Merry and bright

Merry Christmas to everyone! (As you can see, we have our power back.)
Hope it's a good one!

No Christmas lights on today

Brrrrrr... We trying to stay warm after 36 hours of no electricity. At the moment, our house is so cold, you can see your breath. Sleeping under about 25 blankets, we were fine. But having to get up this morning was tortuous!

A giant windstorm blew through the Pacific Northwest Thursday night, downing trees and knocking out power. The upside was, our office was shut down yesterday so I got a day off work. The downside was, I spent all day cleaning a frigid house!

SMH and I are supposed to have a big Christmas party tonight, but we'll probably have to postpone if we don't get power by 3pm. Otherwise, it would be a party in a freezer.

We did, however, go to a neighborhood holiday party last night, hosted by our friends Dave and Joellen. (Joellen is a fellow Ohioan.) Their home was also without power, but the party went on all the same, with the candlelight giving it an especially festive ambience.

Last night, I went out in pursuit of some ice for our fridge contents. No ice to be found, but I did discover some dry ice at the local Safeway. On the way home, I gained some valuable advice from the radio talk show: "Don't bring your Webber grill inside to heat your home, even if it seems like a good idea." Ummmm, does it really seem like a good idea? Situations like this always provide good illustrations of Darwinism at work.

Typical of the PNW, the lines at the Starbucks around town are obscene. People cannot function without their cuppa!

Does your city make the list?

If you're reading this, you probably reside in one of "the absolutely worst places to live in America."

Indeed, Cincinnati has earned the dubious honor of being named one of the 50 worst cities by author David Gilmartin. In his book "The Absolutely Worst Places to Live in America," Gilmartin also relegates Seattle to the list. So, supposedly I went from one craphole to another. Well, not actually, because I don't live in Seattle. But, close enough.

Other honorees include Philadelphia, Baltimore, Washington, D.C. , and Detroit. Whaaat?

Reports The Baltimore Sun, "(Gilmartin) said he doesn't have to go to Detroit to know that it stinks. 'I think enough evidence exists," he said in an interview." OK, clearly this guy hasn't been to Detroit. Otherwise, he would know that the new Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit makes the city a *supercool* place to live.

According to the article in The Baltimore Sun, "David Gilmartin" is a "pseudonym being used by a 30-year-old New York advertising copywriter — raised in South Jersey, schooled at a Boston-area (but not Harvard) university — who admits to never setting foot in many of the cities and towns included in the book."

What? An arrogant East Coast whippersnapper who fancies himself a clever satirist? I can't believe it! No, I haven't been infected with a West Coast disdain for East Coasters. (In fact, I even laughed at a few of the book excerpts in spite of myself.) I'm just all bent out of shape about this guy's methodology.

To select the 50 cities, he apparently posted messages on Craigslist and other online public forums, where he threw out the question, “What’s the worst town in your state?” If we are to believe The Sun, Gilmartin took the results, including comments, and used them to craft (at least some of) the book's contents. So, his writings don't even reflect first-hand knowledge of the cities' alleged crappiness. Come on!

That's all you need to do to "write" a book?! Sheesh, sign me up.