Last week was a very long one filled with late nights. Sunday night, I was up late watching the second half of Angels in America on HBO. Monday night, I was up late working. Tuesday night, I went to a baby shower for a co-worker and then was up late again working. Wednesday, we saw That Movie. Thursday and Friday, I was up late getting presents ready. Saturday, Chad and the dog and I went to Massachusetts for a Christmas party with my dad's side of the family. That was very nice, particularly seeing my sixth-grade cousin Ch., but it was a rather lengthy party and tiring—both because I'm an introvert and because we were stressed out by our dog not wanting to be in the same house as my parents' dog. (Not just the same room, the same house. She slept in her crate in our room, and at seven a.m. Sunday, when she heard my parents' dog go past the closed bedroom door, she was up and barking away. I wasn't asleep anyway, hearing her shifting around, but it was still not a nice wakeup call.) We headed back Sunday afternoon; the dog was very happy to be home, but we were mostly in a stupor.
Monday was my deadline for all the work I'd been doing, and I
made it, though not without some metaphorical tearing of hair (mine
and, I'm afraid, my secretary's as well). Tuesday I (again)
excavated my desk, and then we headed to Chad's parents,
sans dog, for the holidays. We had the traditional
fondue the night we got in, and then the traditional fish and
pierogi Christmas Eve night. Spent most of Christmas Eve playing
with Z., our almost-four cousin, who is positively adorable and who
we really should see more often (his family lives very close by).
Chad's parents' dog is a big, loveable, loud lunkhead,
which did put a small damper on my attempts to catch up on my
sleep, but not too badly—and the relief at knowing that Emmy
wasn't there to be stressed out by him helped. We came back
Christmas day, because I had to work Friday. Yesterday, I
experimented with our new food processor (its claim to handling
dough for 75 cookies is somewhat overstated); 
larabeaton
and her sister stopped by for a bit; the Patriots beat the Bills in
a perfect 31-0 reversal of the first game of the season; and I did
a bit of booklogging. Today we saw That Movie again, details about
which will be in another post, and did a bit of post-Christmas
shopping. I'm still tired (particularly from That Movie), but
getting back to normal.
Blog-like items, all from the Boston Globe, coincidentally:
- Advantage: blogosphere? Around the start of December, discussions of cover songs ran around varous blogs, such as Chad's. On December 19, the Globe ran an article and sidebar on cover songs—and even mentions some of the same songs that Chad did.
- Cool picture of a bird's breath condensing in cold air.
- End of the regular season in football, and the Patriots are,
astonishingly, 14-2 and looking at home field advantage throughout
the playoffs.
- Good article on
how odd this feels to Boston-area fans:
It's rarely like this around here. History has conditioned us to live in fear of folly. Too many men on the ice. The grounder between the legs. Roughing the passer. Pesky holds the ball. Bucky Dent. Grady sticking with Pedro.
- Summary of the twelve-game winning streak. I didn't see all of the games, but of what I saw, the goal-line stand at Indianapolis is the most memorable. I'm glad I went to bed before the intentional safety at Denver, because even though it worked, I don't know if I could have stood it.
- Pictures of the snow-confetti during the win over Miami: one and two (because I didn't see the game, damn it, and think it's such a wonderful image).
- Good article on
how odd this feels to Boston-area fans: