"It's not the thing you fling, it's the fling itself." ~ Chris Stevens ("Northern Exposure")

Call me a fuddy-duddy but I actually crave this mysterious and marbled, everlasting, unyielding, imperishable, rock-hard Christmas delicacy before and after the holidays. (Minus the marbled and rock hard part -- I think I may have just described myself. Hmmm?) I really do eat them and have found that the cheaper the fruitcake, the better the taste. (But so much for my low-end gastronomy.)

My burning question is "Does anybody really have a clue what's actually hiding in a packaged holiday fruitcake?" It usually weighs more than a doorstop (I'm just guessing here) and if wrapped in contact paper, it might perhaps last indefinitely.

Nelly men like myself aside (yes, I take pride in being a Fruitcake!) -- fruitcakes of the baked variety have a longstanding tradition. Consider its origins, found in references from Roman times. Recipes that included barley mash, honey, pine nuts, pomegranate seeds, raisins and spices slapped and stuck together for traveling crusaders and hunters on the go -- the Clif Bar, if you will, of antiquity. Historically, they were made with the intent to be eaten an entire year later. In fact, in an attempt to display ladylike restraint, moderation and fine taste, the Queen Mum (while showing no such restraint when it came to her gin) waited an entire year to eat hers.

Most modern fruitcakes are mass-manufactured to accommodate Yule-time mass-consumption, and are actually comprised "mostly" of good stuff, and are scrumptious to some, yet vile to others. Store-bought varieties are ready-to-serve but -- unfortunately -- because they've not had time to fully congeal, leave behind telltale moist-n-murky stains.

While dried fruits and nuts, mounds of sugar, flour and booze painfully glued together resulting in a cake more impenetrable than kryptonite may be yummy to someone like myself, others might prefer consuming potting soil. Created just for folks who'd rather eat dirt, I proudly present "Fruitcake Toss Day."

To celebrate the festivities of Fruitcake Toss Day (supposedly any day you pick early in January), your first challenge is to not open the package. To most, this is a given, not a challenge! (And don't leave it unwrapped just for re-gifting purposes either. "Oh...a fruitcake! You shouldn't have. Really! Harrumph.) While not much can damage the bugger, hurling its unprotected, sticky and slimy carcass might offer some unforeseen oily offenses worse than the consumption of the fruitcake itself.

While watching the last moments of '08 slip by -
Tossing back cocktails, forlorn and cockeyed.
At the stroke of twelve, hugging all with delight -
Men in tuxedos, and leggy ladies in dresses skintight.

We find our way home, somewhat assembled -- quasi,
After self-medicating from our host's ample supply.
We crawl under the sheets, to avoid the daylight,
Recollecting the night's actions with bleary hindsight.

But by making resolutions while a barfly,
We're bound to set standards so high we can't try.
So in future, make decisions in sober daylight.
Instead of dim-witted -- they'll be dynamite.
~Michael DeJong

Expectations get lowered, trousers get lowered, interest rates have been lowered, with meds our blood pressure and anxiety levels get lowered, the drinking age in some states has been lowered, and our pensions and 401Ks have also been lowered.

But on New Year's Eve -- like clockwork -- millions of people still insist on freezing in lowered temperatures huddled in massive crowds in New York City's Times Square as they watch in amazement as the gigantic crystal ball -- too -- is lowered.

But it's not just in the hustle and bustle of big cities that things get lowered in celebration of the New Year. Take for instance Bethlehem, Pennsylvania's 25-pound fiberglass illuminated Peep; or Easton, Maryland's grotesquely enormous imitation of a steamed red crab; or Lebanon, Pennsylvania's seven-and-a-half-foot "fit-to-be-eaten" bologna; or Mount Olive, North Carolina's three-foot tall shimmering pickle; or New Orleans' paper mache gumbo pot; or Plymouth, Wisconsin's super huge, yet thankfully artificial, hunk-o-cheese; or Port Clinton, Ohio's 20-foot 600-pound fiberglass walleye; or Raleigh, North Carolina's 1,250-pound copper acorn; and let's not forget Key West, Florida's local Drag Queen in her glittering six-foot tall, red, high-heeled shoe. Everywhere, it seems, things get lowered to ring in the New Year.

Descending "stuff" aside, many people look to the New Year as an uplifting fresh start. But for most of us, what it really becomes is a fresh start to old habits. (You know how it goes -- in one year and out the other?) This year, instead of New Years Eve being a fresh start to last year's bad habits how about it becoming a fresh start to freshness?

