I’ve always loved ‘Vanity Fair’ and lately it’s become one of the only reliable sources at a time when the others seem to have given in to propaganda and fascism. Check out this brilliant article, based on audio recordings of its participants. (I say that as they are all acting like they never said what they actually said, on tape.) It’s the lying that might bother me most about the current administration – they just keep lying, and the media just repeats it without check or push-back. Sad times.
And brilliant photographic work by Christopher Anderson – no filter, no photoshop – real, honest, and true to who these people are – ugly from the inside out.
When the office Christmas party arrived last week, it came upon us so quickly there wasn’t time to get too worked up about it, and it’s been that way for the bulk of this holiday season. Somehow I’ve largely avoided getting stressed out, and it must be partially attributed to the fact that any expectations have been lower than low – practically non-existent, which makes for far fewer disappointments. There’s a sad commentary hidden in all that’s unsaid here, but overall this has been a happier holiday spell, and I’m trying to figure out exactly why so that I might replicate this ease for future Christmas runs.
The biggest shift may simply be in intention. There is great power in deciding what sort of season you’re going to have. You always have a choice in how you’re going to react to whatever happens on any given day – we tend to forget that, thinking that we are what befalls us, rather than what we make of it.
Such a profound and dynamic change in perception comes at the tail of a year of similar seismic shifts. The universe will often wait until we are ready before delivering the lessons we most need to learn. It bodes well for a brighter start to 2026. Low expectations, high intentions, and malleable perceptions. So much of human terror arises simply from feeling out of control. We may be in command of more than we realize – and when we’re not there is opportunity to get more comfortable in the messy space of all that we can’t control.
Betsy once made chocolate chip cookies for an office cookie contest, and they literally had about 2 chocolates chips per cookie. She promptly lost the contest to Heath, who had generously added a reasonable amount of chips to his batter. I always think of that when I order anything with chocolate chips, such as this muffin from Professor Java’s.
It stands as an ideal image of the perfect ratio of chips to muffin, and the almost-scientifically-even spacing and dispersal on display here is a thing of wonder and beauty. Behold its prettiness, as life doesn’t often approach this kind of perfection, especially during the holiday madness, and this makes me extremely happy. As did eating every bite of this chocolate chip muffin.
It should be no secret that I find Donald Trump to be the worst President our country has ever had, and also one of the worst people the world has known. Despite several FAFO posts, and the occasional anti-Trump post here and there and otherwheres, I have tried to keep this place as free from politics as possible. It’s my escape from such awfulness, but I’ve had to get vocal sometimes so that future generations, should any electronic echoes of my posts or feelings on this administration persist, know that I fought this terrible person at every step of the way. If anyone wants to know what I did when it was happening, it’s documented here. Hope you have something similar when your kids ask what you did.
His latest post on Rob Reiner is just confirmation of his deplorable views. For those who want to employ the ‘both sides’ mentality (or, how the news has ruined itself) let’s take a comparative look at two takes on this. Here is President Barack Obama’s message, followed by Trump’s. I know what side I’m on, and it’s the side I’ve always been on: the side of basic human decency.
Whenever I feel annoyed or agitated by someone – and it probably happens as much as you might expect – I try to think of them smiling and laughing in a moment of unguarded, unbridled joy and happiness – and it instantly arrests the next step to anger.
The week of a holiday photo card reveal always sparkles with a bit more festive excitement than a typical week here, and the 30th anniversary of my very first holiday card demanded the erection of something special. An extra GIF from this year’s holiday card photo shoot gives a glimpse of what happened outside the borders of the main image. To that hard candy Christmas happy ending, let’s go through the weekly blog recap…
Madonna is on the move – at long last for those of us fans who recall the album-every-two-years pace of her earlier work. It’s been an eternity (in Madonna years) since her last studio album ‘Madame X’ – which came out way back in the summer of pre-COVID 2019. This stretch marks the longest span between original albums in her entire career.
