I'm surrounded by Christmas cheer and I think I need to spend some time with the Grinch just to get my perspective back.
I like the family time and the food and the candles, and stuff. I like that for one day. But after one day I feel an inner teen aged rebel rumbling within me.
But here in a sleep deprived state on the eve of a new year I feel all set to start the new year off right and sleep it all off on January first.
My mom's brother and his wife have been kind enough to take me in over the holidays, and we've had a nice time together. It's been great to get to know their 4 sons better. If you click on the link and study the pictures you will learn a little bit about them.
My uncle's an interesting guy; he's a retired seaman, full of stories from way back. Here's one:

Einar Gjelsvik was a bus driver in Volda back in the 1930's. His bus route went around the fjord east of Volda. That road is still narrow and windy, (I just drove that route last week.) The weather during our story made for slippery roads that day. There are steep precipicies and at a certain precarious point the old massive shoulder stones were absent. This is where Einar lost control of the bus and by the time he finally got it stopped the right front tire was hanging off the cliff. Our intrepid, yet fearful bus driver saw the danger of the bus falling off and down the cliff into the fjord. He grabbed an axe he had there handy. Swinging the axe he forced all the passengers back to very backety back back back of the bus and shouted to the them that if they didn't stay back there he'd go after them with the axe. When it was clear that they all understood him, he said one man could come forward and get off the bus to find some men and ropes and a truck to pull the bus back onto the road. This plan worked, the bus and all the passengers made it safely home.