Post-Christmas Cheer

I always get in the mood for Christmas right after Christmas. I can’t explain why, but the day after Christmas, when everyone and his brother completely stops playing Christmas music, is when I want to hear it. Well, that’s what CD’s are for. This year I might just let it go early, since my oldest daughter got me the new Star Wars movie score as a gift. A day spent writing and sipping tea with John Williams playing in the background? Yes, please.

Between my surgery, overtime, and various other factors, there wasn’t much lead time this year, so Christmas came and went in a flash … or is that part of getting older? Although it’s over, I’d like to share one of my favorite, if badly rhymed, Christmas columns:

http://markrhunter.blogspot.com/2013/12/changing-rhyme-schemes-or-not-so.html

Also, you can still read/download my new Christmas short story, and two other short stories, on our website:

http://markrhunter.com/extras.html

Speak of the Devil: Santa Got Bitten By The Dog

Merry Christmas!



Speak of the Devil: Santa Got Bitten By The Dog: It's my annual Christmas Eve blog today with a whole mess of odd images. Also have a look over at my photoblog, as I'm in the mids...

Maybe red and green Kleenex would help

I have a festive Christmas cold, all green and red and yellow ...

I suppose a weakened immune system from the surgery contributed to it, or maybe I just pulled that idea out of my nose. In any case, there isn't anything this week I can put off, so I suppose I'll just muddle through and hope Emily doesn't get it, which I think she is. Getting it, I mean.

And yet December has still been a bit better than November, so far.

Something fishy ... and octupus-y

Emily got a sushi dinner for her birthday!

I had steak.

Happy Birthday, Sunny

Today’s the birthday of my wife Emily, who was born on what’s usually the first day of winter—or, more optimistically, the time when the days start getting longer. (This year winter comes a day late.) The way I see it, that just makes her nickname, Sunny, that much more appropriate.

You have to wonder what Emily expected when she agreed to marry me. It certainly couldn’t have been Indiana winters, every medical malady known to man, and the strange, long hours of a third shifter who’s also a struggling writer.

She’s become my editor, book designer, nurse, dog wrangler, traveling partner, photographer, best friend, and—oh yeah—the love of my life. And she puts up with my puns. She doesn’t like them, but she puts up with them. See, this is how I know she loves me: Why else stick around?

Emily is also my inspiration. I know without a doubt that without her, I wouldn’t have had as much writing success as I have—she pushes me, promotes me, and encourages me. Boy, do writers need encouragement these days. We have seven books out, and two more almost ready to go … without her I’d have managed maybe three by now. Our self-published projects would have been impossible for me to do alone.

I’m still on the mend from my sinus surgery and not feeling great, and there’s overtime this week, so I can’t say how good of a birthday I’ll give her this year. But, as with the first day of winter, there’s that glimmer of more sunshine in the future. In other words, by next year I hope to have my act together. Either way, I’m already a better person for knowing my Sunny; love does that.