While I was re-shelving books at work the other day I thought of a dozen things I wanted to talk to you about, but do I remember any of them now that I am home at my computer? Do I hell!

We evidently have a friendly library spirit and/or helpful library patron, and by both of those tactful terms I mean we have someone who is leaving us Pointed Corrections, but those Corrections are Correct, so it’s hard to be critical. The other day, for example, I found a parenting book set flat on the shelf near the travel guides. I picked it up with a contented/irritated sigh (there is almost nothing in this life I love as much as putting a lost book back where it belongs, but I am still theoretically opposed to people putting books in the wrong place; but back to the first point, if someone IS going to put something down in the wrong place, putting it flat on the shelf is absolutely great because then I notice it and can put it where it belongs, so I do approve of that)—but then noticed the number on the spine WOULD put it smack in the middle of the travel guides. But…it was a parenting book, and not a travel-related one. Further investigation revealed the spine sticker was incorrect, something that hardly ever happens because the people who put spine stickers on books are the most meticulous people I have ever known. I don’t know how long it would have taken us to discover it if someone hadn’t set the book aside like that.

I mentioned this on Twitter but I think not on here: my brother is an extra in the 2019 Meryl Streep / Emma Watson / Saoirse Ronan / Laura Dern version of Little Women. He’s the flute-player in the wedding scene, and I went to the movie knowing he DID appear in it for a brief moment, and I kept my eyes wide open and did not blink at all during the wedding scene, and I did not see him. His wife’s entire family went, though, and they ALL saw him, so! Flute-player! Wedding scene! My brother! Good luck!

I thought this movie version of Little Women was really good for someone who has read/loved the book Little Women, but I didn’t feel like it would be as good a fit for my family members, who have not read the book. The movie is like a series of “Hey, remember this?” and “Remember THIS?!”—without actually showing the details of each THIS. And it switches back and forth between Past and Future, which can get a little confusing even if you are like me and have read the book many, many times.

And so we are getting the family ready to see the movie. Paul still reads to Henry each night, so he is going to read him Little Women next. And in the meantime, we have watched the 1994 Winona Ryder / Susan Sarandon movie version of Little Women, which I had never seen; and also the 2017 miniseries starring Maya Hawke who, amazingly to me, is the child of Ethan Hawke and Uma Thurman. I remember reading the issue of People magazine that mentioned her birth. And now here she is, being Jo.

Of the three versions of Little Women I have seen (1994, 2017, 2019), my favorite is the 2017, in large part because as a miniseries it has more TIME so it covers more STUFF. But also because I was distracted by the versions with familiar actors. I kept seeing Hermione instead of Meg, and Winona Ryder instead of Jo, and Susan Sarandon / Laura Dern instead of Marmee. (And BOB ODENKIRK instead of Mr. March, what the HECK.)

It’s been interesting to see which movies (I’m going to refer to all three as “movies,” for simplicity) leave out which parts of the book. The book is like a dozen movies, so SOME things have to be left out. It seems like there is general agreement to be brief with Meg’s married storyline. One movie told the silk dress / greatcoat story, and one referred briefly to the jam story, but none of them did the husband-brings-home-friend-unexpectedly story. Amy’s limes ALWAYS make it in. Burning the book / falling through the ice is always in. Marmee’s temper is always in, but with more/less time devoted to it. There is always the story of the piano, but told differently. The Professor Bhaer storyline is VERY DIFFERENT in each movie; I can’t remember for sure, but I think all three incorporate an umbrella, but not in the same way the book did. More like they’re saying “Remember there was an umbrella?” Laurie shaming Meg is overdone in one version, skipped in another, dealt with oddly in a third. Laurie’s bad behavior is underplayed in all three, though one version does address it a little.

I have enjoyed all three versions very much, and now want to re-read the book.

