The holidays come around, and my daily fodder goes missing! You buttheads had all better keep up over the Xmas holidays. I may be running off to Texas to enjoy a not-as-cold holiday (and a short stay in the Austin version of my office since there�s too much work to be done and I�ve found two half-days that could get my attention), but I�m still going to want something to break up my Insomnia Silent Nights.

Yeah, I really should write dysfunctional Xmas carols.

Speaking of dysfunctional Xmas items, I�ve got the Xmas cards addressed and ready to go but not out yet. I got my first batch of cards from the Weetabix Holiday Card Exchange and a photocopied greeting from the Anti-Cruelty Society. There�s a bigger thank you to WHCE for not asking for money, but I�m counting the A-CS�s inquiry as a bonafide greeting anyway since there was a card with a Xmas drawing on it and some red script text wishing me and my lovey-snookums-plums a happy holidays.

Yeah, they got a check. I�m feeding seven dogs and seven cats for seven days.

Yes, now�s the time to hit me up for money. Screw those Salvation Army bastards. Please. There are many others who are so much more worthy of money. This year I�ve donated to the Anti-Cruelty Society, the American Cancer Society, the MS150 bike ride, and the Chicago Gay Men�s Chorus.

I haven�t given much in total dollar amounts, but I feel that my couple hundred spread across these organizations will go to good causes. Every little bit counts.

Sit down, and let me tell you a story.

Comfy? Good.

On September 11, 2001 I found myself unemployed for the third time that year. I used the first layoff to learn how to juggle. The second layoff was when I learned how to decorate cakes. This layoff was rather unexpected and sudden, so I decided to help others out and went to volunteer at Austin�s Red Cross office.

Apparently the surge of volunteers was too much for their volunteer coordinator to handle, so I stepped in for eight hours a day and ran that taco shack for over two months. And although the office was filled with some of the most disorganized yahoos I�ve ever met, they all had one thing in common: they really wanted to help people.

Funds mismanagement breaking stories at the time aside, at a local level, those ding-dongs were all over the place. Tornado victims here. Flood victims there. Rounding up donations for people who lost everything in a house fire. Providing lunches and showers for the homeless. Supporting the airline employees who were now sufficiently freaked out from the recent events and needed to hear that they weren�t the only ones breaking out in a cold sweat each time they had to report to work.

The list goes on and on.

At a local level, the American Red Cross is a fantastic organization who helps everyone despite age, race, income, gender, beliefs, or any of that nambsy-pambsy bullshit reasons people give to not help a brotha or a sista out.

So, yeah. Support locally.

This has been your public service announcement for the day.

Have a good one, guys. I have to attend some stupid office Xmas party in thirty minutes.