It's that time of year, and I'm scramling like a chicken without a head. Days and evenings are jammed. Advent? Patience? Waiting? Pshaw. We gotsa run.
It'll be an abbreviated one today. First: Blue laws are being tested by a Monday Christmas.
For all the attention the day after Thanksgiving gets as the beginning of the holiday shopping season, merchants say the day that ends the season is equally important. That's the day before Christmas, Dec. 24. And at his sporting goods store in Aiken County, S.C., Bobby Sheridan says that day normally brings in a flood of shoppers looking for last-minute gifts.
"Christmas Eve typically is our second-best day of sales, and we do 50 percent of our sales in the last seven days before Christmas," Sheridan says.
My hat is off to this link for providing a double shot of drinking news:
1. Men who drink up to four beers - and women who drink two glasses - per day live longer, a study by researchers at an Italian Catholic university has found.
2. The BBC reports that clergy in the [Anglican] Diocese of Southwark are calling on their bishop to issue a statement of "repentance and regret" after he was found, apparently drunk, in the back of a silver Mercedes throwing children's toys out of the window.
It looks like California is prepared to crack down on children liquor:
California authorities have moved to reclassify sweet alcoholic drinks flavored with spirits - generally known as "alcopops" - as liquor instead of beer, a decision that could boost taxes on the drinks from 20 cents per gallon to $3.30.
That's it for now. Enjoy the weekend. Drink one for me and one for your health and one for the fun of it.
