A festival of lights

First, to those who celebrate Hanukkah, may you be blessed with gifts of love, peace, and happiness this Hanukkah.

At the risk of jinxing ourselves, we got just slightly more than a dusting of snow last night, maybe half an inch or so? It's made the Christmas lights outside the front door look especially seasonal.

festive, seasonal lights

Photo by J. Harrington

The picture below shows the "nesting" material some critter, we suspect red squirrel, has been stuffing into the space under the South edge of the deck joist. This is the second time this Autumn we've pulled a nest out of that location. We're probably not acting very much like the spirit of Christmas, but we don't remember any mention of squirrels in the stable.

squirrel nest in the joist?

Photo by J. Harrington

In a bit we're off to the airport to pick up the Better Half on her return from Paris. Yes, Paris, France. She assures us she stayed out of the riots and had lots of fun and good food. We do remember from the Viet Nam war protest days that at least some urban riots (Cambridge, MA) tended to stay localized. It is worrisome, though.

Unrelated to any of the above, but another chapter in our continuing battle with crappy technology and corporations, the Weather Underground app on our iPhone seems to have gone defunct. We found reports of others having this problem ever since IBM bought the "Weather Underground" company. Meanwhile, we've downloaded LibreOffice and will soon be installing it and learning how to use it since we're tired of Microsoft informing us that our version of MS Office for OS X is no long supported and may cease to function soon. Repeat after us: Too big to fail is too big. Neoliberal capitalist globalism (global capitalism?) sucks. Is it time to bring back "Power to the People?"

Light the Festive Candles

By Aileen Lucia Fisher(FOR HANUKKAH)

Light the first of eight tonight—

the farthest candle to the right.

Light the first and second, too,

when tomorrow's day is through.

Then light three, and then light four—

every dusk one candle more

Till all eight burn bright and high,

honoring a day gone by

When the Temple was restored,

rescued from the Syrian lord,

And an eight-day feast proclaimed—

The Festival of Lights—well named

To celebrate the joyous day

when we regained the right to pray

to our one God in our own way.

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