The fundamental things apply...

 We have completed another revolution. (Around the sun. No one actually busted out the guillotines. It was a near thing, but it never quite got there.)

So here we are. A new year ahead. A pretty terrible all-around year left behind. A calendar born of convention, meaning fuck all, really. Yes, I'm firmly in the Arthur Dent camp--I've never gotten the hang of Thursdays. But they keep happening, just like new years. They just keep showing up, expecting you to fill them.

It's an awful lot of responsibility, and if you ask me, I think it's a bit rude to have it thrust upon me by physics.

But at least this one's done with. There's no guarantee the next one will be any better, but we could all have done without the trainwreck that was 2020. It's amazing we've made it through at all, much less done anything of value, considering the circumstances. Ain't it funny how the human animal manages to persevere, even when the universe is calling vociferously for its retirement?

It did have some upsides. Some moments. It wasn't all bad. I started it with a nice trip with my parents to Cambria at the end of January. We had a delightful time. I started a new job in February, which has been a godsend in the mental health department. I'm challenged. I'm busy. I'm appreciated. What a concept! Of course, then March happened, and everything went to pot in a hurry. No more dance classes in a real dance studio. No more hanging out with friends. No more...well, it's not like I did much, but it was nice to do one or two things, you know?

March turned into April, which turned into May, and on and on... Some people got a COVID puppy. I got a COVID man-friend. It didn't last, but I think it gave us both something we needed at the time. I have no regrets. That, and a renewed interest in artistic pursuits, carried me in an enjoyable way into October, when for three glorious weeks I got dance classes in a real dance studio back. Alas, it was short-lived, and I was back in my living room again with my computer balanced on top of the rat cage trying not to kill myself dancing on concrete slab. Then the holidays came with their usual nonsense, and now here we are.

It feels like forever.

It feels like no time at all.

Only one more sleep...

For your reading pleasure, and for those of you who may have missed it last year, I present to you my contribution to the #joinin Christmas celebration from 2019: A Drunken Live-Tweet of The Muppet's Christmas Carol.

#joinin was originally conceived by English comedian Sarah Millican as a means for anyone who was alone on Christmas to not be quite so alone. The hashtag is live all year, but it picks up most at Christmas time, and helps make the day a little brighter for those who aren't with loved ones for the holiday, for whatever reason. It's good fun, and I'll be popping in and out this year I'm sure!

Community

 I took the scenic route home from work tonight. There was a gnarly accident on the freeway, so it was a matter of getting home in twenty minutes rather than an hour and forty-five. (It's six miles. An hour and forty-five minutes to go six miles. I mean...)

I enjoy the occasional foray into the uncharted territories of modern suburbia. I find that it fills in the bits of my mental map that are generally left blank by virtue of the fact that there are Big Roads circumnavigating them that offer a more expedient voyage to one's chosen destination. I'm all for the old "the shortest distance between two points" argument, don't get me wrong, but sometimes it's nice to slow down a bit.

It was gray and misty. Plenty of leaves scuttling around on the pavement. People and dogs out for their evening constitutional. Christmas lights. It was pleasant. My route, as suggested by Google, went through a section of my town which I believe is called 'Poets' Corner'. Isn't that...well, it's a bit twee, actually, but never mind.

You see, my town doesn't have what you would traditionally think of as a downtown. I've found that the different neighborhoods each have their own nexus--a strip mall or shopping center providing a little common ground. Little communities within the bigger one. I found one on my way home I'd never passed through, and it was quite appealing. It was a bit of a time capsule--the architecture was a 1970's hangover to be sure, but I thought that lent it some character. Times being what they are, the likelihood of my getting to go back and explore it are slim to none for the foreseeable future, but I've tucked that little morsel of geographical interest away for another time.

Passing through it got me thinking about communities. We all belong to them. We have different ones for different things. You might have a school community, a work community, a neighborhood community, a church community, the list is endless. It's almost certainly always been this way, but as we've expanded as a species, so has our reach across communities. Things get crowded, people get all up in each other's business, some people move away. For a while, the ones who moved away are on their own. A microcosm of human community. But by and by everyone else horns in, and the cycle repeats. Pond ripples of human interaction. An infinity of Venn diagrams.

It's certainly more global now than it's ever been.

Isn't it funny, though, how many of us feel like we're farther apart than we've ever been?

Show and Tell!

This year, you don't only get to read about My Favorite Christmas Tradition--you get to WATCH it! And LISTEN to it! That's me, top-middle, singing. Everything else is courtesy of the brilliant, beautiful Marjorie Halloran, or, as you all know her, Friend-Since-I-Was-In-My-Mummy's-Tummy.

While you're there, subscribe to Marjorie Halloran Music and go buy her albums on Bandcamp. Oh, and make sure you read the video description, written by YOURS TRULY.

Watch our Christmas Collaboration here:
The Ivy and The Holly, a Kate Rusby cover by Marjorie Halloran and Elizabeth Fazzio

Enjoy! 

There’s a mouse in the…well, office, actually…

We’ve had some excitement in the office recently in the form of an eensy-weensy rodent.

Yes, we have a mouse.

We discovered him/her/it on the 19^th, when a colleague, thinking she was losing her mind, opened up the bottom drawer to a currently unoccupied desk after hearing noises coming from that area for several days.

Cue much shrieking.

After the theatrics, which we figured would have frightened said rodent away, we started to clean out the desk drawer, removing the vaguest beginnings of a nest, amongst other items not suitable for mouse bedding. Being the Resident Rodent Expert, I was doing most of the stuff-shifting, and was being very gentle and careful in case the mouse hadn’t scurried away out the back of the drawer. Then, suddenly, there was a pair of tiny ears and a set of tiny eyes looking up at me in terror.

“Oh, hello, pumpkin! You are still here!” I cooed at the wee, quivering beastie.

The wee, quivering beastie continued to quiver.

While I looked around for a suitable container, the rest of the office got all squeamish, which only upset my poor mouse friend more. I heard one colleague say something akin to, "Just leave it with Elizabeth, she's the fricken' Pied Piper," while another tried to shoo people away saying, "Just let Elizabeth do her thing," but their curiosity got the better of them. I was trying to work out the gentlest way to scoop my new pal into a pen cup when he/her/it had a sudden moment of bravery and hopped out of the drawer and away behind the cubicle wall, gone forever.

I was crushed. I wanted to take him/her/it somewhere suitable outside...after a decent amount of fussing and clucking over him/her/it, obviously. I love me a little squeaker!

I baited the little critter with paper towels and peanuts before I left for the day with the intention of trying again the next morning, a plan which ultimately failed. I tried again over the weekend, still nothing.

The next week passed, and we had the prolonged holiday weekend, and I got into the office again on Monday and as I was settling in...I heard a little noise. Coming from my bottom desk drawer. Where my snacks live.

No mouse.

But he/she/it had been there and had themselves a holiday feast.

 

Lookit those wittle teef marks!!! ::hearteyes::

Alas, a mouse in the office is not ideal, so I IM'd my manager:

"So our little furry friend returned. It got into some of my snacks over the break. While I personally don't begrudge the wee beastie a holiday feast, I realize that this is not an ideal situation, so we should probably inform the relevant property management people. Just maybe don't tell me about their chosen methods to rid us of said beastie, because I'll cry."

They're coming tomorrow with a humane trap for catch-and-release.