Golden gifts all around, barkeep

I know I already gave you a poem for Christmas, but I wanted to give you something else as well.

I thought about letting you listen to National Public Radio’s Daniel Pinkwater reading his Christmas tale, “Wolf Christmas” (6:10), but I already did that on Boxing Day in 2010.

I thought about digging up yet another unpublished poem of mine to show you, but that would be overkill, and besides, I don’t have another unpublished poem of mine to show you except “Pu-tu-no-gu-tu-da-ron-lilla Bay” which besides being unpublished is unfinished. In fact, it may never see the light of day.

What to do?

“Oh, woe is me,” I thought. “Alas, and also alack!”

If you really think I thought that, I have some swamp land in Florida that you might be interested in buying, or perhaps a nice bridge in Brooklyn.

Then, as is more often the case than many of us care to admit, something serendipitous occurred. Fortuitous, even. I happened to read the blog of Elizabeth Stanforth-Sharpe and encountered an excerpt from Laurie Lee’s “Cider With Rosie” for the first time in my life (I know, my education must have been sorely lacking) and was enchanted. So, rather than doing all the hard work necessary to repeat it here, I’m giving you as an extra-special second Christmas gift:

This link to Elizabeth’s post.

You’re very welcome.

In other news, we received 4.25 inches of rain yesterday and the temperature has fallen from a balmy 71° Fahrenheit to a chilly 25° (also Fahrenheit) expected tomorrow morning.

I guess you can’t have everything.