Austin, TEXAS, December 4, 2005 — I stayed in bed until nine. I had a little headache that didn't go away until almost noon. I didn't take anything for it but a banana and coffee, though. When I got up I dressed in sweats and then I wasted about three hours working on my journal. Wondering whether to post my honest feelings about that Christmas card from a relative. Obviously I decided to do it. I think writing honestly about these things is cathartic. It may be a cop-out. A conversation you can't have with people directly. Although I'm generally honest with people if pressed, I don't always say anything at all, simply avoiding people I don't get along with. Which is something that I sometimes don't want to forgive other people for doing.

Especially if they seemed to love me one moment and not the next. Truthfully, however, I really want everyone to get along. I want to forgive, forget, make nice, pretend we are all friends. Or at least avoid people I can't get along with. And, of course, I'm always well aware that my version of events may not ring true for other people.

But enough about that. I managed to waste three hours this morning on the journal and little else. I started looking at the Book Review in The New York Times. I looked at some of the ads in the newspaper. I drank coffee. Otherwise, I wasted the time on the journal and looking at other journals. I've been going down the Holidailies list seeing what some of the other over 160 journals that are registered in this portal (plus more in Holidailies at Home) are up to.

As I was going through the ads in the paper I started thinking about the few Christmas gifts I'm going to buy. I don't buy presents for too many people. And I usually wait until I've handled holiday cards, family calendars and the family in Colorado to think much about these other presents. Mostly I'm going to have gifts for my parental units and a couple of friends. A small enough number of people that I can make it actually sort of fun to shop and wrap. Some of my relatives are having a White Elephant exchange. But it's in Houston on New Year's Eve so we won't be making that. The idea of it, though, made me think that I should wrap up a bunch of orphaned stuff from around here and send it to them! Or have a White Elephant exchange myself but do what one of FFP's clients did last Christmas and provide all the gifts myself rather than ask people to bring one.

Thus it was that after noon I headed for a workout. I rode the recumbent bike over fifty minutes, reading the editorial content The New York Times had spread through a perfect-bound magazine supplement intended to sell holiday advertising. I was taken with articles on cooking and presents to buy and thought of doing some cooking and buying certain presents. But that's probably all thought, to not be accompanied by action. Most fascinating in this bundle of content, intended to glue together fancy ads from the likes of Cartier, Clinique and Cole Haan and, yes, Target and The Container Store, was a story by Martha McPhee (yes, that McPhee) about fractured family Christmases as seen through the prism of some yearly holiday notes written by her grandmother on the inside of a lid of the box that held a wreath. It is an excellent article, part multi-generational memoir, part exposé of the dark side of Christmas, part a revelation of the hope such a holiday can provide to bring together and even heal families. "Christmas, like weddings and funerals, reveals the fault lines in a family." She says. And later: "We want to be together. Simple as that." For this piece and one about a rebirth kind of New Orleans Christmas and the lovely pictures of Scarlett Johansson this piece wasn't just a throwaway bunch of ads. I climbed off the bike, decided to go home and satisfy my growing hunger and not do any weights.

When I walked into the house, the Lady Longhorn game was roaring out of two TVs.

"They are playing Duke close. We could have gone, I guess." Said himself. (Or something very like that.) Yes, we have tickets which they kindly have provided ever since we gave them a 10K endowment even though we only added a few thousand over the years. It was on our calendar. However, so were two parties this evening.

"You didn't want to go, did you?" I asked.

"Not really. I didn't want to do three things." He said.

I stuffed my face with salad, Clementines and cheese. And some soy crisps. As I was making the salad and chopping some green onions I asked if he'd been to the store.

"No. I got interested in this game."

When the Lady Horns had finished losing to Duke, a team himself declared was #1 in the nation, he said he was going to the store.

"You don't have to go. We don't need anything that desperately."

"No, I'll go. I want to go."

