New Years Eve

 It was appalling, risky, and, unfortunately, necessary. I had to go to our local grocery store's pharmacy on New Year's Eve. It couldn't be delayed until the crowds thinned, because the pharmacy closed earlier than usual, and wasn't open at all tomorrow. This pharmacy serves both Steve's and Rich's needs, and has no drive thru like mine does. They needed their stuff NOW.

The line just for the pharmacy was about 10 people long when we joined it. Do not be fooled into thinking it extended 60 feet, however. The first three spaces back are marked on the floor for 6' distancing. After that, well, people picked anything between 2 and 4 feet. I had Rich with me, and we gave a 7 foot berth to those in front, as if perhaps that might make up for their carelessness. 

It didn't make up for the fellow right behind us, very pleasant and chatty indeed, which wouldn't have been an issue except in addition to all the chatting, he stood close and didn't wear a mask. When I asked him to please step back, he offered to show us his card from his doctor exempting him from wearing a mask. The virus doesn't care. When I said I still needed to protect myself and repeated - gently - my request that he step back, he displayed insult, but stepped back and shut up.

While waiting in line, we passed all the shoppers leaving the checkout counters with their purchased groceries.  One particularly sparkly mask caught my eye. So did the nose sticking out up above it.  I was reminded of something Steve showed me from Facebook the other day, repeated here and with apologies to whoever was being quoted: "Whenever I see how people wear their masks, I understand why condoms don't always work."

After securing our meds, I picked up a trio of frozen dinners, enough to tide me over with what I already have until sometime next week when the crowds should be sparser and - hopefully - saner. (Yeah, sure.) OK, then, sparser, anyway. The lines to check out groceries were even worse than for the pharmacy. Yes, the floor is marked. That works for the first one in line, but the crowd took a sharp turn from there, spreading down the main aisle for way too long, and again, folks were lined up as close to the next in line as they could, particularly those who, like me, carried just a basket or armful of items. or maybe just milk, and weren't pushing a cart to help space them. I did my best to keep back, but the guy "behind" me in line decided that right next to me where he could carry on a conversation was his spot in line. I tried to ignore him as politely as I could, but was  delighted when my turn came to check myself out.

Now that I'm home, my pharmacy called, and my meds are ready. I'm off again, but this time I get a drive-thru! Before I go, though, did I mention the nut in the parking lot, about half as far from the doors as our car was parked, complaining at the top of his voice, that because the parking lot was so full he had to walk so far from the door that he sh*t all over himself? All over himself? Goodness, what a challenge!

Glad I was upwind.

Direct TV: Getting You Coming And Going

It seems it's impossible to get rid of Direct TV when you get rid of Direct TV.  

I first called them a couple weeks ago, in order to find out whether we still had our 2-year contractual obligation with them, or it had expired. Dish had a better offer, and has worked with us in the past. Once finding out that, indeed, we had no more contractual obligations with Direct TV, I called Dish and asked for their installer to start us with them.

As soon as Dish was set up and working, I cancelled Direct. Or at least I hoped I had. All their phone contacts were at least one language away from English, and some of the accents are hard to decipher. Even when you can, communication is still an issue. Including truth.

Making the cancellation order was a battle, due in part to the above and in part to a voicemail system which insists you have their specific wording for their machine. How do I know their jargon? Once finally connecting to a human, she insisted I give them a reason why the disconnect, along with other questions leading directly to a blatant effort to persuade me to change  my mind. I refused to answer beyond our choosing a different company, and I think she got a bit huffy. Perhaps not, just pushy. There is obviously a script to follow. Hard to read minds. Before that call ended I asked how did we send their equipment back to them? 

Well, that was an answer for another person, higher up the chain. After repeating much of the previous call with this new person, including their push for us to remain, I was finally told that we would be sent out an email telling us what to do.

No email came. But a bill did, for next month. The overlap was so close and the mail so slow I decided to ignore the bill, but kept it, just in case.

I called back, inquiring again just how did we send their equipment back? After dodging their opportunity to give us a sales pitch - after all, the Dish system was already up and running - I was told by somebody I mistakenly assumed was being helpful and cutting through all the crap that I just needed to take it all to Fedex, along with my account number and Fedex would box it up and ship it back. Period.

Really? Just that simple? So why did the other person have no idea what to tell me? At least now that last (faux?) bill would be of some use, since there would be need of that magic account number.

