The Eye of the Storm...

.... or The Days Between Holidays

I remember when I was doing my various newspaper columns these few days between Christmas and New Year's Eve were always a little strange. It was too early to do New Year's related material, and Christmas was gone, so... what on earth should we write about?

Nothing has changed, except I am now doing my "column" online. I'm still challenged as to a topic worthy of an entire blog post, so I'll just do my usual Monday thing.

What I'm Reading: The Merry-Go-Round by Donna Fasano. I just started it, but so far it has my attention. Of course, I've always loved a carrousel and one figures prominently in the story.

 What I'm Dismayed About: The great divide between police officers and the general public that is rift with hate and violence. Rioting and looting are not answers to injustice and killing police officers isn't either.

What I'm Happy About: I had a terrific visit with my kids at Christmas. We had the traditional Christmas Eve dinner of lasagna, and I had a good time helping my daughter-in-law make it. The lasagna in Taiwan is much different from the American version. After dinner we did a White Elephant gift exchange, which is always great fun. There were threats to life and limb over the sausage balls my son-in-law makes every year.

Other gifts were given, too, and one that I got was a Garmin Vivofit Activity Tracker.  So far today I've walked 6784 steps, 2.89 miles, and burned 1104 calories. I need to walk a lot more to make up for the pumpkin bread I will eat later today.

Some Monday Fun: This cartoon from Shoe was in Sunday's newspapers. Shoe is sitting at his trash-can desk reading a letter to the editor: "Dear Editor, I'm fifty and still live at home with my mother, who cooks, cleans and does my laundry for me.

"Everything was fine, but now she wants to charge me #400 a month for room and board!!

"What should I tell her?"

Shoe puts the letter down, fires up his laptop and writes, "Tell her I'll give her $800 and that I can move in Thursday."

And Now a Word From Our Sponsor: Not really. I just like saying that. However, I do want to mention that my YA novel, Friends Forever, is currently discounted now through Jan 2 for Kindle and Kindle Apps. This is the new edition from White Bird Publishing.

Friendship is a tenuous thing when you're thirteen and everything in your life is changing, especially your best friend.

"4 1/2 Stars! FRIENDS FOREVER beautifully captures the pain and confusion of early adolescence." (Sharpwriter review)