I’ve met someone, Readers.   Imagine Freddie Mercury singing “Love of My Life.” That’s how I’m feeling these days.   His name is Dobby.   I like a tidy, clean house. Even when my children were little, I’d vacuum every day, because they’d be crawling around and trying to eat bits of grass and cat food kibble (Dearest Son succeeded in the latter and developed quite a taste for it). In addition to human children, we’ve always had a dog and a cat, sometimes two dogs or two cats.

As a staunch Yankee, I firmly believe that snow should fall in winter. Global warming has been hard on me. I feel for the folks who were hit this past weekend in the areas not equipped for it, but in New England, winter feels barren without a really great blizzard.   When I was a kid, snow days were only given if there was a dire threat of death. Seriously. We gathered for the bus at the top of a hill with the Robinson and Downing kids (because we’re Gen X and could walk down

I’ve found a show I love. No. I adore  it. I have watched every season, and I fantasize about being on the show. Now granted, I will never, ever be on the show, or even qualified to send in an audition tape, because it’s for wilderness survivalists, and I am not one of those. I have shot a gun (with my son at a range, very fun, and I was a surprisingly good shot for someone who had never, until that day, held a gun). I have drunk from a stream and caught a few fish in my life

This year, we’re doing something different for the holidays. We’re passing the Christmas Eve torch to the Princess. This is a big deal. Long ago, when McIrish and I were newlyweds and lived in a tiny apartment with a view of the Manhattan skyline (and a family of cockroaches living under the fridge), we invited my mom and sister to come for Christmas Eve dinner. We had been married all of ten days, and we were eager to showcase our teeny home (and Joe, our cat, who drooled wi