here, we should head over to K Mart. That place looked like it’s been ransacked.”

So I guess in addition to my regular forty hour work week and coming home to write this blog and my books, I am now a roving on-call clothing department straightener.

Ho ho ho! We’re practicing because Christmas is right around the corner and we haven’t been prepared for anything else this season. There’s still no cookies at Amylynn’s house and Ava only put up the Christmas tree so the cats would have something to play with. Nothing is wrapped. Nothing. We’re dreading the mall. We’ve utilized a lot of Amazon delivery which has been a godsend. Thank you UPS and everyone else who’s been dropping off all those packages. We’d give you a cookie if we had any.

1. AZDOT has a sense of humor. We love finding examples of a sense of humor in the government. While we were driving to our party, we kept passing under those electronic signs that give traffic and road advice. In a humorous effort to be timely, they said things like “Trust in the force, but always buckle up” and “Aggressive driving is the path to the dark side.” This is good stuff. Who’d think you’d ever look forward to getting to the next bossy road sign.

2. Corporate Christmas parties. The Sisters and the Sister’s official husbands (as opposed to our unofficial husbands, Tom Hardy and Jared Leto) went to our company’s holiday party on Friday night. It was out of town so we even got to stay in a lovely resort hotel for the event. The food was excellent-prime rib! Even the miserable buffet chicken was delicious. Then there were the desserts! After a while the DJ destroyed several 80’s classic rock songs by turning them into house music and adding a hideous back beat. Still, it was delightful to watch our coworkers bouncing around like crazed fools fueled by alcohol and chocolate cake. It’s always nice to have blackmail material.

3. The Arizona Grand. What a lovely hotel. Our rooms were spacious and the grounds were lovely. The pillows were less than desirable, but the sheets were soft and the mattresses were not. Our rooms were not in the same building, and usually that’s a problem for everyone in between. Maybe it was because we had chaperons (the Misters Bright) or because we all came back to Amylynn’s room for pizza and beer after the party. Whatever the reason , we firmly believe our neighbors had nothing to complain about. And except for the pizza crust being a bit doughy, neither did we.

4. VIP Thing. The Sisters work for a company that talks about “Heart” as being one of its guiding principals. As you all know, there was talk of that at Bank of No Forks but that’s all it was - talk. This new company actually means it and they are seriously striving to get to a place where that’s the only type of leaders they employ. The Sisters say “Hear, Hear” because that’s the only kind of leaders they’re willing to work for in their old age.

5. Hillary gets it. Finishing the Democratic Debate, Hillary said “May the Force be with you.” She just threw it out there in her ending comments. Just like that. The debate was a no where near our state so we know she didn’t get it from our road signs. Say what you will about Hillary, she might be a grandma but she’s a grandma who could beat Darth Vader with her girl power alone! May the Force Be With You All this holiday season!

I fear this is exactly why Ava and I aren’t allowed to have one of these.