Discerning the right thing to do for creatures great and small is often difficult for creatures wizened yet still wondering, such as I. And even when that right thing is clear and conscience guides me, for instance, to put a family pet to rest, that right thing is often undertaken with no small sorrow. So it was that on Friday, December 21, in a family ceremony after the boys' school let out for the holiday, we laid Marvin to rest beside the honeysuckle in the backyard after his quiet passing in the vet's office on the morning of that same day.

In matters holidayical, through the cacophony of our bustling and crowded household a faint promise of polyphony can be heard as we tune up for another Merry Kitschmas � a feast day that one and all will soon declare the best ever. Just like last year.

Reading: The Plague (good for clearing the mental palate of Christmas goo)

Watching: Entrapment, Being John Malkovich, Almost Famous, A Passage to India, Shrek, Shakespeare in Love, and Monsignor Quixote