If I hadn't been doing my laundry on Christmas Eve, this never would have happened. I went to the laundry room on the floor above me to take my clothes out of the washer and put them in the dryer, and  someone had moved my clothes into the dryer - and put money in it.
     I know sometimes a person will take your laundry out of the washer and put in somewhere, perhaps even in the dryer, because they want to use the washer and they don't want to wait for you.
     But I know of no reason why they would have done this, except as a small gift in the true spirit of Christmas. I fantasize as to how it may have happened. Was it someone who lives next door to the laundry room and heard the washer. Then thought "Why, I'll just go move their laundry when it's done and pun the coins in for them." Or, I wonder if they somehow saw me and knew it was me, or did they just do it, not needing to know who it was for?
     I believe that the best gifts are those that are totally unexpected. Not necessarily something that we want, or even need, or would ever imagine getting. Just something that makes us feel warm all over, and makes us want to give something back - perhaps even to an unknown stranger - just because. Not because it makes us feel good to give, or because we think it will make the other person happy. But just because giving is - in and of itself - a wonderful, mysterious, magical thing.
     Perhaps tomorrow I - and you - may feel the urge to give just some little thing, without regard for person, place or timing, just because the opportunity is there.
     Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

     My Christmas present, from me to my favorite child - Me! So, it's been building for a while. The experiment in switching to Mac has come to a sad end. Well, not totally sad. 
     This is my new Acer Aspire S7. About the same weight as the MacBook Air that I will be retiring, but 13" instead of 11." I  didn't go all out like I did on the Air, after realizing that I really don't need desktop power on my laptop. I settled for a 3rd generation i5 processor with 4GM RAM and a 128 Raid 0 Solid State Drive. Been using it all morning. Plenty fast enough. Near instant resume and very fast boot from cold start.
     Despite running Windows on the Air, it was never as clean as running it native. Especially awkward was the often embarrassingly slow resume from sleep mode.
     So, I did a lot of internet research and hands-on at Fry's and Best Buy before ordering it on Amazon. 
     That's all for now. Happy Holidays to all my faithful readers. :)

LOVED THIS MOVIE - Had to pause 1/2 way through to catch a breath and cuz I was just so delightfully full I couldn't take any more. Weird, somewhat dark but lighthearted relationship movie - genius along the lines of - I don't know - like a mashup of Little Shop of Horrors, Rocky Horror Picture Show, My Dinner with Andre, something by Vonnegut, Spaceballs with a bit of Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice thrown in ... Great mostly classical music score, hilarious though understated writing, deep social and psychological commentary, awesome and totally unexpected plot twists/reversals . Aaaaah, how refreshing! The image above doesn't really do it justice, but then how could it? LMFAO

     Just a short post to mark an extremely pleasurable event. My granddaughter, age 9 3/4, just wrote her first piece of fiction. I'd post the entire thing here, but she's a bit shy about it. It is such a great joy to know that at least part of that creativity and love of learning and expressing herself is a result of my influence.
     She asked me to type it up and I couldn't help but discuss the story a bit with her, and was delighted at how she took my questions and comments and revised the story somewhat, showing great skill in incorporating feedback into her own creative process.
     This is the joy of being a teacher, and I sometimes wonder what it might have been like to follow a different path where I was teaching young people every day.
     But at this point, it is a privilege whenever I get a chance to share something with a person of any age who has a passion to learn and to act on new knowledge.

     Just watched the second episode of this show first broadcast on ABC1 (Australian Broadcasting Network) in February of 2012. I love Australian TV! 
     I don't want to give too much away, cause you can watch it on Netflix. It's an adaption of Kerry Greenwood's Phryne Fisher Murder Mystery novels, with the protagonist an upper-class never-married woman, kind of an Upstairs-Downstairs meets feminist James Bond-type. (Her name is pronounced as in Fry-knee.) It's a bit edgy and socially conscious in that particular Australian style. 
     Well-written, well-acted and a good bit of humor. Here are a few reviews - 

'Fisher is a sexy, sassy and singularly modish character. Her 1920s Melbourne is racy, liberal and a city where crime occurs on its shadowy, largely unlit streets.' -- Canberra Times


'If you have not yet discovered this Melbourne author and her wonderful books featuring Phryne Fisher, I urge you to do so now... In a word: delightful' -- Herald Sun



'Greenwood's strength lies in her ability to create characters that are wholly satisfying: the bad guys are bad, and the good guys are great.' -- Vogue



And the second season just started in September (yeah!) - in Australia (darn!)


Now on to episode 3!