Gifts, Athletic Achievement, Haircuts, Tiny Creatures, Dreams, Holiday Greetings, and Rainy Days

My eldest daughter seems to think she's kind of funny…
As shown by her Xmas gift to her father (that would be me), which she was smirking about as I tore off the wrapping paper and discovered that she'd given me - a Princess Leia action figure. I'm supposed to hang it from my backpack - not sure if that's going to happen.

Kobe Bryant, like most other multi-millionaire athletes, is just a regular guy…
As shown by an in-depth feature on him which revealed that he - hold onto your hats, boys and girls - pumps his own gas. I know, I know, I'm just as impressed by this little tidbit as I'm sure you are.

My son has a secret desire to be a hippy…
As shown by his reluctance to get his hair cut. I finally took him in a few days ago, and the haircut lady kind of looked at him and said, "How long has it been since his last cut?" and I said I didn't really know, so she checked their records and it was way back in July. So I guess I'm not a very good parent. Actually, I wish he'd just let me take him out in the backyard and use the ol' clipper with the #4 attachment. It's simple, and it's free. Plus, how cute would it be if we had father-son matching hairstyles?

There's something about little creatures in big enclosures that tugs at the heartstrings…
As shown by the adorableness of our two baby tortoises (Uno and Dos, officially, though Connor is still lobbying to name one of them Fred Fredberg and the other one something else that's equally ridiculous but that I can't remember offhand) who are snuggled in for a long winter's nap in their den. Everytime I look at them, I flash back to the day we brought Caitlyn home from the hospital. Being young and ignorant, we didn't know there was a difference between a "child car seat" and an "infant car seat" so when we went to put her tiny little self in the "child car seat" it was kind of like putting a peanut in a… big, empty peanut cannister. But she was cuter than a peanut. Although now that I think about it, peanuts are kind of cute, aren't they?

There's something about certain weird dreams you have that makes you scratch your head and say, "Huh?"…
As shown by my confusion when I woke up one morning after dreaming that I was Barack Obama and I was surrounded by people waiting to hear what I had to say, but my mind was completely blank and I had no idea what I was supposed to say, and they were all staring at me with their microphones extended and their pencils poised, and then I woke up and scratched my head and said, "Huh?"

Some people get way too worked up about trivial issues and make mountains out of molehills and haystacks out of needles…
As shown by the annual December tradition wherein people feel the need to weigh in on the whole "Merry Christmas" versus "Happy Holidays" issue and write letters to the editor about the pros and cons of each side or the need to be reasonable and "accept the greeting in the spirit in which it was given," and then go on to let everyone who's reading the letters to the editor know exactly what they, as the most reasonable and mature and thoughtful and kind and wonderfully magnanimous human being on all the planet, use as their greeting, which I assume is implicitly hinting that we should all adopt as our own.

There's something about rainy days that just makes me want to curl up on the couch and read…
As shown by my plan to do exactly that as soon as I finish this posting and get off the computer. So until next time, may your children be appropriately respectful, may your haircuts be timely, and may your dreams lead you to new levels of self-awareness and self-insight.