I let the dog out, cleaned up from my meal, made some coffee. I had a few hours before our first event. I didn't have anything really pressing to do except get cleaned up. So what to do? I glanced at my e-mail and noticed an e-mail FFP sent asking me to burn a CD for him. So I started doing that which caused me to digress into listening to his cuts and then wondering why all my playlists don't show up on the software and finding this dead jazz bass player Jaco Pastorious and playing some tunes until FFP logged on to see if he could see my playlists from his machine which logged me off. Meanwhile he'd found an article in The New York Times which he knew I'd be interested in where they talk about how films are selected for Sundance. I vowed to read it but first I decided to prowl around through the Holidailies portal some more. Not to really read anyone or get to know them, but just to envy their designs where appropriate. Then I took a shower and got all cleaned up, read the article in the Times and then got dressed.

We knew we'd have to get to the holiday party at our club dead early to get a parking spot. We were there about ten 'til six and it was already crowded. We wandered around a bit, sat with some other folks to eat a little food. Then we made a grand sweep to see who was there. Mostly it was the older set but there were a few people our age, a few teenagers and a few younger people I play tennis with. I discovered they had sushi and had to have some of that. Then we headed out to north Austin to another party. Our friends have turned there house into an explosion of Christmas cheer. The tiny house had lights all over, blow up decorations outside and several trees, lights, garlands and touches inside. I had some champagne, a little food. They were serving all kinds of food (meatballs, salmon, a complete turkey, homemade candy and cookies) in their tiny dining room. The champagne was on the front porch, a festive display with a tub of bottles, a table of glasses, a trash can for corks and debris. And a sign that said something like "Santa knows you were naughty this year. Don't try to make up for it now. Have some champagne." I went back out to refill my glass once and opened a new bottle. A cold wind was blowing. We talked to people we knew about their projects and other friends. We actually ran into someone from the Westwood party.

We left after a time to head home. A cold wind was blowing out of the north. It wasn't late. I called my dad when we got home. We said we'd make the call on water aerobics in the morning, but he didn't think it looked promising.

FFP watched Desperate Housewives which he'd taped. He missed last week. Carlos got out of jail somehow and became a religious nut because of a good-looking nun. Who can watch this junk? However, I wasn't sleepy. I read the papers, worked a puzzle. And ran through Grey's Anatomy and some crime shows. Stop me watching this stuff! Please! I wouldn't have recorded anything but FFP had set it up.

I hadn't had a lot of food. And only two glasses of champagne. But, for some reason, I wasn't sleepy. I watched the last stupid crime show from bed while FFP and the dog snoozed. I tried to go to sleep. After two hours of tossing and turning, I got up. But the house was cold and I was too lazy to put on socks.

I finally went to sleep by thinking of all the things I'd buy if I was trapped in a suite hotel by a winter storm that was going to halt air and highway transportation. I don't know how I got started thinking about this. But rather than counting sheep, I was distracting myself from a vague ache in my hips and feet and a wakefulness that was, well, keeping me from sleeping. By mentally going through the aisles of a supermarket and other stores. Canned goods, check. A fondue pot with sterno in case the power goes off. Playing cards, other games, books, magazines. Blankets. Fire logs. (My suite hotel had a fireplace in the living area, see?) Coffee, check. Caviar, check. Eggs, check. (Remember to boil some while we still have power so we can eat them if the power fails. Finely chopped with the caviar, too.) Onions. Crême Fraiche. Capers. Hot chocolate mix. Styrofoam cups and plates. (What if the hotel fills up and we have to share coffee and cocoa and food with people sleeping in the lobby and run out of dishes?) Bags of salad. Cases of water and soda. Change in case all else fails and the vending machines have to be raided. Fruit.

I know. This sounds like I was dreaming one of my weird dreams. But I wasn't. I was making this up trying to fall asleep.

I finally did fall asleep. It was tomorrow, Monday. And before I knew it I'd slept a few hours and the dog had her paws on the side of the bed bugging me to either go out and get back in bed.