I always stay in 2-star motels/hotels, not because I am choosing that many stars on purpose, but because that is my price range for motels/hotels. However, recently there was a localized dip in motel/hotel prices that brought a 3-star motel/hotel (I don’t know when to use “motel” and when to use “hotel”) into the same range as the 2-star ones, and so I went ahead and booked one. Here are the things I noted (though keep in mind that this is one single 3-star motel/hotel against MANY 2-star motels/hotels):

1) On-site restaurant instead of complimentary breakfast. Not a fan of this. I would rather have complimentary bagels and coffee (and some 2-star hotels have much more: waffle-makers, yogurt fridges, eggs/sausages, fruit, juice/coffee/cocoa) than a sit-down restaurant with waiters. I can see how someone else might want it the other way around, though.

2) Better towels. The 2-star motels/hotels generally have small, cheap towels. The 3-star motel/hotel had towels like the ones I have at home.

3) Larger shampoo/conditioner/bodywash, and better quality and nicer-smelling. The 2-star motels/hotels have teensy sample sizes you can barely get a single serving out of, and they generally smell like coconut air-freshener. The 3-star had much larger portions (like, enough for 2-3 uses), and they smelled nice.

4) Larger bathroom. This one was a draw. The 2-star places usually have a toilet/shower in one room, and the sink out in the main room, which is nice in its own way; the 3-star place had a more typical toilet/shower/sink bathroom, which was nice in its own way.

5) GLASS glasses, with paper lids that turned into coasters. I could see that this was supposed to be an upgrade over plastic disposable cups wrapped in plastic, while not actually wanting it. (I get nervous that I will drop/break glass glasses, and I don’t like the way glass feels if it taps against my teeth.)

6) Bottled water in the room. We were too nervous to use it, because of sneaky mini-bar charges for things in motel/hotel rooms and not knowing if these were in that category.

7) Metal ice bucket instead of plastic. We did not care about this, but we noted it.

8) Working ice machine. We very much did care/appreciate. Except we had the room right across from the ice machine AND the elevator, which was…non-ideal.

9) Prettier/fancier hall carpeting. Does not matter, but felt worth noting. It really was very pretty/fancy.

10) Big intimidating fancy lobby / check-in area. Did not like. Felt out of place.

11) Ballroom / conference rooms. Did not use, but felt important to atmosphere. Subjectively negative, because it made me feel like maybe we shouldn’t be there.

12) Better pillows. Both 2-star and 3-star motels/hotels have about four pillows per bed, but the 3-star ones were fatter/plusher/better. Not a LOT better, but somewhat better.

13) More TV channels, and more ways to spend money on movies. But I do not want, so. And the TV kept cutting out / digitally reloading every few seconds, just like in the 2-star places.

14) Big startling mirror in the elevator. Seemed deluxe. Startled us. Draw.

15) Noisy heat/fan. Same as 2-star, but felt more irritating because we were in a 3-star. Nice for blocking out sounds of ice machine and elevator.

16) Same room carpeting that feels like maybe you shouldn’t step on it with bare feet.

I just dropped one of my kids back at college, and Christmas is over, and the get-together I was looking forward to this weekend as a post-holiday pick-me-up is over, and now I am An Entire Mood.

Add to that Mood the fact that we are now in An Election Year. William is 18, and so last week he registered to vote. He knew more than I did about our president’s recent decision to assassinate a top Iranian commander, and mentioned it in the context of being worried about being drafted. I decided NOT to attempt to comfort him with something I read about how we don’t actually need to worry about another draft, because all of us would die from nuclear explosion/fallout LONG before there would be any call for involuntary soldiers.