Christmas came and went, the weekend and a couple more days passed, and I decided it was errands time again, perfect for sending that stuff back. But had she said "Fedex" or "UPS"? I decided to call them, Fedex first, rather than just haul the stuff to either/both places. Here's where it really got interesting. Fedex informed me my information was in error. Yes, they did work for Direct TV, but I would need it boxed and have a tracking number in order for them to do anything with it. Not the account number? Nope, tracking.

Back to calling Direct TV, now a week and a half after the call to disconnect. By now I didn't trust that the bill could be ignored, or that they had even processed the disconnect. No dawdling, as the funds are directly withdrawn from my bank tomorrow. Meaning midnight tonight. Plus the bank is in an earlier time zone. Chop chop.

Before when calling Direct TV, their voicemail system recognized my phone number, inquired whether this number was connected with the account I was calling about, and did I want my billing balance? It still had problems following my needs from that point, but it was a start. Not this time. (Was this a sign I'd been taken out of the system?) 

The first issue was just as their voicemail system was starting their inquiry, I happened to belch. (Hey, on the Steve scale, merely a 2. A 5 is tops. Really hard to do. So, no biggie.) The voicemail system tried unsuccessfully to translate that into a request. Failing to do so, it repeated what it had just asked. But not recognizing my phone number, the options given for what I might want were different from previous calls. They came in lists of 5 items, plus a "something else" option at the end. After three of those sets of options, I was finally directed to another ESL human. 

Hmmm, could I verify my billing address? You bet. How about my account number? Yep, I had that too. Was there perhaps another phone number with the account? Absolutely, and I gave it to her. Then the why-did-I-cancel routine along with the attempt of a can-we-change-your-mind bit. Once I set my boundaries for the call, she paused about 5 seconds before becoming useful. Pouting? I found reason to ask, in retrospect. Then yes, after taking another full minute to go over our account records, she verified we did indeed cancel on the day I'd specified to her. Yes, that bill really did have to be paid, as it covered the time previous to the cancellation, and carried forward to January 16th. Apparently my cancellation call missed their date by 5 days.

Passive aggressive seems to be in their playbook. She suggested I could call my bank and have them refuse payment on the bill. But I got smart about it, tempting as nonpayment was, and asked her the ramifications of doing that. Well, we'd be turned over to a collection agency and reported to the credit bureaus.

Nasty! Now I wished I remembered her name. Of course, I'm never sure whether they give real first names or not. I've heard stories about phone banks. But the calls are supposed to be recorded, so perhaps somebody who cares will listen. I gotta wonder, though, will she be corrected or congratulated?

I did also finally get the information from her on how to return the equipment. She'd gotten me annoyed enough by not supplying it, that I admit I had offered to toss it in the garbage if they really didn't want to tell me how to ship it back, though I also suggested we could agree that would be counterproductive. No point in being on the hook to these guys for a cent more than absolutely necessary. She finally informed me that within 3 to 5 days after the 16th, when our business was finally finished according to them, they would ship me out a box for their equipment to be returned in via Fedex.

I'm pretty sure the dog won't be peeing on it while it sits on the living room floor in the meantime. She's been pretty good so far. 

I wonder if there's a charge for that.

But I'll be waiting for their box. I truly do not wish to have to call them back a 5th time. They might not be happy about it either.

Year End Haiku

I follow Rude Pundit on Blogspot. He's not for everybody. If I choose to read Steve a particularly salient point he makes, it often means I censor vulgarities in the process. It's why he's Rude. But there are a couple traditions he's established around this time of year. One is showing pictures of creche setups which he finds bizarre, often creepy, like bears, or Veggie Tales. 

His second tradition, this one for the new year, is to first write haikus about what happened in the ending year, then publishing submissions - of his choice - from those submitted by his followers. For the last three years, I've sent in a few. It's been an interesting exercise for somebody who demonstrates with every posting that brevity is not my forte. I thought I'd share what I sent this year:

We back off six feet

Giving a wave, not a hug

This year must end soon!

 

*   *   *

The Donald has stuck

To all of us.Will he not

Ever wash away?

 

*   *    *

Choose which misery:

Stay home in my bubble, or

Put the bra back on?

Something For The Fisherman

I plead guilty. I have conspired. Nothing illegal, just a bit of fun, and only after the fact.

