Away in a manger,
No crib for His bed
The little Lord Jesus
Laid down His sweet head

The stars in the bright sky
Looked down where He lay
The little Lord Jesus
Asleep on the hay

The cattle are lowing
The poor Baby wakes
But little Lord Jesus
No crying He makes

I love Thee, Lord Jesus
Look down from the sky
And stay by my side,
'Til morning is nigh.

Be near me, Lord Jesus,
I ask Thee to stay
Close by me forever
And love me I pray

Bless all the dear children
In Thy tender care
And take us to heaven
To live with Thee there

Got the tree up, FINALLY. Haven't had a chance before now. F and I decorated it while listening to Brian Setzer's Christmas CD.

Seems odd to be putting the tree up when the highs are around 80°.

We had a Christmas potluck at work yesterday. We decided to do that instead of a dinner like we had last year. The company bought steaks and we grilled them, and people brought side dishes. I said I would bring vegetables. The production manager requested squash, so I brought broccoli and cheese, and squash and zucchini. Steamed them in the microwave while the steaks were grilling. I had no room for dessert, and I don't think anyone else did either.

So I had to call an instrument company today to ask how to take the rotor out of the centrifuge, and when they put me on hold I found myself listening to "Every Valley". Had to look for it on YouTube when I got home. I found this charming video.

(I LOVE the little ornament he puts on at the very end - I've not heard that before.)



It's too early to get into the Christmas spirit, isn't it?

Shoes of doom


Also, we had to grab the camera when we opened the garage door this morning and saw this across the street:

Click to enlarge. There were 19 of them, hard to get in one picture.

I hope everyone has had a nice Christmas.

We went to church yesterday and just stayed in today. The weather is really nice but R and I both seem to have colds. Had blueberry pancakes for breakfast and homemade chicken soup for lunch, and opened presents. Last week F spotted some shoes at a department store that she had a fit about. Tried on the display model and assured me that they felt great. I told her to put them back, she didn't have anything to go with them. After we got home, of course, I doubled back and bought those shoes, together with a skirt and a couple of blouses she can wear them with. She is THRILLED, sang "I got shoes" at random moments, and couldn't stop looking at them. They are kind of a teal/dark gray/offwhite plaid, if you can imagine, and looked quite fetching with her pink pajama pants. When she gets her toenails freshly polished I'll get a picture.

The cats, as always, had a blast getting into empty boxes and playing with ribbon and crumpled wrapping paper. Even the grumpy old tomcat had to mess with F, arthritically clambering into one of her boxes as soon as she had the lid off and before she'd even seen what was in it.

Back to work tomorrow.

What Child is this, who, laid to rest
On Mary’s lap is sleeping?
Whom angels greet with anthems sweet,
While shepherds watch are keeping?
This, this is Christ the King,
Whom shepherds guard and angels sing;
Haste, haste to bring Him laud,
The Babe, the Son of Mary.

Why lies He in such mean estate,
Where ox and ass are feeding?
Good Christians, fear, for sinners here
The silent Word is pleading.
Nails, spear shall pierce Him through,
The cross be borne for me, for you.
Hail, hail the Word made flesh,
The Babe, the Son of Mary.

So bring Him incense, gold and myrrh,
Come peasant, king to own Him;
The King of kings salvation brings,
Let loving hearts enthrone Him.
Raise, raise a song on high,
The virgin sings her lullaby.
Joy, joy for Christ is born,
The Babe, the Son of Mary.

"I want to be a reindeer," she blurted out.

Company Christmas party tonight. It will just be a dinner at a restaurant. We had to hurry up and do something PDQ because our boss will be out of state for a couple of months, starting next week, to do cancer treatment. Yes, this was just a bit sudden.

The home office has decided not to sell us in the near future, instead running the part of the plant that has me and a handful of other people employed. So for right now we look like staying in sunny Florida, which we are very happy about. Short-sleeve weather, while a lot of the country is suffering from ice storms. Been there, done that, don't need to do it again.

I have to say that I enjoy being in the lab by myself. The operators come over every now and then to bring samples and so forth, but other than that it's just me. If I make a mess I'm not inconveniencing anyone else. I don't have to fret about who used the beakers I just washed. I don't have to put up with somebody else's dadgum radio. Eventually I'll get lonely, I suppose. For now it's kind of nice.

Merry Christmas



I think we're having a good holiday. We saw my family on Saturday and my in-laws yesterday, in between church in the morning and at midnight. R and F will probably head back over to his folks' today. I have penciled-in a migraine for myself for today (joking) (partly) so I will be staying at home getting hold of myself, looking at the book F gave me about Princess Grace of Monaco, resting, and trying not to eat candy. Molly is having a wonderful time hunting imaginary animals among the litter of tissue paper.

