Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays!

Wishing you all a wonderful day with family and friends. Enjoy the great company, food and conversation. My little grandson is 6 months old, and had his holiday photos taken-here's one to share with all my readers.

Here the holidays have been a bit lonely-we'd always visit my dad and my grandmother however they are no longer with us this year. May they rest in peace, and I know in my heart even if we can't see them, that they will always be with us in spirit.

My husband called me yesterday morning, but I was at work. He said to my son that he'd call back, but no call ever came. I'm not worried, I know that the phone lines must be jammed trying to call out from Guatemala. Every year we call his family and we have to try several times as the calls often get dropped or it is just dead air and no dial tone or ringing. Hopefully I will hear from him later today or over the weekend when the call volume isn't so crazy. (I tried to call his mother's house, but there was no answer yesterday, my guess is that they are all celebrating at his brother's new house down the road-and I don't have the brother's new cell number to call).

On another note, my crazy neighbors across the road had a wild Christmas Eve. I was in bed sound asleep at 2 am when my son came running downstairs and told me there was a huge commotion going on across the street. Sure enough, the sounds of yelling and fighting broke the Yuletide silence. At first, I thought the idiots were fighting over Christmas gifts, since their last knock down-drag all altercation was over a cigarette-but apparently one of the young "men" who lived downstairs wanted to hit one the young "lady" who lived upstairs and her brother and stepfather decided to defend her honor. (um, I wonder if they know the couple in question has been sleeping together for months now, lol)

Considering they were all partying together, and there was alcohol and an assortment of other holiday treats available this was bound to happen. The fighting had come out into the street in front of the house and rocks were being thrown, some sort of a metal pole was involved and within minutes police had surrounded the area and called an ambulance. Apparently the young man who wanted to hit the girl ended up having his top lip ripped off-he could be heard screaming "It hurts!" in the back of the ambulance before they carted his sorry @$$ off to the hospital for stitches. This morning, he was sore, and apparently pissed because he couldn't smoke a cigarette. The brother was a bit bruised, but fared much better than the stepfather. He was transferred to the bigger hospital about an hour away so they could reattach his top lip and move his nose back to its correct spot after it was mashed to a pulp and pushed to the side of his face. Yup, Emergency Surgery on Christmas Eve/Day, just my cup of tea. Apparently because he was bigger than the others, and they were just a bit intimidated by his size, he had the pleasure of meeting the metal pole a few times. Ahh, another holiday in the 'hood.

For now it is quiet... there is peace and harmony. The presents have been opened, and Santa has visited all the good little boys and girls. Those that were naughty, well, they're recovering nicely from what I've been told. I'm sure the painkillers are helping as well. After all, a swift recovery is very important-New Year's Eve is about a week away!