Happy Thanksgiving, Happy Chanukah. I'm being inundated with Christmas carols, I guess not only have a couple of radio stations here in the mediocre radio market of Tucson gone all-Christmas music, but every single store in the metro area feels the need to remind us all to be nice, not naughty, and support our country and our way of life by spending some damned cash, for goodness sakes!

Being here feels a little odd. My mom agrees with the perception that it's like the three of us all met up at the same place in a vacation villa, and we'll all be going back to our lives soon. Not so for them. I return to my normal life tomorrow as I make the 8+ hour 500-mile drive back to L.A. in the PT Cruiser (which I completely love and have nicknamed "my little blue toy" and am very sad that I have to return it to Hertz on Monday), while they enter Week Two of unpacking all their belongings and building their new lives in Arizona.

We all have a lot to be thankful for, I suppose. We found out today that a friend of the family has been called up into active duty in the Army. My problems of trying to get my new laptop to work and load in all my programs and files and my bickering with my father are pale to the point of white as compared to that.