It's Over

Christmas was different in 2023. I have one thing that I am responsible for during the Christmas season (Actually two if you include exterior lights) and I blew it. For the last decade or so, I have stuffed the Christmas stockings for Santa Claus. I shop, wrap, and stuff gifts from myself in the stockings. For the last several years I have put the same thing in the girl Sipes' stockings. ((Can I say girl Sipes'?) (Why, yes I can!) The gift? Pepper spray and rape whistles zipper pulls. I would have preferred to pass out ammunition, but Girl Twin was too young, Elaine refused to carry and Ivy could buy her own. What? It is a perfect Christmas gift from a loving husband, father, and grandfather. (The boys get knives.)

At some point during this past year, I found Elaine's pepper spray still in its package in a drawer. It is no good if you are not going to carry it. I didn't buy it this year. The story doesn't end there. The girls noticed there was no pepper spray in their stockings I went with flashlights and pocket screwdrivers, this year,

Ivy: Monner, where is our pepper spray?

Girl Twin: And the rape whistles?

Me: I didn't them this year

Ivy: It's not a Sipes family hillbilly Christmas without them

Me: I guess I should have got pepper spray

Despite a lack of pepper spray, it was a nice Christmas. Food, family, and for Elaine, football

This is the last day of 2023, and I am glad to see it go. I lost a brother, a nephew, and our last llama. I had another birthday. The last of our kids moved out. Elaine finished her thirty-fourth year drawing/designing powerlines and power poles just in time for a major EV manufacturer to recall two million cars. (I don't know why that's important to this story.)

I'm hoping for a better 2024. Elaine and I have decided to research buying more livestock. I read somewhere that's what people do after they reach their "golden" years. They buy a bunch of animals to tie them down, with back-breaking chores so they can't watch old westerns or twenty-four-hour news on satellite television while their wife is expanding the electric grid. Bitter?

I wish you all a happy and healthy New Year. I hope to find some affordable yaks, Mac needs a couple of friends and I need (according to Elaine) something to feed. Buy yarn, and conserve electricity, (Elaine needs a break) Love ya, God bless.

Our crazy lives!

Monner