I received a call from my sister-in-law Alta, the one married to  Steve's brother Max, living in Salt Lake City. As you may have guessed, it concerns a present being sent to him in the mail, along with others in a box. First it was to let us know it was sent, along with her reminder that it would be late. (As if we had to be reminded.)

She told me what all was in the box: some of her traditional orange fudge (think "Dreamsickle"), cookies we agree are at least as good as Girl Scout Thin Mints and available year around, a gift card for me, and something just for Steve. Ashley picked it out.

Ashley is the youngest of his/our nieces, now in junior high. I first met the whole family years ago on the Great RV Road Trip aka Disaster, posted previously in this blog over a couple weeks in July 2010. Their family was one of the best parts of that trip, and relatively disaster-free. Both families, including one of my sons, Paul, and Steve's daughter Maria, camped in Alpine, Wyoming. It was a place nearly sacred to the brothers, having many memories of fishing there when young with their father. This time more of us were along. From the campground, one takes a dirt road along the Greys River up the mountain into national forest land. You can pull over in suitable areas to fish, though the game wardens are frequent visitors and really appreciate proper licenses. Steve and Max fished, and Max's kids kinda fished a bit between bouts of being kids. 

More great new memories were built for those of us who went. (I took only my camera, no license required.) Ashley was about 5 (?) then, the youngest, and claiming the larger portion of her father's attention. Of the few people-pictures I took, ones of those two are among the best. Anyway, Ashley knew how important fishing is to her uncle.

When Alta told me what the present was, I agreed it was perfect for Steve. I suspect Alta wasn't quite sure, given its uniqueness and the particular sense of humor required for appreciation, but I did my best to reassure her he'd love it. And I promised not to tell him what it was.

However, I did promise to keep Steve from opening it until I was ready to video it being opened so they could have his reaction when he saw it. I had to at least let him know what the new rules for opening that particular present were, and Steve agreed.

It came today, three boxes and an envelope. Nothing labeled as coming from Ashley, so I filmed each opening, as it turned out, because that present was the last opened. Of course. As paper came off in hunks and revealed more of what it was, smiles turned to laughter, turned to him repeating, "Oh, that's precious!"

What was this gift that caused all this reaction? It's a toilet fishing kit.

No,  you don't fish in the toilet, you fish while on the toilet. Presumably for those lengthy stays. Presumably also for those who live in quarters where a second commode is available. It comes with a water-blue colored mat to cover the floor, fitting around the base of the toilet, a bowl for water and "fish", and a tiny pole rigged with line and a hook. All plastic so nobody gets hooked in any tender places. You know, like eyes. If somebody falls off the stool while fishing/laughing, it's their own fault and their own mess to clean up. And that's final!

Alta had tracked the package and known it arrived today, so called after supper. By then I'd had enough time to find out I have absolutely no clue how to send the video from my computer up to them. We may settle for a visit late this spring on our way north, and me bringing my laptop inside to view full screen on it there. Or my learning a new skill in the meantime.

Alta cautioned me that she really didn't want/need a video of it in use in order to be sure it was appreciated!

Hmmm, that hadn't occurred to me....

Another Christmas

I bet your holiday didn't start the same way mine did. Of course every day really starts with sequential bathroom stops: first mine, then the dog's. Other than a couple brief commands to the dog, I usually don't say anything on the way to getting those done, even with noting that Steve was already up and in the living room, witnessing lights on in the living room as I breezed through the kitchen to the door.

My first words as I came back in were. "Merry Christmas! It's raining!" followed shortly with "But just a sprinkle, not enough to keep her from going out." Because that's been such a problem. Well, not in frequency, as it's only rained once before since we got her, but she refused to go out for hours that day. This time she popped out, and in half a minute back in again, just enough time to be sure she used it well. The rain was actually a gentle sprinkle, just enough to say it had, and then gone again. Still, good news.

It was a quiet day. I kept busy with yard work, a combination - over short periods scattered through the day - of raking rocks and cutting up pruned branches to be hauled away in the garbage. Other than that, mostly I was working with our new Hopper 3. For those unacquainted, this means we switched from Direct TV to Dish Network. We switch periodically, depending on prices and contracts, and both satellite dishes remain on our roof. Each switch is a learning curve, as fingers have habits not necessarily helpful on a different remote, and occasionally things change. 

