Just a song before I go...

I guess 2008 is ending with me in a better place than where I started: Borders! No, seriously, I am sitting here with an unfortunate case of massive writers' block, unusual since I finally have some time and space to make a dent in this book o'mine. But honestly, I'm a little tired/stunted/not in the mood to relive these events, so I'm stalling for the moment.

Anyway, I am definitely tired right now, having had the demon methotrexate this morning (and as a result, the naughty beast nephews for whom I babysat this AM are getting a lot of mileage out of the shot in the butt) and also knowing it's a matter of time before I'm too tired, nauseous and generally wiped out to do much more than crash on the couch in front of whatever Law and Order permutation is on NBC tonight. But even more than that, I'm tired by the notion of writing this story, of making a hated entity come to life on paper, of reexamining the futility of those events, and having to remember a truly painful and bewildering time. But, it's a great story, worth the writing, and certainly worth the potential selling.

So the year comes to an end tomorrow, and fortunately, this does not mean that at sunset, I am in for six hours of singing with four to follow in the morning, which is a good thing. I'll take Seacrest over some of the high holiday liturgy if I have to. Especially since I am about as big a fan of the October holidays as I am of New Year's Eve. What a crap excuse for people to get wasted and act like a collective horse's ass, freeze their idiocy off in Times Square, and make others miserable because of some post-20th century expectation of sentimentality and perfection? (Whoa, how's that for some pretentious sociological nonsense?) All of which is to say I'm not a fan of NYE, haven't really had a good one since I was young enough to believe in the nonsense, having gotten completely hammered at some dive Irish bar in the city and ended up at Veselka's or somewhere like that, after having slept on someone's floor for about three hours. Anyway that was a long time ago, in another country, and besides, the wench is dead.

Or not dead yet. So here's the tally on '08: 42 pounds lost, four sizes down, two hundred points of blood sugar up, 48 methotrexate injections, six months without regular Coca-cola (still killing me), four births (not mine), two engagements (also not mine), two funerals, six shiva minyans, three bags of frozen tortellini, two Shabbat services, six high holiday services, one Torah aliyah (gotta do better in 09 with that), three chapters, one deferment, five days in California, two dinner parties, fourteen active contracts, one BlackBerry, seven trips to Toys R Us, one personal shopping session, twelve Intro classes, too many episodes of classic Law and Order, and many, but still too few, adventures with the people I love.

Not a bad run, all told. And having hopefully eased the writer's block, I should get back to work; the hours are dwindling and the story remains untold. But here's to a New Year, a new beginning, fewer defenses, more laughter, a new administration, less war, happier times, and lasting peace.

Shalom.

Breaking News: A Great Miracle Happened...

...at the garage yesterday: the Infiniti passed inspection! And only cost me $600 in repairs! It's a Hanukkah miracle...and what a relief. I swear to G-d that the check engine light is taking years off my life at this point; for every one day it should be on, it is on for no less than eight days, and apparently the car was leaking oil, so...'tis the season. But it wasn't nearly as bad as I had expected, given that the past two inspections have resulted in a transmission overhaul and a brake job. And seriously, I thought that there was so much wrong with the car that it would be another $2K hit at least. Thank you, Judah Macabee!

I do have to get the muffler repaired (thanks to all my friends who have been pointing out that "bottoming out" noise for some time) and a couple of brackets replaced, but it's such a relief to see the blue 2009 sticker where it should be.

And not a moment too soon; the ice has made my building's parking lot so unsafe that it's been impossible to get the car in and out for the past two nights. The first night, I threw myself on the mercy of the Diner folks and they graciously let me leave the car there overnight, and last night I lucked into a spot on the street. But it's not pretty: hopefully the rain will make it all better by tonight.

OK, gotta get some work done before I leave the office for TEN DAYS OFF! I will be working on book #2 during the next week, and I'm excited to get this story down on virtual paper, finally, and given that it needs to be done by April 24, 2009, it's not a moment too soon for me to put in some serious work on it. So wish me luck, and happy holidays to all and a gear New Year, or as the song goes...let's hope it's a good one, without any tears.

We are experiencing technical difficulties....please stand by.

Who remembers this from when we were kids? It always seemed to happen during after-school cartoons. You'd be sitting there with your cookies and Tang or your cheese sandwich and Quik, innocently watching Bugs and Daffy or Tom and Jerry beat the crap out of one another and presto: some stupid transmission issue would result in what seemed like HOURS of psychedelic color bars accompanied by "Theme from 'A Summer Place'" with a completely sincere voice intoning the magic words. And all you'd want was to get back to the action. Given that we had, maybe four other channels to choose from, rarely did I ever change it. This was, of course, when you had to change the channel by getting up off your dead ass and turning a dial ATTACHED TO THE SET. So here were the choices: good cartoons on 5, live action drug-induced insanity (Magic Garden, Joya's Fun School, Banana Splits) on 11, endless BOR-ing episodes of Little Rascals on 9, and sanctimonious 70s touchy feely happy programming on 13.

Anyway, right about now I'd give just about anything to be six and sitting in front of the TV. The technical difficulties are as such: I'm STILL sick (week four) so I'm not sleeping a whole lot, I wake up at least 4 or 5 times a night, usually in a cold sweat out of a nightmare (yeah, Nazis this week!) My family is experiencing some fallout from the downturn (Mom's hours cut, brother in law's company shutting down in March, etc) so there's some worry there. And the general tension of the holidays is, well, what it is.

So I have not been blogging a whole lot. I have, however, considered composing a mock-Italian opera based on the recent reunion debacle. But it is hardly a story worth the telling. I just hope it's over by now.

At the end of the month I am planning on taking some time off to work on the 2nd book, although a recent whisper in my ear has encouraged me to do a different book first - a conversion/outreach book - but I don't know if I have the energy right now. Or if the publishing industry has a need. Something to explore, perhaps.

Thus, if I'm not around/online/posting for the next couple of weeks, I wish you all a happy holiday. Please stand by.

One of these things is not like the others...

I know it's been a while, but there have been some good reasons for not posting. First, I've been completely overwhelmed at work with a lot of projects, which is a good thing in this toilet economy, but a bad thing for those of us who used to take 20 minutes or so out of the day to update our blogs. And out of respect for my dear ones who have been casualties of the downturn, I feel like it's almost a bitchy thing to blog about my stupid/kvetchy issues when they have so much more to worry about - believe me, I've been there.

Second, I've been sick for about three weeks with a sinus bugaboo which has been more of a pain in the ass than an actual illness, but just the same it's preventing me from sleeping adequately, and on the nights I do actually get some sleep, I get hit with numerous fever dreams which are so scary and soul-shaking (plane crashes, being trapped inside burning houses, big old jet air-o-liners hitting burning buildings, I could continue but you get the picture) that I usually have trouble functioning the next day. Not exactly conducive to creativity, or anything else other than getting through the day, going to that night's meeting or class, and then going home to eat leftover casserole in front of Law & Order repeats.

But anyway...it's been a pretty crazy few weeks. I was sick for Thanksgiving, my favorite holiday, which I love because it involves no religion whatsoever. And also, and quite wonderfully, I have reconnected via Facebook with a number of former classmates from elementary school. I can't even begin to tell you what this has meant to me, since those were probably the happiest years of my childhood - way happier than when I ended up in public school. For your amusement, here's a scene from spring of 1978. Can you spot the Jew?



More to come...back to work.