NOW we can gripe about winter...

[lagilman]

And, of course, it's actually a mild 34 degrees outside today.

First small chunk of the Project Eating My Brain is off to Madame Agent. All the short stories I promised to get out in December are either got out or are printed and waiting for the mailguy. My client's revision letter is in the ether to her.

In fact, except for proofreading the author set for FREE FALL (this weekend, I swear!), all the work I HAD to get done in December is DONE. [I think, she said nervously, wondering what she's forgotten]

I still have to go for my last vampire visitation of the year, do some cooking, and deal with Project Whoosh! [eeeee] but otherwise... I made it. With ten days to spare.

Happy Solstice, y'all. We start seeing more sunlight now up here in the Northern Hemi, and I think that's probably a good thing.


Once again, in lieu of sending out paper cards that people look at, display for a week, and then forget to recycle, and in lieu of making myself crazy trying to send out e-cards to everyone I know, I am going to make a donation in your collective name; specifically, a quarter for every person who has this journal friended, effective, oh, noon today. This year, following my earlier comments, the receiving charity will be the Connecticut Food Bank, so if you've been meaning to 'friend' me but just haven't gotten around to it, now would be a good time. *grin*

Comments

[grr-rob.livejournal.com]

Oh, wow! That's a great way to address the "I love you all, here's a token of holiday cheer" with the donation. Cool!

(Umm... I may never have said hi. Hi! I'm Robin, I don't hardly ever post or comment, but really enjoy your LJ, being a caffeine based, feline serving kind critter, myself.)

[lagilman]

Hi, Robin!

[sfmarty.livejournal.com]

Food banks always get my vote! Thank you.

(exit purring)

[lagilman]

They're doing something called "Backpack Program " for school kids -- kids who get subsidized lunches during school days are being sent home with backpacks of kid-friendly and healthy foods for the weekend as well. Results show that the kids come back to school on Monday much better able to focus, and there's been a marked increase in homework done over the weekend. http://www.ctfoodbank.org/kids/Kids_Programs.cfm ordo a search for your own state's food bank, to see if they have a similar program.

If you can't feed and house your own children, what right do you have to call yourself a civilized nation? Seriously. It seems such an obvious thing to me...and yet, somehow, it's not.

[mizkit.livejournal.com]

That's a way cool gift-giving idea. :)

never let it be said I don't encourage and enable...

[lagilman]

"You know, if one person, just one person does it they may think he's really sick and they won't take him. And if two people, two people do it, in harmony, they may think they're both faggots and they won't take either of them. And three people do it, three, can you imagine, three people walking in singin a bar of Alice's Restaurant and walking out. They may think it's an organization. And can you, can you imagine fifty people a day,I said fifty people a day walking in singin a bar of Alice's Restaurant and walking out. And friends they may thinks it's a movement.

And that's what it is, the Alice's Restaurant Anti-Massacre Movement, and
all you got to do to join is sing it the next time it come's around on the guitar."

That's your cue. Go on and meme it! (those of you with scary-large numbers on your f-list, donate a penny per person, I suspect it will still be welcome...)

[burger-eater.livejournal.com]

... I am going to make a donation in your collective name; specifically, a quarter for every person who has this journal friended...

Thank you!

[lagilman]

and a happy, healthy New Year to us all...

[fakefrenchie.livejournal.com]

You are now officially added. Happy Holidays.

[hilleviw.livejournal.com]

Let it never be said that I, a professional fundraiser for the last 15 years, was dissuading anyone from a charitable gift. Mitzvah, no doubt about it.

I just wish you weren't proposing it in lieu of card exchange. For me, card exchange has more to do with "Should auld acquaintance be forgot, and never brought to mind? .... And there's a hand my trusty fiere, and gie's a hand o thine...." than anything else.

Maybe your life is straightforward. Maybe you get to see all the people you love on a regular basis. Maybe a card from you would just be a redundant reminder that you're thinking about people. Maybe you're a great correspondent, and so are all the people you care about. Maybe everyone you know has and uses email. That's not how my life works. But once a year, or at least every two years, I set time aside and go through my address books, and send cards or letters or both to people I care about. I've lived in Sweden, England, Hong Kong, California, New York, Minnesota and Massachusetts. I've traveled through a hundred countries and 48 of the US states. This year I sent 168 letters to people in 38 US states and 17 other countries, on all 7 continents. I've gotten several address changes as a result, and a bunch of cards and notes and emails, and a couple of people have invited themselves to come visit. But most importantly, I've let those people know that I'm thinking of them and that I want to keep in touch, and they matter to me. My auld acquaintance aren't forgot. And that's also a mitzvah.

