End of Year Resolutions- Bah!!

Hey! Looks like we're about to resolve to make resolutions!
That unfortunate man (above) is my latest acquisition for my "bad painting" collection. I know; it's sort of trendy circa 1989 to collect bad art, but I'm an artist and I can do whatever I want. In any event, this poor wonker looks like he's got syphilis and bug bites and a co-worker suggested he looks like he's stuck in the outhouse, so he's got all KINDS of trouble. My year hasn't been that bad...
So, do I really make resolutions? Do I keep those resolutions that I make? I try.
For the umpteenth million time, I resolve to make more money. Not loads more, just MORE whatever that is. (Rule #1: Set the bar realistically low, then you can actually accomplish the goal. Like if I resolve to generate a million zillion dollars this upcoming year, I expect I'll fail. But if I vow to make a few measly thousand dollars more than this waning year, I have a good chance of success. That's the name of the game).
But ouch! that shows where my values lie, if money is Numero Uno resolution. Hmm... how about being nicer and more compassionate to my fellow (thoroughly awful, despicable, gun-toting) men and women kinds? (Whoa! What did I just say about realistic, achievable goals?)
Okay, maybe I'll settle for the hackneyed (but do-able) ideal of loosing a few of those jiggly pounds and maybe drinking a tad less at social functions? THAT I think I can manage...
That's enough for me! I'm going downstairs and join my beloved Bob for a glass of some kind of bubbly and what looks to be a really nice meal. To hell with resolutions tonight!

Are We Ready For This?

Yes, that is what you think it is... a large pile of fluffy white stuff that has been pushed through elaborate mechanical means to a heap at the end of the driveway. And we pay people to do this!  I can think of all sorts of things I'd rather be spending money on right now: vacations in the south of anywhere warm, saving towards my eventual studio, even that crown I so badly need on a left rear molar. But instead we must pay to rearrange frozen water molecules that given a few months would melt on their own.
I am sorry; I'm still crabby and not enjoying this foray into winter. Where is Climate Change when you want it? The weather did serve to keep my indoors where I played (quite happily, it must be admitted) in my studio where I made several collages. I think I'll post a couple tomorrow; I have been exploring that irksome fiscal cliff and all the implications for us 99%ers. You'll see!
Meanwhile, I am confessing that I wanted to do nothing more than ride my splendid steed through snow banks, large and small. It was just too damned cold- and windy- to even be considered. Maggie looked bored and stood with her butt to the wind all afternoon. There was the constant drone of snow mobiles from next door as our neighbor and his son circled their house endlessly, dreaming of Arctic conquest. In short, a day at the end of the year!

A Ramblin' Endish O' Yearish Postish

So I can't report that I have much to report, but the weather is so blasted awful that I thought it would serve us all right if I posted a cranky end of December post. (That, by the way, is a fuzzy flower computer drawing to make us all forget about the ice and snow that persists outside...)
We missed what was no doubt a lovely Boxing Day party last night at our good friend John's house. I'm sorry to have not be available to chat up close friends and hear tales of their Xmas day festivities, but I must admit that staying in due to inclement weather offered it's own low key charms. For example, I didn't consume (further) vast quantities of rich and/or sauced, cheesed, seasoned, oozing food stuffs. I think I am swelling in this end of year binge-i-ness. Like many others, I regret my extreme lack of self control!
However, soon enough the Christmas cookies (remember those?) and the chocolates and the dips and snacks will have vanished like yesterdays snows.... or so we can hope!
I expect to sign on to the old New Year's Resolution band wagon and vow not to let anything more digestively strenuous than water and thin gruel pass my lips for at least a fortnight. But in the next couple of days, Bob and I seem to be finishing off that box of chocolates that we were given...
What else? Can someone please remind me to take my camera with me when I think of doing interesting stuff? Like yesterday I had a wonderful time riding Maggie in the snow and today on my morning ramble with Jules, we saw the neighborhood bobcat, up close and personal. Woulda made great pictures! Maybe that's my New Year's Resolution: bring the camera along!

So Hungry I could Eat A...

