The holidays

Hi all,

First off, I hope everyone had a good holiday season, regardless of their faith.

My mom ended up coming to NYC this year, but left early because of the impending snow storm. Wow, I just walked out in it to come to my favorite place to get away and write, and it's pretty spectacular. Depending on who you read or listen to, we could get 10 feet of snow, or 10 inches. Or less.

I read somewhere that it costs the city upwards of $1,000,000 per inch, to clear it from the streets. Since I've lived here, which is pretty much since forever, I can say that the sanitation department does an excellent job of snow removal.

Soapier did quite well this holiday season, thanks to all of you.

We are working on a re-structuring for next year, so we can stay open. We'll have more news on that next week.

On Christmas Eve, my girlfriend and I splurged on dinner out at Harry's Steak House, on Stone Street in NYC. Very good food. The service was good, too. If you find yourself down there, try their sweet potato mash. Oh my god.

Normally, my gf and I cook dinner. We go grocery shopping in New Jersey to save money, and have a rotating set of dinners we cook. We'd been saving up for this dinner for a long time, and it was sooooo worth it.

We'd also been saving all of our change, you know, that we accumulated, and made a special dinner on Christmas day. That was scallops.

Now, I have never ever ever never been a fish eater. But over the past year I have branched out to both salmon and scallops. Maybe next year I'll try some others.

It was a good holiday, though I was sorry I didn't get a chance to see my mom. We were supposed to go to a Swedish restaurant tonight, but alas, that didn't work out.

I'll see her some time in January.

My sister goes to the doctor on Tuesday, to determine when she'll need surgery. They found an aneurysm in her arm, so it might have to be two surgeries. We'll see on Tuesday.

Other than that, we're very happy the way the holiday season went. My mom got a flight back, after changing her flight via jetblue, and they didn't charge her extra because of the snow storm, so that was good. She said she got in at 2:30 in the morning, got home and has been spending her day relaxing with Petey, her dog.

I've been semi-stuck in the house, watching football, relaxing, eating leftovers, and generally just being an online nuisance.

I hope all of you had a great holiday. I hope you got to spend it with your loved ones. I wish you all the best.

John