Have you had “it” yet? Everyone I know has “it.” I, personally, have taken up residence under the piano to hide from “it.” What is “it”? Well, apparently, it’s called “The (insert name of town) Crud.”
On Dec. 31, Gov. Beverly Perdue made three judicial appointments:
When you live some distance from town, as we do, every trip is planned carefully to maximize the mileage. My preparation was thwarted last week when I found myself in Hillsborough with a long list of things to do but having forgotten the purse I needed to do them.
The newest craze to hit the diet circuit – and I am TOTALLY connected to the diet circuit, my friend – is the craze of throwing wheat out of your life, completely – lock, stock and bagel – right out the window or over the deck. They’ve now decided – and by “they” I mean “not me” – that wheat is basically Satan in the form of a cookie, and if you don’t give it up, you’re going to die of belly fat, probably sometime next week.
“Gone Girl is the best book I read all summer,” said someone in my children’s book club, “But it’s an adult title.” And then, she shuddered. The following week several people in my exercise class referred to Gillian Flynn’s “Gone Girl” as addictive. I contacted the audio publicist, she gave a third recommendation and sent it immediately.
I arrived at my parents’ house on the Saturday before Christmas, along with four bags of presents, three grandchildren, two children, one dog, and a paaartriiidge in a— ... hold on ... anyway, we got there around 6.
I learned how to knit at the knees of my friend’s great grandmother. I wasn’t yet 10 years old, and she was pushing 90. Her patience matched her decades, and perhaps my ability to focus exceeded my chronological age.
One of the best things about living out in the country is the enveloping darkness each night. I can go outside before bedtime, look up and actually see the stars – hundreds of them – so near you want to reach up and touch them, especially on cold, clear December nights. Thankfully, there are no streetlights near my house to wash out that enfolding darkness or the brilliant intensity of my stars. This is where I do my best praying. I was out there last Friday night, Dec. 14.
Last year was our first Christmas without children. I felt caught between two worlds — missing the magic that young children bring and trying to invent a new form of celebration. This first attempt was a bit of a nightmare. It began with a coincidence. Both my husband and I needed December operations; required rest and unexpected expenses gave us both an excuse to stay out of the shopping fray. That was the best part of the holiday.
Here’s me, settling down in front of a roaring fire, the Christmas tree alight, carols playing on the stereo, just one more week of school before vacation, and a teensy bit of eggnog in my Jack Daniels ... um ... I mean a teensy bit of Jack Daniels in my eggnog, of course ... just going over my Christmas list:
Sometimes failure can be enlightening. In the week following the presidential election I planned to interview two Republican friends and ask them questions that I thought would prove a theory I held — that behind our outward differences lay significant agreements that could heal the hurts of an election year and move us towards some real solutions for what ails us.
Last September, I read that North Carolina Supreme Court Justice Paul Newby was the keynote speaker at a Tea Party gathering near Asheville.
The supporters of the proposal approved by the Council of State Tuesday to turn the Dorothea Dix property into a destination park for the city of Raleigh call the plan bold and visionary, a big idea.
Here are the awards for longer books. I have to thank those faithful children’s books aficionados who have met all year on Friday afternoons at Flyleaf and put up with my incessant asking, “Do you think that deserves a Wilde Award?”