I have been having a weird few weeks. Christmas is always a little fraught anyway, with all the work and stress and expectations and so forth, plus of course the pressure to reduce work/stress/expectations and Really Be In The Moment and Truly Cherish the Things That Truly Matter and so forth. My two college kids were home for winter break, which was a strange mix of SO DELIGHTFUL (having them near; seeing them safe and well; patting their tall flannelly shoulders as I passed by; hearing them talking with and teasing their siblings; having Christmas and New Year’s with all seven of us together) and very non-great (hearing their cynical takes on my parenting; worrying that one of them is literally up all night and sleeping the entire day away and also talking to himself at a level that might be fine or might be An Early Warning Sign; being irritated/enraged that I guess I still have to tell them NOT to leave their nighttime cooking dishes for ME to do). I pre-mourned bringing them back to school, and now I am at one-half still pre-mourning plus one-half present-tense mourning. While simultaneously looking forward to getting back to normal, and feeling stressed that “normal” now means “without 40% of my children.” It is all such a rich tapestry. And we never did do gingerbread houses, and the bags and bags of supplies are taking up space in my china cabinet.

Listen, do we feel like we can hang on until Galentine’s Day? It’s only five and a half weeks away. Last year I had friends over, and we did a classroom-style valentine exchange, and for my valentines I taped little paper Wonder Woman valentines to cans of sparkling seltzer in pink/red flavors, which I’m going to do again this year, and which I recommend if you are looking for an idea. Furthermore, I highly recommend THE WHOLE THING: I highly recommend hosting a Galentine’s party, and inviting your gals, and seeing if everyone can get rides so that you can drink a lot of cans of spiked seltzer. (You will have leftover non-pink/red flavors.) (Especially if you deliberately buy a bunch of non-pink/red flavors.) Make it an appetizer/dessert potluck. Bring a big heart-shaped box of chocolates.

I couldn’t remember if I made resolutions last year, so I went back and found last year’s New Year’s Eve post which reminded me we were still neck-deep in the move and I was pretty busy thinking about how if Paul were to die suddenly I could move back to my old house. That was not the right head-space for making resolutions.

I do have a resolution this year, and it’s to put up wall art. I have put up three things total, all on nails that were already in the walls when we moved in. I have not put in a single additional nail, because I don’t know which walls are horsehair plaster (it’s most of them, but some renovations allegedly were done with sheetrock), and I also don’t know if we have the kind of horsehair plaster walls that do okay as long as you’re gentle / use special horsehair-plaster-coddling techniques, or if we have the kind where you try to hammer in a nail and a baseball-size chunk of the wall falls in powder to the floor, and then as you look on in despair, a crack begins a slow gradual spread from the chunked place outward across the rest of the wall. One of the kids rocked an upholstered chair too hard and it bonked into a wall and left a deep shattery powdery dent, which makes me think it’s likely we have the latter kind of wall.

But Paul has said that if I tell him which wall art and where I want it, he will figure out the nails. And I think wall art is important—or at least, I know each time when I took DOWN the wall art when moving, the whole apartment/house suddenly felt bare and echoey and generic and sad. I think putting up my familiar wall art would make this house feel more like mine, and it seems like a bad sign that it’s been more than a year and I haven’t done it. So I would like to do that this year.

We are going to an afternoon, kids-invited-too holiday party today (we are bringing one kid, the one who is friends with one of the other family’s kids), and I am still trying to decide what to bring as a little hostess gift. Normally I would bring a bottle of wine, and I do think that’s an excellent back-up idea, but for an event that includes kids and takes place in the afternoon I’d wondered if I could think of something a little more familyish. I’d thought we were all set with our idea to bring a box of chocolates from a local chocolate shop, but then I looked around at our own house and I thought probably everyone else is also drowning (happily! but plentifully) in an abundance of treats.

We don’t know the other family well, which makes it more challenging. But also: we’d LIKE to know them better, and we are taking this invitation as an indication that they feel similarly, so it adds a little to the fun of this mission: it would be neat to find something that made them like us more or think we’re cool. *wrings hands friendingly*

Flowers, maybe? I have a bunch of inexpensively-acquired vases, so I could bring flowers in a vase they could keep; or I could bring a potted plant. I’m not saying either of those are cool ideas, but they’re classics, and maybe I should save cool for when they know us better and I can say “Here, I brought you these scented candles someone else gave me, plus a box of the fancier kind of crackers I thought we’d need over the holidays but we didn’t.”

