The feverish, body-aching, racking cough sort of cold, which I most assuredly did not catch through running briefly barefoot through the sudden miraculous snow-fall a week ago, nor from sitting out in the cold on a Sunday evening at the Pour Haus in New Braunfels for nearly eight hours. No, it is just the result of having been out and about among a lot of people during the cold-n-flu season. (I was originally going to give a miss to the Pour Haus event, but my daughter sprained-damaged her foot in taking a picture of the snow, when she climbed on top of one of the tree rounds in the back yard, in order to take a picture of the field behind, all covered in virgin white … and well, mothers do this kind of thing.)

So, in between nursing my low-grade temperature and wheezing bronchials, providing a human hot-water-bottle for slumbering cats and dogs, I have been working on a Watercress Press project, and sorting out the last of the Christmas shopping – ordering those gifts which will be drop-shipped and mailing those which we purchased locally … all without ever having set foot in a mall, or in a retailer any more complicated than the brand-new HEB on Bulverde Road. Yes, internet shopping is great, no, a cram-jammed mall or big-box retailer full of vaguely-haunted looking shoppers and endless Muzak versions of twenty-year old pop Christmas hits is not my notion of fun, even when I do not habe a code.

The last big Christmas project is to purchase the last few ingredients and begin constructing the seven or eight varieties of fudge that we make for the neighbors; fortunately, I am starting to feel well enough to be up to this. Besides the neighbors, containers of home-made gourmet fudge made with the finest ingredients – chocolate, butter, cream, and all – goes to Alfred the mailman, the guys who drive the CPS disposal truck, the express service delivery drivers, staff at the bank branch where we do business, the fire house across the way, the police substation on the north-east side, a couple of favored employers and clients … oh yes, we will have the good stuff on the way to you all by next weekend.