Category Archives: Christmas Lights

December 24, 2023 · 21:34

Christmas Eve 2023

I’ve lost a day or two in all of the hullabaloo. My calendar and watch keep reminding me that it’s Christmas Eve, but my head is trapped somewhere in early to mid December. The year is irrelevant and up for grabs.

I’m sure it will all work out and be fine. (Or at least fine-ish.)

Our tree’s only theme is “whatever we feel like putting on there!” White lights, colored lights, bubble lights, an airplane circling the top, old family heirloom ornaments, new ornaments every year from our travels, annual ornaments with planes, and so on.

It’s us.

This year’s new ornaments include a couple from our trip to Winnipeg, one from the Chiefs’ Super Bowl victory, one from a trip up the California coast to Solvang, and a talking Ted Lasso from a dear friend.

I hope everyone enjoys the holiday tonight, tomorrow, and on through the last week of the year, preparing to end 2023 and kick off a better 2024.

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December 23, 2023 · 23:43

Thinking About The Old House

That would be the “Pomelo house” that we sold five and a half years ago. We could put up a LOT of Christmas lights there. The house we’ve been renting for the past six Christmases? Some, but it’s a small fraction as much.

Maybe the next house, the “forever home” that we hope to find in 2024.

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December 15, 2023 · 23:00

Fixed Focus

This was a tough shot. The Moon was far away and tiny (relatively), the Christmas lights about 18″ away and big (relatively), and the iPhone naturally wanted to focus on the Christmas lights. But I remembered reading about how to lock the focus on the iPhone and played with it a bit to see if I could get it to work. And it did!

I don’t have any formal photography training, but I’ve taken so many pictures for so many years that I occasionally get something that I really like. This would be one of those.

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December 10, 2023 · 21:14

Grand Park & Music Center

Last night we were downtown at the Music Center, which is all gussied up for the holidays.

One of the things that the views and lights brought to mind, which is not an entirely new concept, is that I’ve never gone around downtown as a tourist or photographer and just been there to take pictures.

Sure, I’m down at the Music Center eight or ten times a year and I always take a few pictures. I’ve run past a lot of the primary landmarks (City Hall, the LA Catherdral, the Music Center, Hollywood, Century City, etc) because they’re on the LA Marathon course – but I haven’t taken pictures because I’m pretty focused on breathing and not dying.

But when I visit a new city, I love to simply wander around, look at the sights, and take a metric shit-ton of pictures. Look back through the nearly ten years of posts here and you’ll see a dozen or more examples. New York, San Francisco, Kansas City, London, Prague, Chicago, Brussels, Shanghai, Washington, Seoul, Kyoto, Seattle, Mazatlan, Cabo San Lucas, Denver, Puerto Vallarta, Winnipeg, Montreal, Toronto… I’m sure I’ve forgotten some.

But Los Angeles? Sure, I’ve got a gazillion photos as I wander here and there. But a day or two just wandering around downtown, getting on the Metro, taking pictures of all of the tourist traps that I would see in the first day or two if I was just visiting for a week? I may have a picture, I may not.

Sounds like something to do for a day once I get out of Deadline Hell.

 

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December 7, 2023 · 23:36

Rabbits 3, Lawn Decorations 0

Yesterday when sharing the howling neighborhood coyotes, I mentioned that the rabbits had been at work again, nibbling on the wires for some of the Christmas decorations out on the lawn.

I’ve already fixed one cut from last week, this morning I found two more!

I don’t want (necessarily) to kill the fuzzy little cottontail critters, but those are wires with a solid 110 volts running through them. May I hope that when the little bunbun chews through they get a nice little jolt?

Monsters!

Monty Python tried to warn us…

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December 6, 2023 · 22:46

Christmas Lights & Coyotes

I went out to check out the Christmas lights (we’ve had a couple of the ground sets taken out by rabbits chewing on the wires again!) and was surprised to find a whole pack of coyotes sounding off like banshees in the canyon between us and Valley Circle!

Turn it up!

By the time I had gone back inside for my phone and got it turned on they had actually quieted down a bit. What you hear here is about a third as loud as they had been a minute earlier.

I have no idea how many there are in this pack, but it’s got to be at least 15 to 20 just by the number of different voices I heard when I first went out.

The bunnies who are chewing on those wires had better be on their toes or I’m going to be the least of their worries!

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December 2, 2023 · 23:43

MORE Lights! – December 2023

The second tranche of 2023 Christmas lights is up at Sietch Willett!

Last week I did the lights along the roof line, which is typically the most time consuming and difficult. That was seven sets of lights, plus two on the ground (the candy canes) along the driveway.

Today, in about half of the time as I spent last weekend, I got ten sets of lights up on the ground, in the rose bushes, and in all of the plants along the front and side of the house.

