Had yummy chinese food at the in-laws with bhk, some of the best I’ve had in quite a while. odd not having so many delivery places, but the food is superior.

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First sentences of the year –

January- 8079 – Welcome, 2006!

February- 8156 – Odd, considering yesterday’s news, that I took Wilt and the Momster to see The Matador last night (Was going to do Kong again, but a 3 hour movie on a “school night” is a no no for me)…sort of a chaotic film, and I wouldn’t recommend it to anyone in particular, but I liked it, after a fashion.

March- 8215 – Argh, try as I may, I missed free pancake day

April- 8282 – Well, I went and got a Nikon coolpix l2 (the 6 megapixel version)at office depot on sale.. got a 1 gig memory card to go with it.

May- 8332 – The Sarah Jane episode of Dr. Who didn’t disappoint, and it was delightful to see both her and K9 again.

June-8384 – Lunching with mom after work, catching up on family business, and will generally gab.

July-8434 – Today is a better day.

August-8489 – Sharks don’t have knees.

September-8536 – An object at rest cannot be stopped!

October-8580 – Sunday return!

November-8628 – Happy All Saint’s Day!

December-8664 – first day of my new life in md.

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27 degrees tonight, 35, feels like 32 right now. Yikes. I’m glad for a fishbowl-like living room that can absorb sunlight and heat so readily. Flurries tomorrow, maybe!

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Beautiful full moon last night. I’ll post some pics once the images get to flickr. Bright orange, over the bay, christmas lights and sand.

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Review from Patton Oswalt re: HANNIBAL RISING

It’s like reading fan fiction. It’s that bad. How depressing. I love Thomas Harris’ books, but this one…it even has a climax where our hero looks skyward and yells, “NOOOOOOOOOO!”

Which is what I did, when I read it.

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HIPAA / Conversion insurance since neighborhood continuing to be a minor issue, but it will be handled.

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Santa’s evil sidekick gives jolly fright to kids

By Alexandra Zawadil Wed Dec 6, 1:49 AM ET

GRESTEN, Austria (Reuters) – As Christmas nears, Austrian children hoping for gifts from Santa Claus will also be watching warily for “Krampus”, his horned and hairy sidekick.

In folklore, Krampus was a devil-like figure who drove away evil spirits during the Christian holiday season.

Traditionally, he appeared alongside Santa around December 6, the feast of St. Nicholas, and the two are still part of festivities in many parts of central Europe.

But these traditions came under the spotlight in Austria this year, after reports last week that Santa — also known as St Nicholas, Father Christmas or Kris Kringle — had been banned from visiting kindergartens in Vienna because he scared some children.

Officials denied the reports, but said from now on only adults the children knew would be able to don Santa’s bushy white beard and red habit to visit the schools.

Now, a prominent Austrian child psychiatrist is arguing for a ban on Krampus, who still roams towns and villages in early December.

Boisterous young men wearing deer horns, masks with battery-powered red eyes, huge fangs, bushy coats of sheep’s fur, and brandishing birchwood rods storm down the streets, confronting spectators gathered to watch the mediaeval spectacle, which is also staged in parts of nearby Hungary, Croatia and Germany’s Bavaria state.

Anyone who doesn’t dodge or run away fast enough might get swatted — although not hard — with the rod.

“The Krampus image is connected with aggression, and in a world that is anyway full of aggression, we shouldn’t add figures standing for violence… and hell,” child psychiatrist Max Friedrich said.

A JOLLY OLD FRIGHT?

Friedrich, who says Krampus is scary because people can’t communicate with a mask, doesn’t get much of a hearing in the traditionalist towns of Lower Austria and the Salzburg and Tyrol regions that hold the most elaborate Krampus processions.

In Gresten, 3,000 people, including many children, packed the kerbs of Dorfstrasse one recent night to await his coming.

The horned figure suddenly burst out of a dark corner, shouting menacingly at onlookers and waving his birchwood whip.

As he knocked over a metal crowd barrier and waded into the spectators, a boy who identified himself as Simon flinched.

“Don’t worry,” a nearby adult assured Simon. “Krampus won’t do anything to you. He’s not allowed to.”

Johann Leichtfried, a young Krampus actor in Gresten, defended his role and said most children were fascinated by Krampus’s symbolism. “Krampus is for the kids.”

But not everyone agrees.

Listeners of Austrian youth radio station FM4 shared the horror they felt when first confronted the figure.

“Krampus scared … me when I was seven,” said one, identified as Riem on FM4’s Web site. “I panicked that I was never going to see my father again because a hoofed human wanted to throw me in his wooden backpack.”

But Friedrich conceded there had been few known cases of “Krampus trauma”.

He said Krampus remained a popular custom probably because “there’s a phenomenon of finding fear attractive”, pointing for example to the frequently frightening, sometimes gruesome, plot twists in the classic fairy-tales of the Grimm brothers.

Sometimes, Krampus can get carried away — in some towns in the Tyrol and Salzburg areas, some of the horned devils have lost control after downing a few too many beers or schnapps.

“In Tyrolean communities … the Krampus actors have to wear a number so everyone can know who the bad guy is behind the mask, just in case,” said Friedrich.

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1 year ago – uggs, xmas trees, gp surgery, backlogged email notes

2 years ago – Movie with Mel goes poop, nice night out anyway, metro freefi, zombie song, fire butter coats Minnesota town, Freudian inventory, $$$ issue

3 years ago – Rainy-day wakeup, old LL passes the torch, aces & eights, oldest penis, trampled shopper

4 years ago – Danny and I send dopey “Sven” emails to companies for no good reason, bro brings me eggnog, I scare the living tar out of a lippy kid

5 years ago – gestapo gives c’s pal grief about aiming, reptile people, lj bump, world tour, Toliken Movie desire

6 years ago – Sims, accused of being an alien, dead milkmen, cannibal the musical lyrics, I’m a warmer