Would coffee be a nice hostess gift? There’s a nearby place that does their own roasting/grinding and sells the coffee in cute overpriced locally-labeled jars. I could choose a couple of jars. What if they don’t drink coffee? What if they don’t drink wine? What if they’re allergic to plants? Now I am getting a little unnecessarily fretful. There is no need to get all fretty here: they will give away what they don’t/can’t use, and they will not think we are dumb for not knowing.

What do you like to bring as a hostess gift? Has anyone brought you a hostess gift that was unusual or interesting or made you think they were cool people to be friends with?

Let’s have an end-of-year fundraiser check-in. Ever since I posted the fundraiser back in July, one of my primary “lie awake fretting about it” concerns has been that I will FORGET TO SEND A TOKEN, or that I will send a token and IT WILL GET LOST IN THE MAIL. So let’s check in at this point: if you were supposed to have received something by now, but have not, you should LET ME KNOW. It will make us BOTH feel better.

Calendar Twins should have received their calendars last week. I chose Birds, which has since been marked down if you want to be calendar twins with us. If you signed up to be a Calendar Twin and you didn’t get your calendar and I have just ruined the surprise, you should email me: swistle at gmail dot com.

All cloth napkins have been sent out. All favorite Christmas books have been sent out. All favorite baby-naming books have been sent out. If you signed up for cloth napkins, a favorite Christmas book, or a baby-naming book, and you haven’t received them, you should email me and tell me so: swistle at gmail dot com.

Postcard subscriptions have been going out as scheduled. If you are on the monthly plan, you should have received one every month starting in July (six postcards so far); if you are on the every-other-monthly plan, you should have received one every other month starting in August (three postcards so far). (December postcards might not have all arrived: I was a little later than I expected to be, and second-class mail takes longer.) If you are a postcard subscriber and you’ve missed a postcard, email me and let me know. (If you happen to know which month you missed, I’ve kept track of which one I sent each month, so I may be able to re-send the very one you were supposed to have received. If not, I’ll extend your subscription by a month.)

If you signed up for a greeting card with a delivery date of Christmas or earlier, you should have received it by now. If you didn’t, you should email me. (If you signed up for an “anytime” delivery, you may or may not have received it; I realize this is not helpful. I will do another check-in post later when EVERYTHING should have been delivered, so you’ll have another chance.)

If you signed up for a care package or treats box with a delivery date of Christmas or earlier, you should have received it by now. If you didn’t, you should email me. (If you signed up for an “anytime” delivery, you may or may not have received it; I realize this is not helpful. I will do another check-in post later when EVERYTHING should have been delivered, so you’ll have another chance.)

If you signed up for a piece of my SUBPAR POTTERY or a SWISTLE SKIRT, it should have long-since arrived. If it has not, you should email me.

If you signed up for BEE STICKERS, BEE EARRINGS, and/or a BEE ORNAMENT, it should have long-since arrived. If it has not, you should email me.

Just to address another of my lying-awake fears: If you email me about this and you don’t hear back from me, THAT IS IMPOSSIBLE and means I am for whatever crazy reason not getting your emails. Try me on Twitter, or from a different email address, or leave a blog comment, and I WILL get back to you.

In fact: I responded to allllll the contributions at the time to confirm that I got the email, so if you sent a contribution (even if you didn’t want a token) and didn’t hear back from me at the time, THAT ALSO IS IMPOSSIBLE and means for whatever crazy reason I didn’t get your email. Try me on Twitter, or from a different email address, or leave a blog comment, and I WILL get back to you.

In a week full of hectic obligations, I had something to look forward to: one of the obligations came with a side dish of a night all by myself in a motel and then a planned repeat of my cherished breakfast at IHOP. But then it was ruined by weather. Well, I still had a nice time: the driving part BEFORE the weather was unusually terrific, and nobody tailgated me, and I got good postcards at a rest stop, and I was in a great mood, and the ice cream machine at McDonald’s was working (?????) and so I got a hot fudge sundae, and I had a lovely time playing and winning the “Pop song or CHRISTIAN pop song?” game.