Setting timers on programs we wish to keep watching on a regular basis is a particular challenge right now since it has to be done off the "guide" which shows the upcoming schedule for everything for the next 9 or 10 days, but very little is being shown of regular shows, at usual times if at all, and not even always with the same titles. I was smart enough to write down all our timers from Direct before the switch, and I'm checking them off as we finally locate something to set a timer on, but there's still a lot to go.Then there were the new shows we found to set timers on as well, so the number of set timers is just as long as the old, with more to go. I do like the set-up on Dish where we can designate which shows go into which person's folder, when it's something the other doesn't care to watch. Steve's folder will be filling up with "Chopped" and "Lone Star Law" while mine will accumulate "Stephanie Miller" and some choices off PBS for example. Shows we both like will be watched together when we can find mutual time for it.

There are still glitches. In trying to solve one, getting the voice command function to work without telling us we are not subscribed to a channel that everybody knows perfectly we are subscribed to, the tech support guy disconnected ("unpaired") one of our two remotes. Steve got it back, but now mine won't control volume. So I still have to know what he did with his the last time he used it.

Decorations were unique this year. We do not do outside lights, though we enjoy others' displays. However, I do love the wreath on the front door, all multicolored large sleigh bells. And no, it doesn't make noise when we use the door, just when it gets put up and taken down. Still... sleigh bells.

There is no tree this year. Last year we decided the 7 foot artificial one, while in great shape, took up too much of our space. So we found a local small charity who took it and many of our old decorations, including way more strings of lights than even it could hold, to pass on to others somewhere who could appreciate them. Some of the decorations we'd already boxed up and sent north to our family members who do trees for the kids, leaving us just a few. But those were the most important few, like the wreath, and strings of Steve's MUST HAVE decoration for every year, bubbler lights. Don't get me wrong, I love them as well. In fact, it was a great happy surprise to him when we combined decorations years ago to find that I also had my own bubbler lights. But with the pandemic, this year we'd just not gotten around to finding that new little replacement tree to put them on. How to hang them?

Rich came up with the solution, after much thought and several tries of different combinations of things to find what worked. First he located a long garland of what I can only call "fake tree", the kind of thing you wrap around the trunk of a fake tree so you can pretend it's not just a pole with holes in it to plug the color-coordinated-by-size branches into. Then he located some suction type industrial strength grippers to cling to the glass face of one of our display cabinets and hold the garland  in the shape of one trunk with three branches. More or less, anyway. Wires were used to keep the bubblers upright, since gravity wanted them all to point down and who cares when you can't even see the bubbles? So now each "branch" has a cluster of bubblers, and the glass acts like a mirror, so 6 or seven lights appears to be a lot more. Add in the fact that the back of the cabinet is an actual mirror, and our "tree" really brightens up the house. Oh, did I mention that Rich found a floor switch so we don't have to bend way over and search for prongs and fit them in outlets to turn them on/off, but just step on a little knob? Barefoot even. There was a bunch of fuss and bother when each plan leading up to the final solution was found wanting, but who remembers that now?

It's Boxing Day (hey, I finally found out what that actually means, boxing things up to give to others) and we are still waiting for Christmas dinner. It's not turkey this year and I'm not the cook. Rich is. If you've read "Bad Habit" you know what part of the problem is: he worked so long and hard that he collapsed into sleep just minutes before he was to start the cooking. And neither Steve nor I could step in to do the grilling. Nor wake him.

Over a month ago, we'd talked about having a gas grill for some outdoor cooking. Say, maybe by Christmas, eh? We'd gotten a teeny charcoal type months earlier, the kind that sits off the ground about 5 inches, and had used it twice. Not ideal. Rich looked through the local "free" ads and found one to bring home, and this time it was a gas grill, nice cover, two wheels, a couple of shelves to hold stuff, and needing a propane tank. So he checked more ads, locating a used, nearly empty tank for a fraction of what bying an empty would cost. He hooked it to the grill and it had just enough propane in it to be sure it worked safely. We then took it as a swap on a filled tank, paying only for the propane, the way the new tanks work these days. (For you younger folks, we didn't recycle tanks back when, so they started manufacturing new grills with new hookups so only the new recycleable tanks would fit. No more filling the old tanks. You could, for a time, turn in the old ones for new as an even swap. Use it or lose it.) So far, so good on our "new" grill.

