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Cozy Mystery (and Other Favorite) Books, Movies, and TV

Christmas Decorating: for Thanksgiving or Later?

December 13, 2013

I have to admit that I have recently been jumping the gun as far as Christmas decorating. Since our daughter gets home so rarely, I try to get the decorations up right before she arrives for Thanksgiving. Before she moved away, we would put the decorations (did I say “we“?!?) after Thanksgiving, but now I feel like she should be able to see all of the lights and ornaments (etc.) for as long as she can. (I’m not playing favorites here. Since our son lives here in town, he’s able to see them whenever he wants.)

My husband and I have been downsizing our tree since the children were both in college. We bought our first fake tree when our children were very young. It was on sale after Christmas, so we lugged it home. We got many years of use out of it. Once the children went off to college, we down-sized that tree so that it was a little smaller, and actually had the lights already on it. Since we love the colored light bulbs, it was ideal for us. (There was a time a few years ago where it seemed like every fake tree with lights on it came with white light only.)

Well, even that last tree was getting to be more than I wanted to deal with, so after donating it to Goodwill, we just bought a 4 1/2 foot tree. This one has so many colored lights on it that I almost thought of leaving it bare!

This size tree is absolutely perfect for us. It is large enough to hold all of my most cherished ornaments… the ones both of our children made throughout their lives, as well as the ones I made out of some of the special toys they played with while growing up. Things like our daughter’s mini Cabbage Patch dolls and our son’s mini Transformers.) So those are the only adornments we have on our tree… and it is beautiful! A lot of memories for all of us, especially my husband and me. (Perhaps when they are older they will see just how precious their hand-made ornaments are to us.)

Alfred thought it might be interesting to find out when we decorate for the holidays. He actually suggested this entry’s topic before Thanksgiving, but for some reason I lost track of it.

… How about asking readers when they decorate for the holidays? Do they do it before Thanksgiving or the day after or do they not start until the beginning of December?  Today we put out all of our stuff for the holiday season and will take it down a day or two after Christmas…

So, when do you do your decorating for the holidays?

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Vocal Fry: I’m Glad to Know I’m Not the Only One to Have Noticed an Increasing Trend…

December 6, 2013

Vocal FryA few months ago we watched a show called Whodunnit. I don’t remember the channel, I don’t remember who won, I don’t remember even liking the show, but I do remember this: One of the girls on the show talked a certain way through an entire episode, and it really irritated me. My husband thought she had a bad cold, and he wondered when I started being such a pain in the neck about other people’s voices.

(In 2007 I had an operation which left one of my vocal chords paralyzed.  I went to a speech therapist for a year. My vocal chord is still paralyzed but the other one is compensating for it, and after a lot of “EEEE” scales, my voice has returned to normal.)

Getting back to my purpose of this entry which has absolutely nothing to do with mysteries, other than this new epidemic is a mystery to me!

The phenomena I’m talking about is “vocal fry”. I’m sure you have heard it, you may just not know that the women using it aren’t sick with a cold. I actually have looked it up and see that it used to be a type of speech disorder. And, yikes, as irritating as vocal fry is to me when I hear women using it, I have actually started to hear men on television using it. What is with that?!?

I read that there may be a chance of vocal fry actually damaging your vocal chords. (Believe me, you don’t want to do that!)

So, now that I have complained about this new, growing trend, here is a YouTube clip for those of you who aren’t sure what it is. The clip aired during September 2013 on the CBS News Sunday Morning show.

(Sorry, this video is no longer available.)

PS>>> Now that I know how to put these videos into my entries, I am going to have to control myself! I’m hoping the newness will wear off…

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Easy-Peasy Shopping: Cyber Monday

December 2, 2013

I just started DVR-ing a national news show since I felt like I was falling a little behind on world news recently. I have to say, the news shows have changed a lot since I last watched them. I tried one of the major network’s news shows and was amazed at all of the fluff they had during the half hour. I am currently trying another news show on one of the cable channels, in hope that it will not have the “cute kitten” stories that used to be relegated to the weather person’s time slot.

Anyway, the point I was going to make is that I absolutely could not believe what was going on at the stores during this, our supposedly most joyous and love-thy-neighbor, time of year. I could not believe the brawls over merchandise!

I haven’t gone Christmas shopping the traditional way in years. Yes, I’m afraid I’m one of those armchair shoppers… I have my family set up their wish lists, and I click, click, click at my computer. I buy everything online. I either have it sent directly to people on my Christmas/birthday lists, or I have it sent to me and then I wrap it up and put it under the tree.

This brings me to the sales online. I wanted to pass this one on. Amazon is having a Cyber Monday Kindle Book Sale. It’s on all sorts of different genres, not just mysteries. I skimmed through the Kindle mysteries and found some authors of interest:

Charlotte MacLeod
Ellery Queen
Mary Roberts Rinehart
Dorothy L. Sayers
Stuart Palmer
Ruth Rendell
Patricia Wentworth
Barbara Vine
Anne Perry
Jane Haddam
Heather Graham
Jane Langton
Susan Dunlap
Joseph Wambaugh
Jeffery Deaver
Carl Hiaasen

Yikes!! Too many books to choose from!

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Happy Thanksgiving AND Happy Hanukkah

November 28, 2013

Today is a very special day. It is both Thanksgiving (here in the USA) and the beginning of Hanukkah. I hope ALL of  you and yours have a happy and healthy day. 

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