It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas...

...at the Alabama Shakespeare Festival. Sunday  I went once again to view "A Christmas Carol" at the festival, delighting as usual in the music and the actors' playful interaction with the audience.  After the big finale -- Scrooge delighting in human fellowship on the streets on Christmas day, everyone singing and such before all the actors take their collective bow -- we in the audience emerged to a freezing cold rain. Amidist it, though, stood  a massive and beaming Christmas tree.  A friend of mine and I savored it as long as we could before taking off     As December 19th was the anniversary of the story's original publication, what better way to celebrate it?

I've been quiet this week, consumed with a thousand-page page history by a unique author.  Here's a clue: the history was written from prison in the 1930s. I'm almost on the outside, though. Strange to think that two weeks from now will be a  new year, and I have a big challenge in mind for 2017