Happy New Year!

Happy, happy New Year! 2023 is starting off with a rascal’s game. While I was reading the newspaper and sharing my Wordle with my Wordle comrades, Barnaby was distributing my dirty tissues from my bedroom wastebasket. He artfully composed a design at the entrance to the bedroom with his toy stuffed squid as a center point so that I’d know who did it. As soon as I called out “Barnaby” he hid in Diana’s bedroom. He didn’t even offer to help clean it up. What a New Year’s rascal!

I don’t know about you, but I have a leftover list from 2022. I was trying to finish it off, but finally gave up the ghost late yesterday. The list included that I wanted to cover my very, very old jewelry box with a velvet type stick on paper. The jewelry box is a present I received for my 12^th birthday, and since I’m in the age number + category, it’s more than 60 years old. It’s time to recover it. I still have a pin with Sam Ervin from the Watergate hearings and some old earrings in the jewelry box that I wore only in my bedroom to look grown up. I also discovered my old girl scout pin.  These were sentimental finds, but the most important, at the bottom of the tray, was a list of my father’s mother’s siblings (there were 11 of them) in birth order, their parents’ names (some changed for different reasons), and that my great great grandmother was actually born in New York in 1850. I had written the list when we lived near one of my grandmother’s younger sisters, Aunt Sid (who changed her name from Sadie to Sidney to sound more elegant, she reported). Aunt Sid was a grand storyteller and repository of a great deal of family history. What a great find on New Year’s Day.

Should I make a resolution or two for the advent of 2023? I’m torn. Generally, my resolutions include “not eating” and “losing weight,” but I really want to stay positive and give myself a fighting chance to accomplish my resolutions. Losing weight, at this juncture, is a never-ending slog of self-recrimination. So, that’s off my list, but I will try anyway. Nope, instead, I’m going to resolve to write book 2 in my teachers who are private investigators series. I’ve sent copies of book 1 to a few brave souls who are willing to be readers and critics. Still, regardless of that outcome, I must sally forth and start on book 2. Then, my next resolution is to get going earlier in the morning. Being retired means that I can read any or all parts of the newspaper in the morning, but I don’t get all that I want to do done. When I went out to work, I skimmed the newspaper over a gulped cup of coffee. Retirement means the luxury of entertaining myself in the morning; yet, there’s so much to do. Yes, no, what to do, what not to do…I resolve to read faster and get going earlier. Finally, I resolve to clean out my emails. I am embarrassed to admit to how many unread emails I have. It’s better if I keep that secret. You don’t need to know. Simply accept that I’m embarrassed. Three resolutions – let’s see how I do!

We had a fun time at last month’s The Cozy Mystery Book Club on Meetup meeting. We read the Mistletoe Murder by P. D. James and played a game around that. Three people won prizes. We have gotten very adept at using Zoom and making it as interactive as possible. Since we have so many members who live in different parts of the country and state, we’ll be staying on Zoom for our meetings. I’ll change our standard introduction to the Meetup group to reflect that.

Don’t forget that Sheryl Ickes, the author of the Becky and Rufus series and The Slice of Life series, is coming to our January meeting on January 22^nd at 2:00 p.m. Pacific time. Please choose any of the books from the series to read so that you can ask questions and make comments. It should be quite fun. If you aren’t planning to attend the meeting because you’re busy, but you are still a member of our club: The Cozy Mystery Book Club on Meetup, read the book/s for the month anyway. It’s a good way to keep up with our club news and online discussions.

We have another author coming to visit with us in April. Misty Simon has written over 52 books, most of which are cozy mysteries. Check out her books. I’m looking forward to her visit.

Happy New Year folks! See you on www.acozydeath.com and at our monthly meetings. Message me on Meetup or the blog whenever you have something to add for the group.