Well it’s the Dorothy Parker/Samuel Beckett steel cage death match. Miss ‘I hate having to write but love having written’ vs. Mr. ‘I can’t go on- I’ll go on’. That’s basically where I am at right now. I told Bill a little while ago that I don’t think I will be writing tonight and here I am doing just that, writing. Crazier things have happened I can tell you, but this isn’t one of those. Whether or not this entry makes it to 500 words remains to be seen. So far it is not looking too good but I have rallied in the past and will do so again.

Let’s see when I was last doing this here blog thing, I had just gotten back from helping Shlomo out at the cigar shop. Oddly enough that is what I did today. Shlomo has been a bit under the weather and sent an urgent text to me this morning. He did order the cigars I asked for and would I mind working for him today at the cigar shop, in effect making my cigar request no charge. How could I refuse an offer like that? And what would the GZA have to say about that?

Monday I also helped out at the cigar shop. I had a feeling that Shlomo would need some help. Israel and Brandon were not to be found and so stopping by on Monday afternoon I was corralled into helping Shlomo. I was out of there by 4:30 and came home to find Bill getting himself together for a trip out to Bergen County. I was starving and looking forward to the trip, seeing my family and stuffing myself with food. It was infinitely better than being with some guys who did their best to avoid expectant spouses and nervous gym working cousins on Christmas Eve.

And once we landed in Bergen County, all was well. Brothers and their wives and children and their boyfriend/girlfriend were all assembled and it made for a lovely time, and the phone was handed around once again so that everyone could have a word with Annemarie. After a few hours that went by too fleetingly we all headed back to our homes. It was all very pleasant and the buildup and the hype takes so much time and effort and it is all over much too soon. A ride back past the house I grew up in was nice, the neighborhood all decorated nicely.

Back home Bill and I exchanged gifts and went to bed fairly soon. It had been a long day and now it was basically over. Christmas day, Bill was up before me and made coffee. I showered and looked forward to doing not much at all, but Bill wanted to shoot a video with a Christmas message. So we trooped out to Wally World and I recorded Bill driving a very large vehicle and him making a very nice, very funny holiday greeting. It’s on his Facebook wall if you’re so inclined.

That’s it. I said I wasn’t going to write and here I did write. Hope you had a good Christmas!

There it is, The Smoke Shop

You can smell like Antonio Banderas

or you can smell like Jennifer Aniston…

while watching Daniel Stern in A Christmas Story 2…