Still having fun on my new job. I have a whole bunch of stuff to figure out, more all the time as people off-handedly mention things that I realize I will need to bring into my sphere of influence, ha ha. We're getting the lab squared away. It's starting to look nice. Quotes on equipment we'll need. I'm looking at electronic notebooks for data capture, archival, and reporting. I described how I think that's going to work and my boss was very pleased. He will have access to real-time data, from his office, of all the lab results, including in-process testing. This will be so cool.

When I said that the week would be work-and-home, I forgot about choir last night. We're working on Christmas music, which could be irritating except that it's good stuff. We're doing some of the Robert Shaw "Many Moods of Christmas", including Patapan, and a new setting of "The First Nowell", which is pretty cool; and "Ding Dong Merrily On High", and Vivaldi's "Gloria" which I have not done before. This last is very satisfying to me. I am a complete sucker for baroque music. I suppose that we will do "And the Glory" from "The Messiah" for the first Sunday of Advent, as we usually do. Never get tired of it. Lyrics: "And the Glory of the Lord shall be revealed. And all flesh shall see it together. For the Mouth of the Lord hath spoken it." Short and sweet. The music is spectacular.

We just got back from my sister's house in Tupelo. I guess that was the last hurrah of Christmas 2005 for my family. We did have church services on Christmas Day, in addition to the 11:00 PM C. Eve service. Also went to R's family in town here. Ate a bunch of stuff, including too many sweets. And there were gift exchanges of course. Among other things, I received a collection of short stories by Edith Wharton that I did not previously have, as well a book by Ann Rule, and from F, a gorgeous book about Queen Victoria's granddaughters. Q. Victoria and the next two or three generations after her are a hobby of F's and mine, although F is a little more interested in the Russian royals; of course, that's all connected. The picture on the dust jacket is so beautiful that she had to struggle to give the book to me rather than keep it for herself. I appreciate the sacrifice. From me and R and the cats, F received DVDs: "Gigi", "My Fair Lady", and "V: The Final Battle"; a collection of Katherine Anne Porter short novels; a nice leather jacket; gift certificates for iTunes and McDonalds; some appropriately nerdy t-shirts from thinkgeek.com; and some stuff for her computer. R's main gift was an overcoat that he needed, and he picked out one he really liked. F had some thoughtful gifts for him too. So we're set, and I'll go to bed soon, because somehow I have to go to work tomorrow.

Once in royal David's city stood a lowly cattle shed,
Where a mother laid her baby in a manger for his bed:
Mary was that mother mild, Jesus Christ her little child.

He came down to earth from heaven who is God and Lord of all;
And his shelter was a stable and his cradle was a stall:
With the poor and meek and lowly lived on Earth our Savior holy.

And our eyes at last shall see him, through his own redeeming love;
For that child, so dear and gentle, is our Lord in heaven above:
And he leads his children on to the place where he is gone.

Not in that poor lowly stable, with the oxen standing by,
We shall see Him; but in Heaven, set at God’s right hand on high;
There His children gather round bright like stars, with glory crowned.

F wrapped Christmas presents the other day while R and I were at work, and she got lots of expert help. She grabbed the camera and got a few shots, and converted them to gift tags. Here are two of them.




I think they're the cutest things.

The concert went well. My parents came up for it like they always do. The music included a very nice arrangement of "O Holy Night", some contemporary stuff and some carols and so forth, but as always my very favorite was the "Hallelujah Chorus" which we did last. I liked all of the other music, but the Handel just seemed transcendent, like if you were going to call the other stuff "music" you should invent a different word for it. It seemed that way to me anyway. I could do nothing but baroque the rest of my life and never miss the rest. It's the real deal.

Well, I enjoyed the orchestra's encore, too: Leroy Anderson's "Sleigh Ride".

Back home. F is upstairs sleeping, of course. Sadly, my migraine did not go away, but woke me up in the wee hours. I hate when that happens. I woke R at 5:30 and he helped me get on top of it. I'm OK now but I always feel strange for a while after those things.

Tonight we have the company Christmas party, at a downtown hotel. Last year I wore a fairly dressy outfit, but there were those present in chiffon and sequins. So I'm a little spiffier this year. I found a dress at April Cornell that supposedly was originally $198 but was marked down to $20. Maybe I'll get a picture.

Tomorrow evening is the Christmas concert at church. I am in the choir, so I also have to go to the non-singing rehearsal in the morning. Sunday is church, of course, and Monday and Tuesday at work we are being audited by our biggest customer. They're very nice but they'll find something; they always do. They won't feel that they have done their job if they don't. I've joked about leaving something minor for them to find so they can stop looking, but I'm only partly joking when I say that. Facing these things is a little like Judgment Day. All your secret sins will be found out, even ones you didn't know you committed, and you can only hope for mercy and reasonableness. I have a little button that says "I just hope God grades on a curve". Maybe I'll wear it under my (freshly washed) lab coat.

There's something Wednesday but I refuse to try to remember what. Gee, I wonder why I had a migraine.