As many of you already know -- New Years Eve or not -- baking soda sparkles like a freshly fallen first snow. (Somewhat appropriate considering that here in the eastern portion of the United States, it's winter.) White, powdery and soft to the touch, odorless and inert upon inspection, baking soda most commonly loiters in the fridge behind leftovers, lunchmeat and lettuce. Not just great as a refrigerator deodorizer, it's remarkably useful when sprinkled, scattered, spread, strewn, or kept in your closet, kitty litter, crisper or carport. (And you're probably wondering to yourself "Hmmm? What's this got to do with New Years Eve?")

For every occasion -- Christmas, Hanukah or otherwise -- my partner Richard and I have a code for gift giving. Whatever it is, it has to be consumable, edible, drinkable, burnable (Okay, I know what you're thinking, but no. I'm talking about candles or incense.), or time sensitive things like tickets to the theater or movie passes.

During the Holidays, gifts, of course, are important to many -- especially kids. When I was a rug-rat, my mom used to make tons of stuff for us each Christmas. During the year she'd knit and crochet sweaters, goofy hats, horrible scarves and oversized mittens from thread she rescued from outdated knitwear that she'd unravel. (Funny how our hats always seemed to be the ones first offered up for the neighborhood snowmen.)

The things she would knit weren't always the best fitting or the prettiest, but in that moment -- on Christmas Eve when the lights of the tree sparkled, with the scent of her handmade candles everywhere, unwrapping gifts to the quiet hum of carols -- we knew that she had made them, stitch by stitch, night after night. The fact is, my mother was a frugal Dutch immigrant who had survived World War II as a teenager, scraping by with her family through the occupation, and she learned how to make magic out of nothing. (Shine-ola!) Nothing went to waste, everything was re-used, and making things by hand was just what ya' did.

She sewed things, too. There were ill-fitting pants (Imagine this...pink and green seer-sucker hip-huggers with fringe. Ooo-la-laaa! ...I wish I still had them!), the occasional coat, for my sister a dress without buttons (she ran out of time) and one year, from a bolt of fabric she found in a clearance bin, she created matching florescent orange Nehru shirts for my sister Mags, my older brother, John, and me. (Presented in our "glowing" holiday finery, I'm certain that the ladies from church thought that we had joined up with the local Hare Krishnas.)

But when mom baked it was easy to forgive all of her fashion transgressions. She made endless batches of homemade oatmeal bars, lemon squares, pecan sandies, chocolate chip cookies (salvaging the chocolate from our Halloween booty), and our favorite -- British toffee. She'd also decorate canisters rescued during the year with smartly applied compositions cut from the previous year's Christmas cards, ribbons and paper, before filling them and delivering them to our schoolteachers, Sunday School instructors, Scout leaders, band directors, and just about anyone else she had on her list.

Learn how to easily remove chocolate stains with natural green cleaning.

"Mail your packages early so the post office can lose them in time for Christmas." ~ Johnny Carson

In the early 19th century it was customary to drop-a-line -- envelopes filled with seasonal messages on calling cards or in letters -- to both family and friends at the holidays.

As a marriage of art and technology, Sir Henry Cole -- founder of London's Victoria and Albert Museum -- commissioned artist John Calcott-Horsley to whip up a card displaying jovial folks enjoying the festivities of the season paired with images of feeding and clothing the poor and the words "A Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year."

Back then Christmas cards were expensive because they were individually crafted and delivered in person. Faced with a predicament of mountains of Christmas greetings to send, in 1843 Henry Cole invented the first printed Christmas cards.

Delivered by mail or carried by hand many still send and receive Christmas cards. Embellished with images of gingerbread houses, sparkling landscapes, Santa Claus tumbling down a chimney, rooftops cluttered with reindeer, googly-eyed cats tied up in ribbons, red-faced and hysterical babies presented on Santa's knee or an ornery dog writing holiday greetings in the snow... we've all gotten them and sent them just the same.

Sending cards through the mail, for many, is a way to celebrate the holiday season, be it Hanukkah, Christmas or Kwanzaa. As an expression of acknowledgment to those we share time with throughout the year, we toil over notes of recognition.

But with the rising cost of mail services, not to mention the price of the cards themselves, shopping for them, and then being faced with an inability to compose something meaningful and witty -- Ecards have become the twenty-first-century replacement for a pile of envelopes stuffed thought the holiday mail slot.

I toast considerations for stemming the tide of man-made climate change and of slowing the melting of ice caps. I offer up a "Whoop-whoop!" to the victories over drought, wildfires and extinction of endangered species, and even relish in the warm new green-alternative menu being served up in Washington.

Indeed, I'm thankful for the oncoming cornucopia of change. But for some dumb reason, while I'm a thankful person and feel wickedly blessed -- I'm just not crazy about Thanksgiving. It's just too much work for so little payback. It's a holiday with its own personal, familial carbon footprint. So instead of rambling on about Thanksgiving like the love-child of Norman Rockwell and Martha Stewart, I've written a poem about the humble, edible dinosaur-throwback that sits center stage while reviving our family dysfunctions.