Ooops! Sorry Maggie; only kidding! (She doesn't look amused at my lame joke!) I am happy to report
 that- just in time for consuming loads and loads of Christmas goodies (and baddies) I am cured and feel fine. My appetite has returned, along with my usual high spirits. It was a weird "bug" and I subsisted on a diet of (boxed) mashed potatoes and white meat chicken, and a bit of Bob's bread and apple sauce; you will notice the entirely beige complexion of the food I ingested. But whatever! It worked and I am anticipating our trip to Byron and Dan's for a lovely Christmas Eve celebration.
Last year, Byron and Dan regaled us with a multi-course epicurean escapade with fish and cheese and fruit and wine and cordials and nuts and roots and tubers and berries and things in bowls and on trays. It was really wonderful. Fortunately, we didn't embarrass ourselves badly enough that they saw fit to invite others to dine in our stead... Good friends for the holidays!
Now I am off to my studio to try and complete a collage, again about financial mayhem in our present peering over that dang-nabbed cliff. I say give them a good push!
Then I must prepare for tonight's repast. I will probably wear my new leggings:

I got so excited! I loved this print and they had them in the grey in my size, which I bought. The red was equally fabulous, but only in large and extra large. So I contacted my sister Beatrice and she scored them for me at her local (get this) KMart... and they were on sale! The things we worry about in the holiday season. God bless us, everyone!

In Which The World Does Not End and I Take Sick

So I begin to experience symptoms that I first attribute to the consumption of too much cookie dough while preparing greasy lumps of sugar for the Cookie Exchange at work. And as a true Lover of All Kinds of Cookies, you can only imagine my despair at being unable to attend and swap out my Ornamented Sugar Cookies with Colored Sugar and Creme de Menthe Chocolate Chip Cookies for equally elaborate and delightful extravagances. (I must be very ill indeed; I'm playing with needless formatting!)
Anyway, the feelings that I was feeling did not abate after a reasonable time, but worsened. I became seriously nauseous and started getting chills. Bob and Jules and I attempted to watch a movie, but I bagged and simply lay in bed freezing and wishing for the deliverance that a mighty hurl would bring.
We slept for hours, and upon awakening, I felt no better, nay worse. My head is killing me and I continue shivering and dizzy. I forced myself to consume a piece of Bob's bread simply to enable my ingesting Ibuprofen in an effort to rein in the thundering headache.
It doesn't help that the weather is abominable- worthy of the end of the Mayan calendar. It is pouring rain, driving wind and general unpleasantness. As with the hurricane last year, the odd direction of the wind has forced rain backwards through the door in my studio and there is a major puddle on the floor beneath our Christmas tree. Even poor Jules, despondent that we are unable to take our daily walk, seems less than enthusiastic about a trip outside.
Bob has been dispatched to our local supermarket to procure provisions should I live. I figured some external corroboration that the world had indeed not ended was in order. Although I did call in sick to work and someone who sounded remarkably like my co-worker Erica (and not a Mayan deity) answered. Alas! All those lovely cookies beyond my grasp!

The Two Things of Christmas, Maybe Three

Okay, repeat after me (I sound like a broken record), "The two things that make me feel anything remotely Xmas-y are the 1.) Christmas Cookies, and 2.) The Tree." As you can see, the first batch of Christmas Thing #1 is pictured above. I have now consumed so much dough that I feel vaguely bilious, but that's a good thing! There's a second batch on the way.
And look! What to my wondering eye should appear:

Away in a corner, surrounded by Tibetan prayer flags, no less! So now I do (kinda) feel a bit Christmas-y. And I'm finishing up our Annual Christmas Card Extravaganza. That takes time and energy as we still insist on hand-making all the cards. But they're all small creations and that's a good thing to send off into the universe. I believe that the influence exerted by making and sending something carefully hand made is priceless (like those credit card ads!). I really (mostly) enjoy making the cards; maybe once every five years or so, we grumble and "take a vacation" and purchase a box of pre-mades. This was definitely not one
of those years!
Tomorrow is the shortest day of the year, the winter solstice, and, apparently, the last day of life on earth. Or the end of the world... something big! We'll see! Our friend Joe is coming by to celebrate darkness and doom with us. At least we'll go out in style!

Cheer Me Up, Batman

Yes, this is supposed to be a happy time of year. Various holidays occur, we are permitted to overindulge and there are pretty lights and even some presents. But what with things like mass shootings and general craziness, sometimes it's hard to feel good.
Silliness is an important antidote. Jules is supremely good at silliness. Witness these (sorta out of focus) pictures (well, he wouldn't hold still and was showing off!).

Jules is very jealous now that Maggie the Horse is here. He knows I like her, even though I point out that she has to live outside and he comes in and sleeps in the bedroom with us. So every time I go to the store to buy horsey food, I come home with another bag of tennis balls for Jules. The back yard is riddled with them, as is the house. He guards them like a little dragon, that's why he's rolling around.

Just look at him! Making a selection or counting them. And believe me, that's a pathetic fraction of the thirty plus balls he now has. I should take a detail of the ones that Jules has deconstructed.
They look like dinosaur eggs, gathered together into a nest.

At least he's cheerful and he keeps our spirits up. Don't tell Jules, but I got him more balls for Christmas!