I wrote my holiday newsletter this afternoon. (Yeah, I know it’s early, but I’m always pre-punctual. That’s just me!)

 

I also wanted to find out if I had enough news to even bother to make one.  Since the second side is a slew of 2021 client testimonials (as all of my newsletters have been for the past several years), it turns out I had barely enough news to fill out the front page: panniculectomy, happier political commentary, rats, and new client. I also swapped out the photo for a newer one showing my weight loss  — fortunately, taken before one of my front teeth fell out, so I was actually smiling in it. (I’m still waiting to get into the U of WA Dental School to have it replaced. I’m super thankful for mask-wearing still being a thing right now!)

 

 

 

Gee, now that I’ve posted it here, I don’t even need to send it out!  But I will, later on. Close to Thanksgiving. Unless I forget!  I’d better put a note on my calendar: “Email newsletter to friends, family and clients!!!”

 

I still have a few I must mail out, too.  I have friends who are in their 90’s and don’t use email or have the Internet.  (I can’t even imagine being without email and the Internet in this day and age, after having them for so many years — can you?  It must be easier than ever to feel isolated and forgotten as an elder unless they have smartphones and can do video chats via Facetime or some other option.)

 

I’m terrible about calling; always have been; but I actually enjoy Zooming and Facebook video chatting because it feels like a real visit — I can see faces, and expressions, and when they’re winding down and wanting to hang up.  Makes it a lot easier to get it right every time…

 

Re the Feliz Naughty Dog trivet image I posted with the headline image. I bought a trivet like this last year for my dear friend Nancy Graf, a basset hound owner for some twenty or thirty years.  I spotted it and got two because it was so darned cute… and then I figured she probably had it already (being a collector of basset hound memorabilia) but wonder of wonders, she had never seen it, so she was tickled pink to receive it. That made my day for a solid week — finding something she had never seen, didn’t have, and absolutely LOVED when she got it.

 

It’s nice to find the perfect gift for good friends or family members. It’s usually darned hard, too, as I am not very inquisitive; I don’t ask a lot of questions about people’s passions or interests: I just glean ideas from conversations we end up sharing on a day to day basis over time. But I know Nancy’s interests and passions; we worked at the Animal Protection Institute at the same time, and we had lots of fun adventures together, so there was plenty of time to find out about each other’s swoon buttons.  She loved (still does) Liberace and Michael Crawford (Phantom of the Opera), Texas,  and animals (especially basset hounds).

 

When De (DeForest Kelley) and Deaken (my serval cat) died, she sent me “care packages” she had been collecting for years, knowing the days would come when I would lose them to death. She sent me pix of Deaken I’d never seen before, letters I’d written to her about him, and more.

 

Same with DeForest Kelley. She sent me stuff she had been collecting for years. I was deeply touched and I still have the care boxes and everything in them. She’s a gem. What more can I say?

 

So, whenever I see the basset hound trivet — and I see it a lot because it’s in my kitchen year ’round MOSTLY to remind me of Nancy — I get another chance to grin and remember all the fun we had so many years ago (from 1981 to 1985 and then on a couple of occasions after that, when she came to see me in LA or I came to Sacramento from LA.  I stayed with her when I went to SAC to see De at a convention there. She picked me up at the airport and ferried me all around.)

 

When she came to LA (sometimes with British friends) we’d visit Warner Bros. (where I worked at the time), polish “our” stars on the Walk of Fame (De, “Lee” –Liberace’s nickname), and go see Liberace’s place in Hollywood (he had since died and the place was for sale, so we got to go inside) where she would regale me with funny stories.  Like the time she snuck up the side of the fence on this very property and peeked over, only to find him on the other side in a chaise longue listening to her progress.  He grinned a delightful, “Hello!” and she said she just about died from embarrassment at being caught.  She was his fan club president. If I recall correctly (and she will correct me if I don’t, and I will correct the info here if that happens!) they knew each other but not well.  She knew his brother George better.

 

Those were the days, my friend. We thought they’d never end…

 

And as long as we’re here to remember them, they never will!

 

Ain’t memories magnificent?