I did a load of laundry and watched a movie. Soon I’ll go begin Ghost Story and hope it’s good.

Just got off-line thanking David, Evie, Steven and Carol for their gifts. Got a total of ten Christmas cards, too. I also saw Alex on my buddy list, so we swapped Merry Christmas messages.

Got some unexpected surprises today. At Mary’s house, Mary and Dave got Tom a joystick, and me a 3-D puzzle game you play on the computer. There was a box of hair accessories from Mom, nuts from David and Evie, a small wolf blanket from Carol and Steven, and this really cool clock from Ray and Nora that I wanted to get myself but forgot about. At each hour is a picture of a different bird that chirps its sounds at the hour. The great horned owl is at the twelfth hour, for example, and the song sparrow is at the eighth hour. This is much better than having a live bird here in the house! That Tweety bird was way too obnoxious! It has a light sensor too, so that the birds won’t chirp if you have it in the bedroom or something like that.

The blanket will be good for Tom to use next time we sleep together. That way, if he pulls the covers I shouldn’t feel it.

The hair accessories consist of a few different sizes of claw clips and some cloth-covered hair elastics.

Mom’s still hanging in there, but who knows when she’ll be able to go home? It’ll probably be a few weeks.

Tammy called to say in a message to us that she had a wonderful Christmas party with Mark and Stephanie. That’s Mark’s 18-year-old daughter.

Andy called too, leaving a message about how he went to Donna’s and got some unexpected gifts. As usual, so into himself, too. Not a word about Mom. Not an “I’m sorry to hear about Tom’s mom,” or a “How is she doing now?”

Later...

The Baltimore oriole went off at 10:00, and at midnight, off goes the owl.

Any sec now I should have my spot that I get a week before my period. I felt pre-cramps, I think. My tits are also doing well this month as far as soreness goes.

I didn’t like the book Ghost Story but began A Cry in the Woods last night and got 115 pages into it.

Tom told me the renters are really weird. They talk on their cordless phone while standing in the driveway. People out here tend to hang out in their front yards, but yup, that’s a weird one. If you’re gonna talk on the phone outside, why not sit in a chair on your patio or porch? Why stand in the middle of your driveway?

Also, at 1:15 last night, for about 20 minutes, some people were out partying. I couldn’t fucking believe it! I know this is Arizona, but this wasn’t 1 PM on a winter’s day or 9 PM on a summer’s night. This was in the middle of a freezing December night! All I heard were voices laughing and talking, but the weird thing about it was that I couldn’t see anyone. I thought it could be one of the houses across the street, but I never saw any movement or people.