What a mess

So what happened this weekend? Christmas shopping for the most part although I did help my church assemble Christmas boxes for 150 needy families in my parish. It did help me feel better for all of the money that I'm spending on Christmas. Friday was our group Christmas luncheon, we ate at Retro Bistro and the food was fantastic. I had black pasta with goat cheese for an appetizer, cream of broccoli soup, Filet Mignon, and Creme Brulee. I also had about 3 glasses of wine. After that, I started my Christmas shopping. I am done shopping except for a couple of things that I can't get until Tuesday. Actually, that's not completely true, I could do the other stuff tomorrow, but there is a movie I want to buy for my brother (Shaun of the Dead) that doesn't come out until Tuesday. Except for my sister's stuff, everything I have is at least boxed. I still have some wrapping that I have to do. I went to my sister Tracy's house today and picked up her Christmas gifts. She's flying to Midland so they don't really have room to bring that which they bought and one of the gifts she bought, a jewelry armoire for my mother, barely fits in my car. It's going to stay there until Christmas morning because I had a hell of a time getting it into my car. My car is going to be filled when I go to Michigan.

As far as Iraq is concerned, the level of death seems to have decreased somewhat. "Only" 5 Americans (and one Brit) have been killed since my last report. This brings the totals to 43 Americans, 1 Brit, and 3 Poles that have died this month and 1304 Americans, 75 Brits, and 75 others in total. The numbers are still way too high.