Tis the Season

The inside of my house looks like a crappy Christmas display from Home Goods. Sadly, the outside is not reflecting the nature of the season. 

I think this year has been the best Christmas so far for expendable cash to spend on others, but the least Christmas-ee feeling of them all.

Maybe I’ve become disillusioned by having to deal with the very worst kind of Christmas spirits. Anyone working in customer service will know who I’m talking about. 

I get the shopping frustration, especially when dealing with technology based gifts geared toward 90 year old shoppers, but the rudeness is almost shocking. 

I’ve been sworn at when relaying bad news, called inept by someone who doesn’t even know where the refresh button is on her browser, called a liar while pasting the truth typed on the page verbatim, and worthless because I cannot put someone’s order to the front of the line because they want it so. 

Thankfully, there are also my saving graces. The really sweet, kind people who understand mistakes, who understand technological and personal learning curves, and those who admit that maybe it’s their fault or the programs fault or something out of everyone's control and accept the problem with grace and kindness. 

The season colors things in many ways. 

I'm trying to not let the dark block out all the twinkly lights

Returning from my Hiatus

Poor Picture quality but that face 

We’ve reached the other side of my annual November blog hiatus.

Was I successful in my NaNoWriMo endeavors?

The short of it … no.

I made my word count consistently for the first week, and then it all took a tumble.

It was one of those situations where you wanted to do everything but the thing you committed to.

Was it a total failure?

No.

I finished a short story, finally, that I’d been working on for about a year. I’m excited to see readers’ responses after I do an initial edit (if any reader is interested in being a short story guinea pig, don’t be shy, let me know.)

Since I wasn’t writing as I should’ve been for NaNo, I got some other things sorted out.  Including some exciting things on the horizon for a friend and me that combines our love of reading and cooking. Stay tuned.

I started working full time, more than full time now. It’s still from home, but there’s human-to-human interaction on a daily basis now. Yay me!

I also bought a new vehicle. My Malibu was reaching the end of its very prolonged, slow death. Like any good car owner, I decided to abandon it in favor of a shiny, quiet, black Chevy HHR.

Car aficionados out there are shaking their head at my choice. Of all the options, why go with something judged so poorly in the car world?

The answer comes in three points:

1)   It was cheap

2)   It doesn’t sound like a motorcycle gang driving down the road

3)   If it runs good, which it does, I’m on board since it meets the first two criteria

Naturally, one progresses from car buying to house buying. So, we’re now traveling down that road.

November … A lot of stuff crammed into 30 days.

December: Christmas goodness and prepping for a very, very busy 2015.

A 2015 without our family dog, Zack. Rest in Peace.