Live long and prosper

Robbo and Tim still don't have power, and aren't likely to have it restored before the weekend. The romance of the matching headlamps is wearing off as they have to trudge to the stream for buckets of water and there's no TV, no Internet. They're showering at the Y and recharging cell phones at work, although they live so far out in the woods that their cell phones don't work at home.

All this is fun for a day or two because they have heat and they can cook, but not for a week or more.

*****

I decorated the Christmas tree last night. Six strands of 150 lights and two strands of 200. Putting the ornaments on was a little hard. I put the three that Michael made near the top of the tree, plus the memorial ornament I got from CarePartners Hospice in his name. Then I put the memorial ornament to my sister nearby and the fishing creel ornament that Mike and I bought together after my father died in 1990. The ones for Daddy and Ellen weren't so hard this year, but Mike's made me sad.

Then there was the Star Trek ornament. We found it in a Hallmark store in the 1980s -- probably 1988. I don't even know what we were doing in a Hallmark store since he hated chain stores even then. It might have been the ornament that drew us in.

It's a shuttlecraft, and it plugs into a socket on the light strand. When you push the button, Leonard Nimoy's voice says, "Shuttlecraft to Enterprise, shuttlecraft to Enterprise. Spock here. Happy holidays. Live long and prosper."

Well, we were both totally enchanted. But it was $24. For one ornament. But it was Star Trek and it was Spock. But it was $24. It could be argued that the thing was a collectible, but we weren't in it for the investment.

We stood and looked at it and pressed the button again and again. I'm sure we annoyed the poor store clerk, who had probably heard it many too many times.

Finally, Michael said, "I'll pay half if you leave it to me in your will."

So, I took the $12 from him.

I never expected I'd have to worry about who gets it.

But I smiled when I pushed the button. And I pushed it again for Michael. And again for me. And again for Michael.

Happy holidays. Live long and prosper.

*****

One of the reasons Michael wasn't overly enthusiastic about Christmas was that he managed an Auntie Ann's Pretzel store at a mall in Albany, NY. Just before Thanksgiving, mall management put three animatronic bears right outside the store and they sang "We Wish You a Merry Christmas" all day long.

Again and again and again in a never-ending, hellish loop.

People would stop at the pretzel counter, rude and nasty as they rushed to shop and buy unnecessary crap, and the bears kept singing the same song again and again and again.

He was never the same after that Christmas.