Thing is, the new tank didn't get hooked up before Rich zonked out, and we don't know how to use the grill in Rich's absense. That lesson will come, but not yesterday. We'd taken all the frozen hamburger patties in the house out to thaw. Rich could start on those while he himself got familiar with how the grill cooked. Hot spots? Cool ones? Does it cook slow or fast? This way, if anything burned, it was just hamburger. Christmas dinner was to be steaks! Actually, fillet mignons! It all had to go back in the fridge overnight.

.     .     .   .

Post Grilling:

Yummmmm. Yummmmmmmmmm. YUMMMMMMMMM! Of course there were a couple more snags. We don't have a grill utensil set, for one, so there was some scrounging for something usable, for now, as a fork and a spatula. Proper utensils will be on somebody's shoppping list, but not immediately.

There was also the need for a proper gasket for the gas line. The first time Rich turned it on with the full tak of propane, he heard a hissing in the joint in the gas line. Stopping immediately, he jury-rigged a new rubber gasket for the joint, though reminded us it would work for now but needed to be replaced soon with the right kind of rubber for a permanent fix. This seems to be the only thing wrong with the grill, but if it came to us free for want of a gasket, well, hooray.

Rich whipped up some packaged mashed potatos to go with the steaks, adding butter and garlic. Once on the plate, soaking up the steak drippings, couldn't have been better. As for other side dishes, who had room? All the hamburgers got packaged up for the fridge or freezer, depending on whose they were and their plans for them: eat promptly? Or freeze and pull out to nuke one at a time later? You still get that great smoky grilled flavor.

So now, you think the holiday is over? Hardly. We still have two packages arriving in the mail that we know about. One has been mailed. The second is waiting on something needing to go inside arriving in the mail to the person sending it to us. We might still be celebrating for our anniversary!

Bad Habit

 Rich has developed a bad habit. No, not that one. Not that one either. What? Wait! Moms don't get to know everything about their grown sons!

What I'm talking about is that he's developed the habit of pushing himself until he drops. Quite literally, he drops asleep after days of pushing himself as hard as he can tolerate while only taking brief naps, and then drops wherever he is, whatever is left undone or whatever his surroundings.

At first, it was just leaving the lights on. I'd remind him to turn them off, and once he woke, he'd go around and deal with them. A bit late, but he at least recognized the need to do so.

Then I'd start finding him asleep near his bed but not on it, or occasionally he'd gotten part of his body on the bed. He'd sleep sitting up fairly often, sometimes on the floor. Some times he'd sleep leaned over the workbench while sitting up on a stool. A couple days ago he was working outside on the patio in one of the wicker chairs, winding up spending the night out there. It dipped into the upper 30s that night. When he came in, I suggested he treat himself to a nice hot shower, but he fell back asleep on the toilet instead. Once he woke again, he was warm and skipped the shower. 

Lucky for us there's a second bathroom in the house.

Yesterday was the topper. So far, anyway. I found him as I was working on taking the dog out to the back yard, her bathroom. He'd been on his knees, rummaging in a box on the floor for who-knows-what, and fallen asleep in that position with his head down inside the box. The dog refused to go over his legs, which were blocking her path, despite my calling and coaxing. I gave up, hoping her bladder was up to the challenge.

But then a thought: I came back out with my camera and took a shot of him this way. Someday I may show it to him. Having his head hang down over the edge of the box doesn't seem to have hurt him any, as proven by his waking a few hours later in order to go sleep on the toilet again. And the dog got outside in plenty of time, so there's that.

My friend tells me he's turning into a cat. She has one and he sleeps in many of the same positions including head hanging ones. When Rich starts licking his paws, I'll go for that explanation.

A Little Christmas Magic

There was a time in my life when Christmas was about the magic. There was Santa, and modest presents, the kind where when you went to Sunday School and they handed out little brown sacks with an orange inside, possibly a bit of candy, a pencil, or a tiny toy, then topped off with peanuts, it was a magic event. Somebody gave me something! Wow! Mom raised us on her post-depression budget, all our lives for that matter, and a tiny gift counted!

Christmas magic was about the stories, the magic star, the angels, all the lights, and hiking home over snow so cold up in northern Minnesota that it went crisp! crisp! crisp! for every step. If we were lucky enough, there would be a few snowfalls with higher temperatures so it would stick together for snowmen, snowballs, forts, and still let us go sledding without courting frostbite. Now that right there was some magic! Of course, we didn't know yet that snow pants and puffy mittens and three extra layers and face scarves weren't fashionable. All of it simply allowed us to continue through winters.