[lagilman]

I just wish you weren't proposing it in lieu of card exchange.

I wasn't. I was saying what I was going to do this year, for my own reasons. I may favor e-mail over paper cards for reasons enviromental, but at no point did I say that anyone should not send cards if that's what they enjoy doing.

But since you brought it up. Yes, I do try to keep in touch with people during the year -- if they're important to me in December, they're important to me in June, too.

[debg.livejournal.com]

Warning: longish Deb-iean ranty post ahead.

Confession: I hate paper cards.

I understand why people send them, but because Christmas is pure Hallmark in terms of its meaning to me, I don't go there. I'm also in the "I donate food to Second Harvest in July, not just Thanksgiving and by the way I doubt the turkeys are thankful" camp, and I keep in touch all year long.

Truth? Every time I get a paper card - and so far, this season, I've received nearly two dozen - I want to cry. Because it means I'm now obligated, by societal norm, to take hands that don't work, that hurt like hell, that don't grip the pen the way they used to, and write personal messages that can't be corrected the way they can be when I'm clumsy on a keyboard. It means I have to go stand in the fucking post office and buy stamps, which I no longer use for anything since I pay bills online (and prefer e-cards anyway, for environmental reasons), and I have to do these things because apparently telling people 364 days a year that I love them and have their back isn't personal enough. And apparently using electrons isn't personal enough to most people.

I don't get it. When Jo grew up and moved, I pretty much sang a hosanna, because that was the end of the December bullshit, the obligatory parental entertaining, the wrapping of presents, and above all, the writing of cards. Especially now, with the MS, I hate it more than ever, because it no longer leaves me vaguely resentful; it actively hurts.

Housewarmings, yes indeed. They mean something to me. Someone's birthday, that means something to me.

Jesus Christ's birthday means jack-diddly to me; not a Christian, never have been, pretty sure I never will be. So this holiday is purest Hallmark to me, retail is the reason for the season, all that. And December, to me, means little more than the solstice, after which maybe we can for pity's sake get the hell out of this rancid dark season and see the sun again.

I love my friends all year long. December is nothing special.

[lagilman]

I understand why people send them, but because Christmas is pure Hallmark in terms of its meaning to me

People send me Christmas cards and I'm always like "well, I appreciate the sentiment, but... WTF?" If you don't know that I'm Jewish, why are you bothing to send me a card? And if you do know, and sent me that card...how am I supposed to take that? Ugh.

I tend to send New Year's cards, when I send anything. We all [more or less] celebrate New Year's, and it allows me, as was mentioned upstream, to wish someone well for an entire year, rather than just remembering them for a particular season (and update my address for them as will need it. Two mailings in one!)

What bothered me about the post that started this, other than the fact that it claimed something not in my original comment, was the idea that there's only one time of the year that you can send out "wanted to stay in touch/am thinking of you" communications; a time when people are already stressed and not wanting one more thing to have to deal with...

Screw that, I say. I love getting cards in December...but I also love getting e-mail in April, and phone calls in February, and IMs in July... you get the idea.

[debg.livejournal.com]

An illustrtion: we got a card yesterday, fancy, big enough to need additional postage, hand-addressed to both of us: "Dearest Deb and Nic:". Nic doesn't open cards - he makes me deal with them. Swell.

I opened this thing, and there was a letter in it. It was one of those "hi, sorry we haven't talked to you or acknowledged your existence in a year, but here's Every Damned Thing we've been up to! New car! Broken tooth! The Dog died in April!" deals, on and on, two sheets of typewritten paper.

I didn't recognise the name. No clue who in hell they were, or why they wanted to cram all the minutiae of their lives for 365 days into a typewritten letter shoved in a big "WOW! Look! GILT-EDGING SANTA!" card.

I asked Nic; they turned out to be members of the old GeNie crew. Nice for him, but I've never exchanged a word with these people, not once in my life, in any shape or form. I never played on GeNie, never posted, never hung out, wasn't interested.

"Dearest Deb"...

WTF?

You know, there are moments I'm reasonably glad I'm in the Ani deFranco "I care less and less what people thing" mode. Because I am NOT going to sit down and write back. Social mores and manners put the ball in my half of the court, and damn it, I don't want to play. I have neither time nor interest for doing that for a dozen people, none of whom could bother talking to me about their stuff back when it actually happened.

Cards? All about my birthday. That means something to me. Or if I'm in hospital for something. Otherwise, nyet.

[vincam.livejournal.com]

in lieu of sending out paper cards that people look at, display for a week, and then forget to recycle, and in lieu of making myself crazy trying to send out e-cards to everyone I know, I am going to make a donation in your collective name;

Hey, thanks. That's sweet.