Diarist.net

Sunday
December 24, 2000

Each year it becomes more difficult for me to muster anything resembling Christmas spirit. Commercialism alone is a good enough reason for my hum-bugging attitude (I mean really...Christmas advertising before Halloween, even?). The fact that my immediate family has fragmented down to a bare minimum -- factions thereof gather amongst their chosen few, deliberately excluding several of us (and I'm going to leave it at that -- you may speculate the reasons as amuses you). Southern California's boringly consistent weather (one day it's in the 60s, the other the mid-70s) -- and I realize those of you in climes with wind-chill factors twenty or so below zero are rolling your eyes right now. Oh well. Malls crowded with short-tempered shoppers ready to bludgeon anyone standing between themselves and the last Sony Playstation II. Rude drivers of ultra-luxury land-barge SUVs throwing horn-honking hissy-fits as they cleave their metallic behemoths dangerously between other vehicles -- my beloved little Jeep among them. Then there's that weird and depressing election situation...don't worry, I'm not going there.

But I'm going to wish all who visit this page Happy Holidays and the Best for the New Year. Coming from someone who loathes hearing smarmy Christmas musak (except "The Christmas Song" sung by Nat King Cole), this is my most heart-felt, sincere wish.

I was checking Con-Dor's website today and discovered that they have posted pictures from the 2000 con. One photo in particular caught my attention -- it's a shot of the rock 'n roll dance on Saturday night. You can just see my chubby-cheeked visage in the background. The picture must have been snapped pretty late in the evening when the crowd had thinned out a bit -- or perhaps a song was playing that didn't quite appeal to the majority of revelers. Anyway, I've enlarged the section of me just a tad.

I'm still working on my Web portfolio website, annehutchinswebdesign.com. So far, I've got the "lobby" done -- but I've got a heckuva lot more to do (including re-doing my Flash animation splash page). I've also got another domain, annehutchins.com, which is only being "parked" at dreamhost.com. When I can afford to have them host it, my mainpage will be moving there. Hopefully this Spring I'll be bringing the new domain online.

A shameless plug for an ill-fated fantasy novel which has only just visited its last publisher and, alas, will now live its days on the Web. Please humor us by reading the novel and leaving a caveat or kvetch in the guestbook. It's not such a painful, terrible thing. Uh...if you'd like to display this pathetic banner on your own Website, you can find out here. Hey, it only takes up 18k of bandwidth...

This page webbed by Anne Hutchins. Yes I did it myself. Honest. Copyright © 2000. All rights reserved.