Houston, we have a tree. It's not decorated yet.

Emmett took the wooden base (which we didn't need, so I knocked it off) and hammered a bunch of nails to spell out X-MAS! Now he's tying red and green thread around the nails to spell out the letters more clearly.

I'm drinking hot chocolate with rum and kahlua.

He says the best books he's read recently are The Babe & Me, and Thank You, Jackie Robinson.

Oh yeah, Emmett loves these books too. I can second those recs. (Go Ben!)

Hurray for Emmett and all boy readers. I'll tell him you're cheering him on, when he gets out of the shower. I covered for a lunch mother a month or so ago, and one of the boys in Ben's class was reading Christie's Murder on the Orient Express. I was impressed, and told him so.

Ben scored his first basket, in basketball, today. This is his first year playing. They play eight 5 minute "quarters" (my inner-pedant hates that) at this age. When they took him out for one of the "quarters" the kid he'd been covering exploded, and scored a few times. He hadn't scored at all when Ben was in.

They still lost, but, he said (and Scott backed this up, so it isn't just Calvin Ball style kid sports talk) that the score keeper messed up a lot of times. He gave the other team 4 points for a basket one time, and at least 3 or 4 times, only gave Ben's team 1 point for regular baskets. So we've decided Ben's team won, even if it doesn't count.

I finished off the Ellens. Oh finally it seems that Oz is really fully over the hissing. He is letting Sylvester groom him right now. YAY!

The tedious task of double checking that I have all the music from my work iTunes onmy home iTunes is still under way. I am up to the Rs.

Hec, hair update in Bitches.

You know, after a long day of working at conquering the world, one coffee refill at a time, I love remiding myself that at the end of the day, I get to come home to all of you. It's like being married to 100+ Mrs. Cleaver's, if Mrs. Cleaver was super kinky and had many cats and/or an ita.

That's a lovely martial artist you have there, Mrs. Cleaver.

Mrs. Cleaver: Why, thank you dear. Would you like some little bells on your S & M harness?

Thanks for the recs, Cindy. A couple of years ago, I was with my father's side of the family, and we were reccing Agatha Christie to my cousin's then-10-year-old. Good stuff!

Unfortunately it also tastes really good. Kinda distracting.

What you need is someone else to lick you. FYI.

I need to be either writing a paper or cleaning my house. I just spent way too long on the phone with a friend in similar circumstances, and now White Christmas is on TV! Which means I'd better do dishes now, because I like the later parts better.

I say this every year, but: I love Vera-Ellen! She's just like the little dancing ballerina in a jewelry box.