I had a great holiday weekend and I hope others did too. I even got the extra bonus of eating like a complete piglet and only gaining a half of a pound. Yes! A HALF OF A POUND. This even shocked me when I reluctantly got on the scale this morning. I haven't braved the scale since last Thursday. Nothing but ham, cheese, potato chips, green olives, cannibal sandwiches, wine, cookies, miniature bbq hot dogs, and raspberry kringle! Thank you PCOS cocktail of 7 meds. You may give me grief from time to time, but that is one thing I'm quite pleased about.

Now that my musical adventness has come to an end, I will have to come up with another regular feature for this blog. And of course my other one over at my main site. I have a few ideas I'm kicking around, so never fear. There will be something coming January 1st as a regular installment. And of course there are still my podcasts. Complete excitement there.

Speaking of, New Year's Eve is up next and I couldn't be happier that a new decade is about to unfold. Or at least a new year. 2009 was completely heartbreakingly bittersweet and I'm still smarting from the unsweetened parts. I imagine that effect will last quite a while. Maybe it will never go away. Actually? I don't think it ever will, but maybe 300 years from now it won't hurt quite as much. Or maybe it will all make more sense by that time.

Happy December 25th and Merry Christmas! Hope yours was/is a good one! My final holiday advent offering is appropriately Perry Como's ~ There's No Place Like Home For The Holidays. Santa was good to my family and hope he was good to you and yours too!

Happy December 24th to everyone! Today I have two offerings. One being my musical advent which is none other than Nat King Cole singing Caroling, Caroling. At this point do I even have to comment further about my choice in song?



The other offering I have is a holiday podcast from my art cave. I am happy to report that I got all my holiday things done, am about to embark on my journey to Racine for holiday festivities AND was able to finish this podcast and not let it fall to the wayside any longer. It's just a very small accomplishment, but it's important to note those too I guess. Anyway, enjoy!

Wow. We're already at December 23rd. It seems like December is the fastest month of the year. Today's offering is an old favorite off of one of those 1970's mix holiday LP's I'm hoarding for my podcast. Charley Pride's ~ Christmas In My Hometown. We listened to this one A LOT when I was growing up.



I heard this song in Michael's Craft Store the other day (I needed last minute canvases that smelled like Vicks Vapor Rub: stories for other times) Like i said, I heard this song in Michaels the other day and I must admit, I got a little misty because more holiday memories came flooding in. Im glad I was in an aisle where nobody was because Im sure one would question why someone is having an emotional moment staring at blank white canvases in Michaels. It hit me out of the blue though, but I suspect why. Multiple reasons, actually. It was a tough year. And even though I am super duper glad Im on this additional PCOS mind med (depression is another symptom of PCOS fyi) it is screwing with the balance of the other ones Im on. They told me it might. What I mean is - I think Im the only one losing weight this holiday season. I eat a little bit and then want to yack it all up. And sometimes I do. TMI, but that's how I roll.

Speaking of sick! I came across this commercial from @retorist in Twitterland and it brings me to a tale I just must share. Baby Alive!



Now, I didn't have dolls growing up, mostly because I just didn't want any. No wait, I had a Pipi Longstocking doll that I ADORED. She was actually my secret friend (please note she was not a baby doll, had cool legs with mismatched socks and RED hair) But other than that, I had cars, monsters, Star Wars action figures and Breyer® horses. No Barbies to speak of. That's a whole 'nother story. So why Baby Alive was on my Christmas List is beyond me. But it was. I think I was around the 6-7-8 mark. So Santa brought it for me. My mom was probably relieved (sorry, SANTA) was probably relieved that I finally wanted something every girl seems to want: a baby. Come to think of it, I liked that it could eat and then poop.  But unlike the one in this clip, it had no lever. It had a button inside it's skin (YUCK!) and batteries.

