On the Eighth Day of Christmas...

...it was New Year.

We didn't get home until after two a.m. It was a great party: much laughter and munchings, stories and wandering from room to room chatting with friends. The big announcement of the evening: Matt and Kelley are engaged to be married!

We also saw a friend we had not seen for years, Chris Cook, who has always been a talented comic artist. I still have my "Dalek-toon" T-shirt that he did many, many years ago. Well, it turns out Chris has been working professionally in comic art for the last four years; he has drawn the Powerpuff Girls comic book and is also working on a comic involving a robot (don't remember the title, unfortunately). Super!

Got home just in time to miss Rodney on chat, but did get to wish Mike a Happy New Year before collapsing in bed sometime after three. And then back up at ten to watch the "making of" special about the Tournament of Roses parade.

Great parade, and much better weather than last year! There was a wonderful dragon float, but unfortunately the fire that was supposed to spout from the dragons' mouths did not work. However, there was a successful flight by a gentleman with a jet pack on his back. Some lady from American Idol performed. Mike had told me that Oklahoma would be "leading the pack," so to speak, and they did; it's their centennial year.

After the parade we took a ride to Fry's. They had a sale on all the M*A*S*H seasons; I needed the last two. We also stopped at Michael's to spend the 50 percent off coupon; I bought a Valentine's Day wreath for the front door. James got some more blue LEDs for next year.

It is astonishing, the difference in the weather yesterday and today! Yesterday was high 60s, cloudy, sticky, desperately dismal. We drove to Bill and Caran's and back in a hard rain most of the time, warily watching traffic that gets rather skittish when it's wet. Today the sky was a broad, bright blue bowl overhead with cirrus clouds painted lightly on; the air was crisp and 50s, with a stiff breeze blowing from the northwest (the welcome cold front came through during the night). Clouds came in as we were driving home from Gwinnett County.

Then we came home to relax. I can't believe how quickly the past two months zipped by. We had vacation, then it was Thanksgiving, then we did something every weekend before Christmas. Time just flew by, which is both good and bad: it means we were having a good time, but it also made that time so ephermal.

So while James is downstairs having some downtime (probably working on his rocket model for next month's IPMS meeting), I'm here savoring Christmastide: it's cool enough for a fire, I have the "Christmas Wreath" Yankee candle burning, and I'm watching Ask the Manager Christmas shows.