To the kids who fabricate the Scene’s Fabricator

BITE ME. We had fun. Damn shame that Nemesis Boy has outed himself herself and didn’t appear, or else we could have once again been exposed as solipsistic witless dupes…oh, wait a minute….we didn’t name Nemesis Boy as the blogger of the year…

Seeing the forest…or, Ok, even though I like to schedule my own thankful days, I’ll do the thankful Thursday thing…

I’ve written a lot lately about the many wonderful people I’ve met (especially in my West Tennessee Blogger Tour disguised somewhat as a work trip*). I’ve been really lucky to get to know (and I’m not going to attempt to list them all) folks like Kerry and CLC and Sista and so many more. Without blogging, and without Brittney and her wondrous work, it wouldn’t have happened.

But, I want to devote this post to the person to whom I am most grateful. She’s not a blogger. She’s met a few and knows that they aren’t crazed ax-murderer types (at least not the ax part). She tolerates my blogging and blog-reading most of the time (i get a LITTLE obsessive reading your blogs). She has put up with my idiosyncratic behavior, and irascibility much longer than my parents did. She’s a person of abundant energy and talent (witness the painting on top of this post). She’s a talented cook and a great date. I’m not going to go all ‘B-Dub‘ on ya and describe the outcome of some of those dates, but I can tell you we have three children and none of them were conceived immaculately.

I told Lynnster sometime during my western swing that I’ve already received my gifts for this year – getting to know so many of YOU. I’m being soppy I know, but the greatest gift of them all is my wife. I think she is beautiful and I know than she is more patient than Job could even dream.

Sadly, neither one of us married an organized person, but we did manage to organize our thoughts well enough to marry the right person (well, I did at least..)

So, thanks to Lynn for the last 29 and 1/2 years…..

Hope I die before I grow up, or, tell me about the tacky sweaters George, tell me…

My usual up-to-date radar on what is trendy was jarred when I read MY Tennessean and discovered the smart set were scouring Goodwill and their weird aunt’s closets and chiffarobes for ugly, tasteless, LOUD, sweaters to wear for their trendy outings to trendy clubs. Actually, I now realize that if I read MY Tennessean to find out what is cool, I’ve already pretty much lost the war.

Anyway, besides some possible questionable activity spurred by trying to purchase sweaters from homeless people, I wanted to point out a rather odd quote from one of the women interviewed by MY Tennessean for the sweater story.

…..So when she moved to Nashville this year, she brought her newly found Christmas tradition with her and persuaded 40 friends to participate in their first-ever “tacky Christmas sweater pub crawl.”

They wove in and out of the bars on Demonbreun Street, drawing attention from other bar hoppers with their flashing sweaters and jingling hems.

But Ainge and her friends didn’t care about the stares.

“There’s something to be said about not caring what people think and having a good time,” Ainge said. “I can’t wait until I’m older and I can wear holiday sweaters all the time and it’ll be completely appropriate.”

I had always thought that the beauty and grace of growing old was based on the wisdom garnered from a life well lived, or enjoying the grandchildren we hope we’ll have someday (no rush kiddos!) or being able to shoo young hooligans off the yard while brandishing a cane. I better start stocking up on holiday sweaters…you know I always wanna be appropriate!