The last time I mentioned that game, someone signed me up for alllllll the Christian newsletters, which I think is the wrong answer if you want to be competitive in the “What Would Jesus Do?” game. DO we picture Jesus huffing off to his computer and simmering in the delicious spite of signing someone up for a bunch of junk mail? Or do we picture him saying “Ooo, ooo, my turn, my turn, I want to guess this one!” Twice I heard that new Harry Styles song and thought Jesus would be fooled by that one FOR SURE.

Harry Styles: “Walk in your rainbow paradise…”
Jesus: “Oh, yes, that is DEFINITELY one of mine!”
Harry Styles, continuing: “…Strawberry lipstick state of mind…”
Jesus: “Oh My Father God, WHY AM I SO BAD AT THIS”
Swistle: *smugly adds another tally mark to her column*

I have not yet done my Christmas cards, and I do not like to be last-minute about cards, and also I LIKE doing cards so this is perplexing. I addressed the envelopes a number of weeks ago, but I seem to be having trouble writing the cards and putting them into those envelopes. Part of it was that I ordered photos from Shutterfly because they’ll print text on the backs, which saves me from writing our names dozens of times; but they arrived and the text was truncated, so that they said “Thistle family, Christmas 2019: Elizabeth,”. Just like that, with the comma and then no one else’s names. So I contacted Shutterfly, and somehow this took an HOUR to deal with, and finally I had to ask for a refund because they said there was nothing they could do to make sure a re-order wouldn’t arrive printed exactly the same way, and they wouldn’t rush the redo or anything, so the replacement photos wouldn’t have arrived until tomorrow and still might have been wrong. And I think that experience sapped the life out of the cards project. I’d been so ahead of the game! Addressing the cards! Ordering the prints in plenty of time! And then: prints ruined, start all over. It was too much, apparently. Well. I need to rally. I will do it right now.

IT IS TIME.

This year there is more at stake, because several of you signed up to be CALENDAR TWINS as your fundraiser incentive. CALENDAR TWINS means that I will send you a copy of the same calendar I choose for myself, which is very bold and risk-taking of you and I admire you for it. I won’t tell anyone which calendar I chose until AFTER your calendars have arrived, so it will be a FULL SURPRISE.

This gives the whole post a fun little smack of suspense. I always list SOME calendars I’m seriously considering plus a bunch that DO very much appeal to me but I’m posting them more in case someone else wants them / has a good gift recipient for them. But this time when you see all those extra calendars some of you will be thinking “She always says she doesn’t want twelve months of the same thing, so she wouldn’t REALLY choose Goats in Trees or Men in Kilts. …right?” I GUESS YOU’LL FIND OUT, WON’T YOU! (But while I have you here: if you are one of my Calendar Twins and one of the possibilities listed below contains a phobia or Severe Dislike for you, you should let me know.)

There are two calendars I’ve had the 2019 versions of in my cart since last year, because they were almost-buys last time and I wanted to see if they had new versions this year. One of them (the Angie Lewin) does not have a new version, but the other one does:

Este MacLeode calendar. Gorgeous. Gorgeous. So bright and colorful and cheery.

After that, it is just madly into the calendar fray.

(image from Amazon.com)

Feathered Friends calendar. Charming, colorful, whimsical, full of birds.

(image from Amazon.com)

Pusheen calendar. The children don’t usually notice my kitchen calendar, but the year I chose Pusheen EVERYONE was into it.

(image from Amazon.com)

Space Cats calendar. It’s VERY TEMPTING to consider this one, MOSTLY because of how very surprised the calendar twins would be.

(image from Amazon.com)

Farmer’s Market calendar. This one meets my preference for a calendar that is beautiful and comforting without being too cheerful or optimistic to deal with when I’m looking ahead to a busy day/week.

(image from Amazon.com)

Wanderlust calendar. I do not have wanderlust myself, but I do not object to other people wandering and taking beautiful pictures of where they went, so that I can see the places without having to go there.

