Five days ago at the stroke of midnight and we turned the calendar page moving into the New Year, I was not out painting the town for a change but was at home feeling a little under the weather. While kicked back with the herd watching a marathon run of a television show, I noticed the clock had already moved into the New Year without the normal hint of it's turning by the noise of fireworks.

It was pretty late in the evening when I heard the key in the lock of my front door. A cold gust of wind blew in as Surfer Girl returned from her weekend of wave riding or whatever it is that she does. She came into Stalag 9 took off her coat and said hi.

She asked what I had done on the weekend so I told her that I had been getting set for Christmas, which shocked her to no end.

“I thought you weren’t doing Christmas Steve.” She said to me.

After I had spent a little time remembering the Miracle of Stalag 9, the melting of the frost around my heart and all of that, I looked around the place. I was still there all by myself, and I knew that my room-mate was gone for the rest of the weekend, so I decided that I needed to do something to change the atmosphere of the place.

Well if you’re going to have a Christmas Tree, even if it’s pink one, a chick tree, a stupid looking one for a guy, bought out of fear for your life, you still need an angel on top of the danged thing. I figured that out by myself, probably because my mother taught me that a long time ago, or something equally as inconceivable, so I went back to the craft store in search of my angel.
 

As the sleigh gained speed and altitude into the night’s sky, I leaned back just a bit, closing my eyes, and telling myself this is nothing more that a weird dream, wishing on wishing myself awake. I opened my eyes as I began to feel the sleigh slowing, looking over to the reigns of the sleigh, I found sexy Ms Santa was gone and had been replaced by one of those plastic army men from my childhood, with the single exception of this one being six feet tall.
 

It’s getting late and the pressure on me is not only mounting, it’s unrelenting as well.

It’s tough enough trying to survive in this economy without the piling on effect of the Christmas Season. Heck I just realized that it’s already the second day of Christmas and I’m already three days behind.

As I sit here in The 'Watch Tower' (I call my writing room 'The Watch Tower' after the
sky-top computer room where Batman's daughter The Huntress and Barbara Gordon - who use to
be Batgirl, and The Black Canary watch over Gotham City in the DC comic book 'Birds of
Prey'). Today, reflecting on the past, I smile as I recall a tale of a Christmas so very
long ago...
These days there are a lot of people going through hard times because of the bad economy.

It’s so good to see the readership of  the Paper Magazine is spreading; I have received comments from around the United States, Australia, England and now the North Pole. Not long after the publishing of my last column, As Seen on TV, I have received some very critical comment from that Winter Wonderland and in particular Santa’s Work Shop.

The Wiz has left the building. Stalag 9 has lost part of its soul, and as a result I have too much time with little or nothing to do, save talking about nothing of much substance with Surfer Girl.