Curiously, I ran out of lights to put up! This is due to the age of my supply of lights and the fact that there were nearly a dozen strings that I had to pull when they were failing. I test everything before I put it up and I won’t put up anything with a section (usually a 1/3 section or 1/4 section, depending on the style of lights) completely burnt out. By the time they all got weeded out, I had enough to finish today’s ten sets – but I’ve got at least four other sets that really need to get filled in and there are a couple more places where I can put some up if I can still find them in the store tomorrow.

Good thing that the Chiefs game isn’t until 17:00 local time tomorrow. There’s a time and priorities conflict that might just short circuit my frazzled brain.

One other thing that I’m going to be trying hard to get done earlier this holiday season is getting the Christmas cards out earlier. To that end…

  • If you’re on the Christmas card list (i.e., you’ve gotten them in the past) and you’ve moved or changed your address and want to stay on the Christmas card list, please send me an email at pwillett@ix.netcom.com (or call, I’m easy!)
  • If you’re not on the Christmas card list (i.e., you’ve never gotten cards in the past) and you want to be, please let me know and tell me where to send it
  • If you see me posting a list on here in a week or so with high school friends or CAF friends or fannish friends who have dropped off the radar and you have current contact information for them, please either let them know that I’m trying to reach them or contact me with the current information

Social media is (sometimes) great and all of that, but I’m an olde phart and believe that there’s nothing better than a card, a couple of pictures, and the family newsletter from friends.

Especially given how many of them this year are being flagged as “deceased” in my mailing list database.

Life’s too short. I don’t know or care who “they” are, if “they” say that Christmas cards are uncool and passe, then I have a number of physiologically improbable suggestions for “them.”

Merry Christmas!

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November 25, 2023 · 23:01

Not NaNoWriMo, 11/25/2023

Mucha more better! (Ghod, I’m going to be soooooo sore in the morning…)

The full Moon and Jupiter are still pulling their own weight up there (it’s a gravitational thing!) but the Christmas lights are looking good.

I concentrated today on getting everything on the gutters and roofline up. LOTS of ladder climbing, but *ZERO FALLS*, which is a big deal these days since I don’t bounce the way I used to.

Those bushes and shrubs are looking pretty barren, but that’s a lot easier to fix. Tomorrow, between the laundry, groceries, and Chiefs game, there should be time to get most of that done.

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July 10, 2023 · 23:33

Christmas In July

From Christmas 2017, what would turn out to be our final Christmas at the old house, although I didn’t know it then. 😭😭😭

Yet another thing that *I* keep in mind when looking at potential new “forever” homes – where do I hang the lights, where do I plug them in, and how many can I put up before I blow the circuit breaker panel?

The “really really nice on the inside but outside it’s just a box on an acre-plus of dirt with zero landscaping” places not only don’t have anyplace to hang lights, they also tend to be so far out in the boonies that no one will ever see them. Yeah, I’m the guy who, when meeting a neighbor from down the street for the first time, goes “YEAH! That’s me!” when they say, “Oh, you’re the lunatic with a gazillion Christmas lights?” (I will also note that many of them who say that are also putting up lights and more lights than before after the first year or two when we moved in. I think of it as being a good influence, leading by example, that sort of thing…)

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June 7, 2023 · 23:36

Random Old Photos – June 07th

Playing the Zillow game, house hunting (or at least semi-seriously and starting to get more seriously house window shopping), I quickly started building up a checklist of things to verify. Priorities. Deal killers. Variables.

For example, a one-story property is a high priority – but a nice two-story with a master suite on the ground floor is acceptable. We have a price range which is firm – but if the perfect place came along and it’s “close” to that range, then we can talk.

Some things are absolute deal killers. I’m still working remotely and intend to keep doing it for a while, so an excellent, high-speed internet connection is a must, no questions asked.

Then there are the “softer” variables. How does the yard look? Does it have a pool or spa? Does it have solar already? Is it near a busy high school or mall or someplace with a lot of traffic? How old is it?

Beyond that, everyone has that “something” that they’re keeping an eye on, even if the real estate agent or other family members might not be. For me that’s, “How many Christmas lights can I put up? How many trees and bushes are there, and how much roofline and gutters to hang lights from? Are we on or near a major street where lots of people are going to see them, or are we off in the boonies where only a handful of folks will ever know, no matter how much time I spend hanging them?”

It’s not a deal killer, but it’s there in the back of my mind. The old house on Pomelo shown above from twenty years ago? That was a great house to hang lights on! The house we move to will be our last one, our “forever” home, so we need to get it right.

There are going to be a lot of Christmases there, they need to be celebrated with lights!

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