Oh, that's why I never messed with Christmas lights.

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I'm not a humbugger.  I won't belabor the point as, well, those people usually really are.  So, what is my problem with Christmas lights?  Well, when I start something I often end up completing it.  But with Christmas lights, there might be no end!  I went looking, initially, for clips to attach lights to my roof.  I was not willing to spend (and keep spending) on temporary disposable attachments.  I certainly would not use a stapler, nail, or other attaching device which would damage the wood.  Okay, so I find a good selection of clips fairly quickly.  Now, for me, $60 on Christmas lights, plus another $30 in extension cord and timer, was about it for this year.  I spoke with my mother, watching the other Christmas lights going up (I think, think... we were the first locally, more by accident than (at least personally) drive or such).  We both agreed that the eerily odd white was pretty good, that regular white wasn't bad, and that electric (darker albeit) blue was a fine color.  So... I decided to look at those while I was looking.  Just looking mind you, I have a wheat grinder and bicycle-mount to buy before too long.  *cha-ching*

So, there I am, all helpless and alone, online, looking at lights.  I was almost blinded by the options.  Okay, where to start.  Sort out by outdoor and LED.  Check.  Hmm?  Thousands?  Okay, how about white, then blue?  Okay, manageable.  But, the best price?  The best quality?  The best blend of those?  That isn't even science, it is guess and by golly.  This one is this length, with this many bulbs.  That one is twice the length with only 70% of the bulbs, these are not rated by users, those by only one, few are rated by many users.  Some are in metric (which I can do, roughly), others have a mix of standard and metric measures (or even something else... what length goes with 16.4 feet that equals 128? [tip: 16.4 feet ~ 500 cm ~ 5 m]).  Plus, figuring out how much I would need will require some measuring.  Oh, and they do have solar powered strings of light, though they get hit for being very dim.  And they have strings that are self-contained, timered, battery operated, operations, lasting (according to the manufacturer) 30 days (4 AA) or 60 days (3 D or C, didn't look that closely).  Hmm, something to be thinking about through the year though.  My guess is, right now, Christmas lights are at a premium.  If you can find them, it would be right after Christmas but before they bundle them back to the keeper of value warehouse for next year.  Over Whelming.  Still, I'll... do just fine, over time.  At least I know there are clips to hold the lights that fit both budget and common/home sense.

Supper arrived just a bit ago.  I really do feel spoiled.  It isn't just the food, but that it is someone's dinner, that they are sharing.  It is... like being a distant part of the families.  While we aren't breaking bread together, we are breaking the same bread.  It is an intimate thing, in the best of platonic, or social, or familial intimacies.  Food, as I have suggested, is special to my notions of life, friends, family, and God.  Well, that it is good and balanced doesn't hurt a bit. 

Oh, in a bit, I will be calling to see if I talked over what my guests from yesterday(?) had been suggesting.  Call on the quarters and halves, in order to call during commercials.  Yeah, I know.  I know some things, even for not having television here.  Well, save when my mother is here.  Which reminds me, that thing needs to go back, the cable box.  Yuck!

I just now received a call about the meat.  I just wanted to make sure they knew I was coming and the time fit their schedule.  I could have gone in this evening, but that would mean a shower (which I missed today).  No, it gets too complicated, I still have tool sorting left, and I am starting to wind down.  Tomorrow morning was another option, but I just am not sure if or when I can or will rise on any given day.  I hate to plan for that, especially in partial recuperation from three weeks of heavy work (to me).  Tomorrow afternoon seems about right, and the earliest possible time.  I would rather have done it tonight, partly for embarrassment for being a week off, partly just to get the job done.  But some things must be the way they are.  If we never fully learn to live with shame, we can at least know it will happen, again and again and again.

An hour of goofing, then I will hit the tool drawers, I suspect.  I've gotten most everything else I planned to do completed already.  I might even, if I have the energy to lift a leg, get a shower in yet this evening.  Just because.  Hmm, didn't even hurt, mostly.  But then I might still be jazzing on mom-work-power-fumes.  Time will tell.

Good night, most likely.  Yeah, no.  I won't be going to bed very soon, but... I've been posting enough.  That and nothing much else will probably happen.  What a busy day considering I had thought there were only two or three things, give or take, to do.  Much more incoming and outgoing that I had... even thought possible!  Sleep well, I think I will.  Again, good night.