Kids are still asleep. JZ was up a good chunk of the night coughing, as she's had a persistent hacking cough for over a month now. Convinced her it was time to visit the walk-in clinic before she did her half day of work.

She looked rather dashing though in her new Burberry coat that her father gave her for Christmas.

We've had coffee and I've cooked bacon. I think Emmett and I might see Django Unchained tonight.

We got Minecraft for Christmas and the kids love it. They are also currently obsessed with Pocket Frogs.

We went sledding (basically grass with a frosting of ice, but it worked ok) and Dillo got his face washed and scraped off a scab, so we walked all the way home with him crying. But now they are wrapped up and watching Dirty Jobs and eating chocolate.

That cough sucks, Hec. I had it for 4 months and DH had it for about a month. I strongly recommend that JZ try to get ahold of Advair or some sort of steroidal inhaler. That's what she needs, not antibiotics. It's the cough itself she needs to get rid of.

That cough sucks, Hec. I had it for 4 months and DH had it for about a month. I strongly recommend that JZ try to get ahold of Advair or some sort of steroidal inhaler. That's what she needs, not antibiotics. It's the cough itself she needs to get rid of.

Thanks for the tip, Burrell. I'll make sure she sees it.

Giant shark tank breaks open, flooding mall and injuring shoppers

Whenever I see one of those massive public aquariums, I wonder just how thick that glass has to be. Apparently, someone at a shopping mall in China didn't work out the answer to that question accurately enough, because the giant front window of a huge tank holding recently gave way, flooding the onlookers with a 33 ton wave of water and sharks.

The tank had become a major draw at the Shanghai Orient Shopping Center since its installation two years ago, and held seven lemon sharks plus several other species. Thirty three tons isn't particularly huge as public aquariums go, but the water still weighs as much as 20 average cars. In the accident, all of the sharks were killed and 56 people at the mall were inured. Most of the injuries were cuts and bruises caused by shards from the 10 inch thick acrylic window, with no reports of sharks bites as far as I can tell.

I think the sharks were all pretty small.

Good to hear you're improving, Burrell.

I finally hit my migraine wall good and hard yesterday, but as a loud and proud Commonwealth country, ain't nothing happening during Boxing Day, especially chain-calling-in-of-favours. But today we went by the Sickle Cell Unit, who are very experienced with pain crises, and prescribed me with liquid morphine (oral). My mother is not excited about me taking this (prescription said every 6 hours, doctor said every 45-60 minutes) in case I up and die. That is her job, I concede, but at the end of the day, I need to be able to handle the three-plane flight back to LA all by my lonesome..

At some point you need to start believing that multiple people with relevant specific training and accreditations who are familiar with more of my details than I can tell anyone know what they're doing. If you don't, then speak up and say exactly that, and you tell me how and why you want me to pursue my health, and allow that my preferred methodologies differ from yours for a REASON.

I've snapped at her enough times that I can see her swallowing her nagging instead of saying what she feels. I might feel worse about this, but agitating me clearly makes it worse, and I will get up and walk out of the room if she persists.

So I had quite a busy Xmas (and weekend lead up to same). Going into this, I wasn't feeling even remotely in a holiday mood, but somehow all this activity finally jump started some cheer. This is good because my big family thing won’t be until Sunday and I’ve been able to work out a few things to do for presents, which I hadn’t done until now.

It started Friday when I drove from MA to Canandaigua, NY and spent the weekend with the parents of the wife of my closest friend from college (also my freshman and first-year-out-of-school roommate). It was a haul, but totally worth it, though heading out in Friday's gale-like weather had me dubious at first.

Saturday was an all-day house party that was a blast. Food, lots of drinking and a table top shuffle board tournament (this was a serious set-up - the rec room was designed at least in part to hold the table along with the full-size bar) were on the agenda.

The only downside is that almost everyone involved is a serious conservative, including, sadly, my college friend who we used to call "the communist" to his approval. Oh well, people change as they get older. All incredibly nice people, though, and luckily politics mostly stayed off the table as a topic of discussion. They are also seriously lunatic NY Giants fans, but even as a Patriot's fan, I've never had a problem with the Giants other than those two specific occasions (a lot of older New Englanders are Giants fans from the time when they were the only team in this part of the country to root for).

I headed east on Sunday and detoured to Amherst to hang out with another friend I hadn't seen in a few years. She just got out of seriously bad relationship and is doing incredibly well. She's happier than she has been in years, and looks great. Almost ridiculously so. She's my age but she doesn't look much different than she did 10 years ago. So unfair.

After one night back in Salem, on Monday I took the train up to Maine which now goes to my hometown, which was a wonderful way to spend the morning after all that driving. I spent Monday night with my brother and two sisters (and spouses) at one of my sisters houses and just had a little quiet family time. My brother, his wife and I also did our usual Xmas light tour on the way there and back.

I got dropped at the house of the mother of a friend I've known since kindergarten, and spent most of Xmas day hanging at their house reading (they were at an Xmas dinner at my friend's brother's, and I wasn't going to intrude on that, plus I needed the quiet time). I also got out for a long walk, which was gorgeous because it was snowing just hard enough to get a light cover on everything, but not enough to be a nuisance. The trees were so gorgeous.

Xmas night my friend and I invaded the after dinner portion of another friend of ours family Xmas, since we love his parents and siblings almost as much as we do him. Got a ride back to Salem with my pal the next day (he also lives in MA for the time being). All in all, it was a lovely, low-key Xmas after the crazy weekend.

I'll head up to Maine Sunday morning for family blowout, and also probably hang with both my friends as they'll both be up for the weekend as well. Then on New Year's Eve, I'll stay over with a couple I often spend NYE with, and then hit SJs on Tuesday afternoon.

After dreading the holidays so much after everything with Mom in October, I'm actually seriously looking forward to having some more holiday time. I suspect just keeping busy is helping a lot. Plus I just got tickets for The Hobbit at a serious IMAX 3D theater for Monday afternoon for between my trip back from Maine and my NYE plans.

Oh ita, I hope the meds do their work.

What Burrell said.

I might feel worse about this, but agitating me clearly makes it worse, and I will get up and walk out of the room if she persists.

Yikes, ita. I'm sorry you're having so much trouble with your mother. I hope she figures out that you're doing the best you can to keep functioning. It's hard to be second-guessed by family when you're already having so much trouble with your medical providers.

As for my folks, we asked Dad last night why he wants to move (again). Sounds like it's mostly because Mom's unhappy in the new place (as expected), but also he's kind of bored. He didn't like cooking or cleaning, but it did give him something to do. (Well, cooking, anyway: he never really cleaned much.) He needs a new hobby, I think.