Give all the toys to the little rich boys

I’ve never been great at gift giving.* Some years back, one of my sisters read a book, The Five Love Languages, which boiled down the ways people like to give and receive love into five “languages.” A person tends to be able to perceive love through one of these styles, and to give via one …

25 days of Christmas

Oh hey! It must be December. I’ve been scurrying through the last few weeks (months), head down and nose to grindstone, largely oblivious to the seasons. But I can’t help but notice that holiday music is back. Even my own iTunes has started playing it, unprompted by me. The other night I turned on the …

The view from the snowflake truck

View from the snowflake truck, originally uploaded by cynthiacloskey. This Sunday morning, at the alarmingly early hour of 6:30am, I and a group of other volunteers for Butler Downtown helped to set up the electric snowflake decorations on Main Street, Butler, PA. We volunteers unloaded the decorations from the special rigs they’re stored and transported …

Kooky Christmas Countdown: #22 and #21

Continuing our Kooky Christmas Countdown of strange and wonderful holiday songs. Number 22: "Five Pound Box of Money" by Pearl Bailey Here’s a heartfelt plea from a practical woman. Hey, Santa Claus! You want to make me happy this year? Listen to me honey. Give Pearl something that’ll be of some use to me, Like …