Anyway, I fed it and it pooped and then I got bored with that and carried it around by its foot and had no idea why my mom kept scolding me not to carry THIS TOY around by its foot (but now I know, and I could see how that would worry a mother) and then one day Baby Alive seemed dead. It wouldn't eat and it wouldn't poop anymore. So I brought it to my mom and she sent me to go ask my father. To my horror he got out his toolbox!  His effing toolbox. And proceeded to "operate" on it at the kitchen table. He was very patient about it all which is a nice memory because that's not how those projects usually went. But then he started to make that nauseous sound as he started to get it open and that scared me. Like a lot. I couldn't look at what he was looking at because HE had a horrified look on his face (which never happened) but I finally did and what I saw inside there still scares the crap out of me (no pun intended) to this day. It was all green and moldy assuming something had leaked out of Baby Alive and corroded all of the gizmos and gadgets  AND BATTERIES that made it eat and poop. I was fearful of bugs but he assured me there were none in there. Then my father had a nice talk with me about how it needed to be thrown away immediately because it was toxic and dangerous because of the battery acid that had leaked everywhere. And THAT boys and girls is one of the reasons why Carol Kroll never had any kids. Baby Alive literally scarred me for life.

Happy December 22nd everyone! Last night's Winter Solstice celebration was perfect, complete with brie cheese. And shrimp. And a filet. And a salad. And a fire along with gently falling snow. It was like Hollywood showed up or something (kind of a rare thing in my world of regular follies) but maybe this was a sign of better things to come. Also I have some clarification on what I was talking about regarding those slips of paper to be tossed into the fire and the celebrating of the Winter Solstice in general. And welcoming the light into this next decade is what I exactly intend to do. I really enjoyed the part of throwing the crappy things I wrote down on all those pieces of paper into the fire. It may have just been the moment, and my spiked apple cider but I did feel something when I did it. Better? Yes. Let's just say better.

Anyway, today's musical advent offering has nothing to do with solstice because I'm completely random like that. Keeps life interesting (read: frustrating) for those around me. It's a Pisces thing. Or a Carol thing. Whatever. Today we have Bing Crosby's ~ Mele Kalikimaka because no matter how cheesy it is to some, it is a fun song to sing along to. And what is the holiday season if you don't have a little Bing in there???

Hey Happy December 21st! And Happy Winter Solstice if anyone celebrates that. I do, actually. Complete with fire outside tonight and appropriate dishes (and cookies, well, raspberry BAR chocolate cookies)

Everyone can think it's silly if they want to, but it's kind of refreshing to celebrate the season and life and not commercialism or someone else's (or a bunch of someone else's) idea of god. It's also the longest night of the year and from this day forward we'll be getting a minute more of daylight every day. So we all have that to look forward to.

Now, tonight it's supposed to be clear skies and I really hope it is so I can see some stars. Right now it's cloudy, but at least it's cold. One year it was nothing but RAIN. So gross. And so wrong. One of the things I do is write down things I want to change, or things that didn't go so well - and toss them into the fire and wish those things well as they vaporize into the night air. Or something like that. It's hard to explain and probably ridiculous, but so are a lot of traditional religious ceremonial things (I feel) so be careful pointing fingers.

My advent song and winter solstice offering is Patapan (or Burgundian Carol but I figured we're all tired of how fascinated I am by the use of my name by now....well, Im not of course....) This one is by a choir I am not familiar with, but its beautiful all the same. I tried to find it performed by The Jay Welche Chorale - which is off of a CD collection of holiday tunes put out every year by a local radio station in Racine, but that was a a couple decades ago, so this version will have to do. It's a beautiful holiday song and exudes winter to me for some reason. Enjoy!

Happy December 20th! Today's advent offering is a musical find all on its own. Julie Andrews singing "Carol Of The Bells" with a bunch of men in the streets of what looks like England. Again, it's one of my favorite holiday songs for many and various reasons and I love Julie Andrews. In fact I used to list to my Mary Poppins LP nonstop as a kid trying to get to sound just like her. "Feed The Birds" was my favorite off that soundtrack and is it any wonder that it's the most depressing song off that album? No. Not really, I'm sure. Doesn't surprise me anyway. But her diction and enunciation while singing is just some of the best. Plus I secretly wished while I was singing to the LP, my room would have magically cleaned itself like it did in the movie, but alas, that never happened. Oh, who am I kidding, I STILL wish that would happen when I clean the house.

