Rows and Floes of Angel Hair

I have just mistaken someone at the very best coffee shop* for someone else, and spoken accordingly.

How embarassing.

Still, she laughed it off nervously and played along.

While and after I ordered a short cap and a silver needle tea, she continued the same laughter. Her strain is maybe something else and not me. That's a relief.

I've left the house to clear my head.

I'm thinking of right turns, southpaws, cold feet, and the gold dust that settles in my lover's hair.
I'm wondering how two people can live together for fourteen years and navigate the boneyard labyrinth between them - a tired ribcage before the heart, and doors that won't open.

One shouldn't have to work so hard, only to arrive at this.

It hasn't been the jolliest of Christmases, nor the worst of times by any means, but I suspect I'm not alone in my Holiday Ambivalence. Even Spreaders of Good Cheer are under duress. I never guessed Disney would repossess Santa (who was recently handed his ass), but I guess they own everything else. Is Bill O'Reilly puffed-up, red-faced and spitting about that?

Maybe it's time to mention a few things for which I have gratitude:

- I have love in my life.
- Some very dear friends.
- Fondness for my regular readership (and I am yours), though I wish you'd post more comments, for good or ill.
- I've just learned that my blog rank on Technorati is 247,131. That's not so bad, but surprising given the low number of hits per day. I also just realized that when I made the switch to BetaBlogger, it wiped out the ads, which is odd, as they were Google sponsored. It's just as well.
- The comforting way my dog snores.
- The severely damaged nail on my index finger is half way grown out now.
- My mother's clear of cancer.
- Mr. Claus saw fit to send a friend a lap(ple)top, which is what I've dreamed of getting her for years, if I were a rich man. She deserved it.
- I'm less afraid than I was two years ago, and less still than half a decade before that.
- Sometimes I dream about Claire.
- I've some resolutions I'm willing to make.
- I've been reminded that time is quite possibly infinite, so I can't really be wasting it.
- The sun just came out for the first time since I've been home.



*There. Now you have a way to find me, and if chance keeps us separated, you can content yourself with the very best coffee in Portland, so far as I know it. They have free wifi, like every other boutique espresso place in this fair city, though at the chains you must pay.