As I grew older, the magic of Christmas was about the music. Being a Methodist meant that when in church, we SANG! Not wimpy mumbles chasing a tune, but we actually made music. And I was always in the choir, one blessed in my teenage years with a great director, Jewell Shannon, our minister's wife,  who challenged us and taught us with music we didn't always realize was supposed to be difficult. There were always concerts in church and school, back then making no pretense of being anything other than Christian, and so many carols over so many years meant that I knew multiple verses instead of the one most people can barely remember the words to, and could even sing descants to some with what passed for a soprano voice. That church choir director took a tenor part and raised it an octave for us sopranos. She even gave me a solo one year, something called a "Mexican Christmas Carol", which I've only heard once since, and lost the words to decades ago. The music is just fine. thank you, still there just by thinking of it. There is a repeated line of "then rejoice and sing, all ye children tonight." Every time I look for it, something else claims to be it but isn't. Even Google, with it's 30,000,000 answers to everything, can't find it, neither by title or those few lyrics.

The children's magic of Christmas switched from mine to being for my kids, as long as they would let me try to make it for them. Even that faded, much too quickly for me. My most magical memory of that time was when Steph was either two or three. I had found a good kids' book on the Nutcracker story, and followed that up with taking her to the ballet in Minneapolis. It could have ended there, but we always went down to the farm in Fairmont to spend time with my husband's family. There happened to be a thunderstorm that afternoon, leaving everything coated in ice. After dark, the farm's yard lights turned everything they reached into a fairyland straight from the design sets of The Nutcracker. Well, better, but who could duplicate this?  Leaving her baby brother with the family, we two bundled up and went out to enjoy the magic of it. By then we had the addition of a heavy fog, muting sounds and making all unreal. Their driveway out to the highway sloped just enough for a fun toboggan ride for a little kid, and I pulled her most of the rest of the way out to the highway. A car passed every two or three minutes, adding a whole new layer of otherness to the night. I hope the memory stayed with her, but it stays with me still, just as magical as then. I still try to catch some airing of The Nutcracker nearly every year, hoping some of that magic can be savored again. As for Steph, a second in-house performance a few years later when I took her along with both her brothers, Paul just over a month old, was more than enough, and she begged off from being "dragged along" any more. It occurs to me to wonder sometimes if the performances just can't live up to some winter magic.

 I no longer believed in the Christmas story as anything other than a much embellished fable, used by The Church to recruit members by appropriating everybody else's rituals into the mix to make it seem like changing their old ways wasn't actually a big loss because they still....fill in the blanks. It became about power and greed and so many other things they mixed in that The Church lost its credibility with me. It has accumulated a long history of having so many things needing forgiveness, and I'm not the one to give it to them.

The magic went away.

Decades of life happened, and after a while the music went away. When it came back, it was other people's music to create and perform, mine to listen to. I didn't really sing for so long I recently decided I couldn't anymore. Carry a tune? Uh-uh. Sour notes, wavering, croaking, and the note I was reaching for would evaporate before its end in a puff of air. So I quit trying. I couldn't stand to hear what I was making.

KBAQ (pronounced K Bach) is playing carols on the air these last couple weeks. Lots of them. Steve asked me to drive him to the grocery store late last night, late to avoid others, and me driving because I still have decent night vision. I waited in the car and listened to the music. It was cold so the car was running intermittently to keep me warm. It was almost like singing in the shower, private and lots of white noise to disguise whatever I was doing. So I joined in, halting at first, but I still know the carols, many through several verses.

I was surprised at how easy it was to sing along. Yes, there were a few breaks and sour notes, but then something changed. My voice was back, so long as I didn't try to pass judgment on its quality, just join in. I sometimes switched octaves since my range is shot, but that's easy with music heard every year of one's life. At least, when one was used to singing them most of those years. Eventually I popped up into the high ranges and started hitting every note. I haven't hit some of them for decades. I wasn't pushing it, just blending in, amazed at the ability so easily (?) returned after so many years. Eventually I let it go, knowing those muscles would be complaining soundly for days if I didn't ease off. It was about the same time that particular segment of carols quit. The announcer came on and informed me I'd just been singing along with the Mormon Tabernacle Choir!

Maybe the real magic of Christmas is in the music. Maybe that's all the magic the world needs, any time, any reason. Maybe all the world will get.