(image from Amazon.com)

A F*cking 2020 calendar. “Includes profane stickers”! My kids are old enough now that I feel pretty free to have a calendar like this one, and I’d say this might be perfect for right next to my desk. And look at October! It’s terrific. But this is not what I’d choose for the kitchen.

(image from Amazon.com)

Garden of Delights calendar. I need squares to write things in, so this one is ruled out for me, but I think it is so pretty. Maybe for next to my desk, where I don’t need so much square-writing.

(image from Amazon.com)

Fairy Houses calendar. Imagine being so very wee, and having a charming wee little house.

(image from Amazon.com)

Charley Harper calendar. I have a puzzle of one of the months (Tree of Life) and it’s a great puzzle, and that’s almost a reason to choose this calendar.

(image from Amazon.com)

Gustave Baumann, Small Untroubled World calendar. This upcoming year is an election year, and we are going to need soft calming scenes in soft comforting colors.

(image from Amazon.com)

William S. Rice calendar. Another in the soft/calming/comforting category.

(image from Amazon.com)

Kawase Hasui calendar. A third soft/calming/comforting option.

(image from Amazon.com)

Klimt Landscapes calendar. Yet another. This one is a strong contender.

(image from Amazon.com)

Flower Crown Animals calendar. Problem: this would absolutely be a final finalist, but there is less room than usual for the squares, and I need the squares.

(image from Amazon.com)

I Adulted calendar. Has a certain frantic, lowering-the-baseline, let’s-just-get-through-this appeal.

(image from Amazon.com)

Les Fleurs calendar. I love this immediately. I was looking specifically at flower calendars, and they all appealed to me in general but some of them all seemed to be the same palette (every page in pinks/purples) and others seemed like pictures I’d already seen a million times (tulips in sunshine! one entire sunflower filling the page! etc.). This one feels fresh and interesting and different. But the one review has legitimate complaints: there is a little uninteresting comment on each page (I can live with that), and there are no lines between the squares (I don’t know if I can live with that).

(image from Amazon.com)

Fleurs calendar. This one is also very pretty, and has lines between the squares.

(image from Amazon.com)

Redouté calendar. Another nice floral assortment, better than I’d expected from the cover.

(image from Amazon.com)

William Morris calendar. I would buy more of this sort of thing if the selections were more SEASONAL. Like, in December I want spruce/red/green, and in spring I want flowers/pastels.

(image from Amazon.com)

Guinea pig calendar. I had a guinea pig calendar one year next to my desk, and it remained cute all year, and the children were interested in it and enjoyed it.

(image from Amazon.com)

Bee calendar. BEES.

(image from Amazon.com)

Garden of Dreams calendar. This is so close to what I’m looking for. I love most of the pages, but a couple of them cross into Slightly Creepy for me. Plus: no squares.

(image from Amazon.com)

Masha D’yans calendar. I’ve had this one twice, and have been happy with it, and I recommend it.

(image from Amazon.com)

Feline calendar. Do you remember earlier, when I was talking about how I like flower calendars but sometimes they seem trite or boring? Same with cat calendars: looking at a cat calendar, I sometimes feel as if I’ve seen all the images before. But not this one.

(image from Amazon.com)

Pooch calendar. I like this dogs one too, and the whole dog concept is a soothing one for me.

(image from Amazon.com)

Rebecca Campbell calendar. These are interesting to look at and may cross the line into slightly too surreal.

(image from Amazon.com)

The Bird calendar. WHAT IS THIS WONDERFULNESS I AM LOOKING AT

(image from Amazon.com)

Birds of the World calendar. There are too many good calendars to choose from this year. This one is pretty to look at AND educational.

(image from Amazon.com)

Birds calendar. I MEAN! I would choose this one for December’s bird expression alone. No lines between columns of squares, but it occurs to me I could fix that with a ruler and a fine-tip marker.

(image from Amazon.com)

Bodleian Library calendar. I looked just to see if there were any library calendars and HECC YES THERE IS A LIBRARY CALENDAR