Quilt store
It is such a joy to have Ellen close by. Today, she called and said she was coming over our way to go to a quilt store in Pennington and would I meet her for tea? Certainly! What fun. So, lured by the prospect of Chai tea, Paul joined me and we went up to the quilt store to meet Ellen and Seth. He is so adorable... I suppose I've said that before. After our trip to Starbucks, when I was kissing Seth goodbye, a fellow in line said something to us in a friendly fashion, about saying goodbye to such a lovely family. I'm not sure I caught all of it, but I had to give him a good look - do I work with him? Should I know him? It is an odd feeling to have someone know you, and you don't know them at all. I'm not saying I'm some sort of a celebrity, but being a reporter and having my photo in the paper, over the years, I've had the odd experience of being recognized when I don't know who the person is who is addressing me. I mean, in Brush, Colo., people would come up to me in the grocery store and make comments on the newspaper; a visit to the post office in Fairplay, Colo., was a half-hour due to people commenting on this, that, or the other thing. It's an odd feeling. In Cheyenne, when I was writing a column about Frontier Days, I actually had someone stop me on the fairgrounds and comment about the column. I don't think of myself as particularly memorable ...

We had the oddest thing happen on Wednesday or so at the office. A women came into my office, toting a box of chocolate covered pretzels, declared "I wanted to bring you these," and left. Bemused, I said, "Thank you." And she left abruptly. Well, the odd thing is that I thought she might be a vendor I had met once, briefly, spoken to the day before on the phone, but no one in the office knew her! It was most odd. Of course, we ate the pretzels, joking for a moment about the possibility of poison.

We've been under an extraordinary amount of stress at the office, due to a 40-page special section on a short time line, but we pulled it off. The staff is absolutely marvelous. We've hired the most enjoyable and talented fellow as a staff designer and artist. What a gift he is. Also, what a wonderful time we had with Christmas - a little gift exchange, a little eggnog ...