Anticipation is running high for her long-ago-announced upcoming (2026) album – which she has been billing as a sequel to the smash fan-favorite ‘Confessions on a Dance Floor’ from 2005. Two decades is a long time for a follow-up, but if anyone can conjure magic no matter how much time has passed, it’s Madonna.
These recent shots are spectacular – and a step up from the heavily-filtered Instagram nonsense she seems to have favored of late, so I’m hopeful about this new era. Pink goes well with more than you think it will.
There was a day this past summer – after a stretch of several 90+ degree days – that I found myself walking languidly through the greenhouses at Faddegon’s Nursery, melting and sweating through a tank top and shorts, cursing the extreme heat and humidity, and ducking intermittently into the air-conditioned gift shop section while seeking out a friendly Australian tree fern that wouldn’t instantly expire after a single missed watering (to no avail).
I think longingly of that discomfort as I pull a chunky cable-knit cardigan tighter to my chest today.
The greenhouse is deliciously different at night, especially in the winter months. Cooler in atmosphere and hue, it carries a more hushed vibe to it, quieter and more somber somehow, even with the vibrant poinsettias and flaming heads of cyclamen.
Being in the greenhouse around Christmas, especially in the early evening, always brings to mind the melting scene in ‘Frosty the Snowman’ – one of the more traumatic Christmas moments for a kid just trying to find joy in a song brought to animated life.
A little preview of tomorrow morning’s greenhouse-inspired post, this is a specimen of stephanotis, sometimes called the Madagascar jasmine. Sweet of perfume and swirling of tendrils, it is a white flowered scent of summer, one of those heady tricks of the greenhouse while the snow spins wildly outside.
Intended to be both trendy and timeless, this card is hopefully everything you expected, dreaded, and wished for from the questionable depths of my creative prowess – equal parts amusing, offensive, inflammatory, ridiculous, porny, obscene, silly, grotesque, colorful, wonky, wanky, and wildly un-Christian. The very best of Christmas past, present, and future to come, with enough innuendo to erect the highest of holiday spirits.
Speaking of erecting things, this isn’t the first time my North pole has held up a Santa’s hat in service of a holiday card – somewhere around 1999 there was a photo card that featured a fully-naked body shot save for the iconic hat hung only by all that nature gave me – a card that has since been lost to time (and if ever I dig it up I’ll add it to the pantheon).
As for a few behind-the-scenes tidbits out of which you may get your own rise and chuckle, test shots for this year’s image were conducted on a birthday trip to Boston with Suzie, who had no real idea of what was going on behind the closed bedroom door, and who wouldn’t have batted an eyelash even if she had. That original concept had a full body and face shot, with Santa hats on both heads – the first working title being ‘A Hat for Every Head‘, but my body was not quite fit for such a full reveal, and my artistic eye wasn’t happy with such a blatant display when good erotica is all about seduction and mystery; it all fell a little limp until I played around with things in the following days, in which this more coy concept firmed up, giving a bigger hint and some mystery for the viewer to spin their own holiday fantasy about what happens when the hat comes off.
Hard copies (pun absolutely intended) of this card were mailed out December 9, 2025, and scented with ‘Overture’ by Amouage – a boisterous oud-heavy stomper designed to be as potentially off-putting and repellant as the card itself. That’s how we’ve rolled for thirty years ~ Happy Holidays!
Tonight marks the calm before the storm of this year’s online holiday photo card reveal. Sitting before the tree, a green candle throwing its warm light over my meditation space, I begin the slow breathing that constitutes my daily meditation. A necessity for the winter months, it also comes in handy during any stresses that come up during the holiday season (of which there are often many).
Here, the noise of the day – and the noise of the season – immediately cease. Externally and internally, the world quiets. The atmosphere slows. The motion of time stills. Only the breath marks any sort of temporal movement. Even there, it feels more measured, more calm. Within ready grasp, the opportunity for meditation is a portal to peace. The importance of this presents itself more distinctly at this time of the year. How strange, this being the Prince of Peace’s time to shine and be born, that we should find calm and tranquility so elusive.