Happy December 19th! Grey skies around here that look heavy with more snow. I'm quite happy about this. This is the way December is supposed to look and feel in my world.

So! I went downstairs and started rummaging through the box of old Christmas LP's from my family's past and dug up this gem. "Happy Holidays! (from) Sander & Young" presented by True Value Hardware Stores, circa 1976.



This song was a popular one to put on in my house when I was young. And I always loved the way the two guys sang two different parts. Not to be all Norman Rockwellish, because my family was far from that, but during December we came pretty close. Which is why I always like this month a lot. I have a LOT of good holiday memories. And this song brings me back to making cookies with my mom, helping her wrap presents, sitting at night on the couch with my mom, dad, and sister just watching the lights on the Christmas tree and reading books together......and our black cocker spaniel, Scooter, eating all the popcorn garland we all painstakingly strung together one year as a family holiday "project". No wait, that was a pretty bad scene because he knocked the whole tree down while we were all gone and my parents were amazingly pissed. But who could blame him? Which is why they were both so pissed. They couldn't.

My parents bought a lot of those special edition albums from Sears, Firestone, and JCPenny and I have the the evidence to prove such things existed. I thought about taking a picture of this actual album and posting it here for today's post, but decided to save that show and tell for my podcast that I have been severely procrastinating on. Not on purpose, just other things have taken priority. You know, like making money and taking out the trash and shoveling snow and picking up dog poop, and making dinner and cleaning the house, and cleaning my fish tanks and doing the laundry. And playing Santa Clause. Then the making of art and music to actually put in the podcast, and the assembling of the podcast...I think you get the picture. Hopefully. But I think I may save my holiday LP finds for the actual picture show. That may be a nice way to close out 2009 from Carol Kroll.

Because as we all know it was good to me and really shitastic, both in many and various and surprising ways. But I feel l need to say goodbye to it properly so as not to invite the same kind of shitasticness into the new year of 2010 or the entire new decade --- more importantly.

Happy musical December 18th everybody! Got another gem by The New Christy Minstrels.



Is it any surprise that A Mighty Wind is one of my favorite movies? Im sure that isn't surprising one bit. Did I mention that Im tired of having nightmares every night now for a week? Well, if not, I just mentioned it here for good measure. I can't even begin to tell you what they are about because they are quite involved and when one tries to convey a "dream" sequence to someone else, it fail miserably all the time. So I'll just keep it to myself and you will all have to trust me that they are crappy and bother me during the day. And it's not even about blood and guts and scary things, they are about real life things which is even more terrifying.

Besides that, I am crazy intrigued again with the two Ice Hotels located on this planet. I have always wanted to go camping during the winter (and still might) but years ago when someone showed me the hotel made of ice in Canada, I nearly passed out with glee. I must visit either one or both of them soon, I feel. The blocks of ice that they claim are beds intrigue me to no end, although I am not buying that they are even remotely comfortable. But the whole structure is just completely fascinating to me and I would like to see it.

Happy December 17th! Today's offering is Herb Alpert & the Tijuana Brass's version of Jingle Bells. Pretty groovy for this Thursday morning. Herb will always and forever remind me of a 1970's Kmart shopping scene. I have fond memories of being at one when I was a kid with my Mom and this type of music playing.

Other than that, I'm still in a little fog this morning because all night I had crazy dreams that bordered on nightmares. And they sure are affecting me today. I kind of hate that when that happens.

Oh, and unrelated - I have come to realize that some people make no sense whatsoever and that has nothing to do with me. Hard to keep that in mind though and not feel hurt by it all, but I am going to make a strong effort to today despite the cloudy skies inside my noggin.