(pant)

(shallow short breaths)

Silence.

(deep inhale)

(long exhale)

Okay, I'm back, even if for a short time. Christmas in New York was fast and furious, no time to blog, not a free second to e-mail. I returned back to the DC area on Thursday, only to have my sister and brother-in-law visit me for New Year's weekend.

Random neuron firings:
1) I always get sad when radio stations playing non-stop Christmas music return to their regular format the morning after Christmas.

2) Christmas without watching "A Charlie Brown Christmas" just doesn't feel right, kinda' like not wearing deodorant.

3) Out of the ten things on my Christmas list, I got half of them. I didn't get either of the two "big" presents: a Mercedes or a puppy.

4) On New Year's Eve, Paul is making Thanksgiving dinner, since both he and I were in Australia, and my sister and brother-in-law worked that day.

5) Working out? Lifting weights? Doing cardio? What's that? I don't know what any of that means, because I haven't been to the gym in over a week.

6) And since I don't have anything else going on in my life, I have surgery this Friday, with a chemo regimen beginning almost immediately. Isn't life grand? Don't you wish you were me?

Happy New Year's Eve, friends and family. Sorry for the impersonal term, "readers" I called you from before.