Twas A Very Merry Friessmas!

Since a few of you asked, I'm not sure when I started referring to my birthday as "Friessmas," although I think it was back in grammar school when I fantasized that someday my birthday would be a holiday. Yes, even then I thought an awful lot of myself or, at least, my future self. Silly, I know, but when you're as an unpopular and weird a little turd as I was back then, you relish your birthday as the one day off from misery. (Awww. Tragic.)

Of course, I've built up a whole ritual, complete with requiring my partner to play "Once A Year Day" from Pajama Game on Friessmas morning even though it's actually a song about the annual company picnic. (I'd been with Miles two weeks when our first Friessmas came around. Amazing, isn't it, that he didn't open the escape hatch then and there!)

Anyhow, it was a lovely Friessmas. I got to do another NYT piece, this time about a stay of execution in Nevada for a killer who, strange as it seems, actually did not wish to see another Friessmas. And I discovered that one of my more pathetic dreams had been fulfilled, the NPR show "Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me" used one of my stories as fodder for a joke! I'll play the segment on this week's "The Strip," so tune in when it's up tomorrow night. I suppose I should've known the idea of transplanting the scalps of cadavers would tickle them, but I sort of thought Rock, Paper, Scissors professionals might, too. Ya never know. I just learned it also made a Leno monologue! Woo hoo!

I heard from my family via phone, our ritual in lieu of cards and gifts for adult relatives, and Miles left me all day with a tempting stack of wrapped gifts on our gorgeous new kitchen table. I did not cheat, either. We dined at Joyful House, the most authentic Chinese restaurant I know in Vegas where I don't have to use my now-overrusted Mandarin skills to order. We came home for our little gift-and-cake ceremony, as you can see. The puppies enjoyed it too!

The loot consisted of a Norah Jones CD, a new Ruth Rendell book and a beautiful new winter jacket (see left) from Saks that Miles seems to have spirited out of the store without having the alarm tag removed. There I am modeling. My friend Walt gave me a season of "All in the Family" on DVD and my mother says a gift is en route. And, of course, there were many e-cards, calls and other well-wishes. So thanks to you all for all that!