Skarka, with the assist….
Back at the end of November, John Tynes posted a link to part one of a fascinating article about bizarre happenings on a Nevada ranch.
As I was wandering around the corners of my laptop today, I found a note to myself to remember to hunt down the second installment. Tynes never posted a follow-up link, so, for those who were interested, here is the second and final part of that story. Bizarre stuff.
Christmas was good. We got about a foot of snow, which made for a pretty day, perfect for staying inside and drinking home-made mead (go, me). We head out to Long Island this weekend to make a brief round of the extended family, and then it’s back to work.
I love this holiday. Folks often ask me why, given the fact that I am not remotely Christian. I usually respond with the following quote from Dickens, which I find sums it up for me nicely:
“There are many things from which I might have derived good, by which I have not profited, I dare say,” returned the nephew: “Christmas among the rest. But I am sure I have always thought of Christmas time, when it has come round — apart from the veneration due to its sacred name and origin, if anything belonging to it can be apart from that — as a good time: a kind, forgiving, charitable, pleasant time: the only time I know of, in the long calendar of the year, when men and women seem by one consent to open their shut-up hearts freely, and to think of people below them as if they really were fellow-passengers to the grave, and not another race of creatures bound on other journeys. And therefore, uncle, though it has never put a scrap of gold or silver in my pocket, I believe that it has done me good, and will do me good; and I say, God bless it!”
Merry Christmas.