Merry Christmas

Yes, I say Merry Christmas and not Happy Holidays. "Happy Holidays" is as offensive to me as "Merry Christmas" is to others. I had a whole big rant about that typed out but decided it was better left for another day. I've been feeling all Christmassy this year and I don't want to ruin my day with a rant.

I normally don't get the tree up until about a week before Christmas but I've had it up for 2 weeks already. Did a boatload of baking this past Sunday. YD even commented on my Christmas spirit. I have no idea what came over me this year. Maybe it was that milestone birthday I had last month. Maybe it's cyclical because I've felt this way before. And maybe it's "just because". At any rate, my family has been enjoying it all.

Excuse the detritus around the tree. The blue bin holds the firewood for the woodstove, the hearth of which you can just see on the bottom right. And excuse the plastic bag on the hearth. And the extension cord for the tree lights. I'm not a photographer. I usually just point and shoot and hope for the best. Although, now that I'm typing, I'm thinking that, after listening to Marc at the blogger's conference, I could have done a better job. Oh well. There it is, anyways, for you to enjoy.

Is it a bad thing that I have enough decorations to decorate 2 trees? Last year I did it up in gold and clear ornaments. This year, I used the cutesy ones. My angel doesn't really match the cutesy theme but it's the only topper I have and I truly love her, so she gets to grace the tree each year, no matter what decorations go on it.

It's weird to think that I'll be putting up a tree only 4 more times after this year. Señor B and I will retire early 2015 and plan to winter in México. I'm surely not dragging all those decorations down there with me.

We've had a series of bad events happen in our little town...several high profile deaths, a bank robbery and the burning of the old hotel. The deaths have especially bothered me...all good people who had the misfortune of being in the wrong place at the wrong time. It's given me pause to speculate how precious life is, how precious the people in our lives are and how it can all be taken away in an unanticipated instant.

I hope we all take the time to let our loved ones know how special they are and to let them know, always. Not just at Christmas or year's end.

Wishing eveyone a peaceful and love-filled Christmas.

Kodak Moments

Don't you hate it when you get a great Kodak moment and you don't have your camera ready? That happened to us twice, on our way to the airport in Cancún.

Along the toll road between Cancún and Mérida are signs with a drawing of a person riding a bicycle, with the red circle and line through the picture. Meaning no riding bicycles on this road. Seems pretty straightforward, right? Well, apparently this sign doesn't apply to those nifty 3 wheeled bikes with the carrier on the front. We saw plenty of those each time we travelled the road. The Kodak moment? Seeing a dude riding one of those bikes directly below one of those signs.

Driving towards the airport, there's an overpass that looks like any other. We're in several lanes of traffic with signs indicating various terminals. We're very close to the airport. We never noticed the lack of traffic on the overpass...until we saw an airplane driving on it.   !!!!!   A big blue airplane. And no camera ready to take the pic of a lifetime...for us, anyways. It was the oddest danged sight. I told Señor B that nobody would believe us.