Ode to The Turkey

The life of a turkey pre-golden is sickening.
Please let me share while your gravy is thickening.
Some think it's weird, nasty, gory or strange,
To feast on a bird that once roamed the range.

From newly hatched poult to the moment he's plated,
Meat from a creature once so adulated.
The esteem of this poor, tasty, "almost" national bird,
Of whom we eat mountains -- 'til our vision is blurred.

He's fattened and handled and coddled for days,
Until he no longer can stand on the weight that he weighs.
From his birth through his prime, he'll never deduce,
That he was meant to be garneed with roasted produce.

Often tranquil, serene and never malicious,
Clumsy and awkward, but when cooked, to some he's delicious.
If crafty and cunning and devious he'd be,
He'd potentially skedaddle and flee filled with glee.

Unfortunately he's dumb, flat-footed, ungainly,
A life on the plain beginning so plainly.
But today he's honored with a place of distinction,
Tomorrow perhaps he'll be gone or be close to extinction.

Until that occurs, he'll be gorged on by us,
His carcass bound with a string-forming truss.
Golden and delivered from the oven with sighs,
While some fight over wings, others the thighs.

I can't stand turkey or the mess one must make,
While shopping or baking or preparing to partake.
If thankfulness is displayed by this time-honored route,
Please -- have extra turkey. I'll do without.

As it says in the book of Psalms, "Come unto his gates with thanksgiving, and into his courts with praise." Now I'm pretty certain that they weren't speaking about the food court at the mall -- though how thankful I would be if they were - that's where I'd rather be this Thanksgiving -- eating french fries and sticky buns.

"God looks at the clean hands, not the full ones." ~Publilius Syrus

While he was campaigning in 2000, George W. Bush used to say that when he got into the White House he would give the Oval Office "one heck of a scrubbing," making allusions to the traces of "icky-bits" that Bill Clinton left behind.

When his term was complete, Mr. Clinton took only his favorite personal belongings -- minus that assumed "something special." So Mr. Bush, at taxpayers' expense, gave everything else Clinton had left behind the "heave-ho," with the exception of the massive oak desk made famous during the Kennedy years.

Being the president of the United Stated means that you're the leader of the free world. You're the big cheese, the Commander-in-Chief, the "decider" and "Numero-Uno." The buck stops with you and you're responsible for running a clean ship.

That said, I can't imagine John F. Kennedy caring about cobwebs, Bush buffing the bowl (though the image does make me smile), Dwight D. dusting, Clinton clearing out the cupboards, Woodrow Wilson washing windows, Truman taking out the trash, Hoover pushing a Hoover (except perhaps his wife), Johnson sweeping joints, Ford cleaning the floors, Lincoln doing laundry, Teddy tidying tiles, Nixon neatening anything (except for scrubbing 18 minutes worth of audio-tape), F.D.R. fluffing and folding, or Carter cleaning the crystal.

In actuality, the nuts and bolts of cleaning in the White House falls onto the shoulders of a special branch of cleaning crew called the Executive Residence Staff.

The Bush family has occupied the White House for eight dirt-filled years (this go around), and while there isn't a U-Haul back to Crawford in the driveway yet, they clearly have one foot out the door, making ready for the new 44th President -- Barack Obama -- and his family. (The Executive Residence Staff are gonna' have their hands full preparing for the Obamas...that house is bound to be nasty.)

In preparation for our new Democratic President, how do those in charge of housekeeping intend to get eight years of Republican stains and smears out of the White House? There are those actual blood stains from when the Bush's dog "Barney" bit a reporter, and the smears from the likes of Karl Rove. Quite possibly there are moose droppings tracked in by Sarah "Recently Tagged and Released" Palin's snowshoes (though there were no reports of her visiting), but there are those nasty vomit stains from when "W" choked on pretzels. Oh, and let's not forget the burn marks on the new Oval Office rug left when Satan and George exchanged the presidency for the remainder of his soul.

Updated at 7:30 pm on 11/15/08

"In Beverly Hills... they don't throw their garbage away. They make it into television shows." ~Woody Allen

Americans generate almost twice the amount of trash of other developed countries -- a whopping 4 pounds of garbage per person everyday. That's 301,139,947 U.S. residents producing just about four pounds of trash each, equaling 1,204,559,788 pounds or 602,280 tons of trash each day...the weight of about 580,000 Liberty Bells.

The U.S. currently has approximately 3,000 active landfills. Buried and forgotten (unless you live near one), the trash that each American creates leads to water contamination, land erosion, methanol off-gassing, and disgusting odors. (Peee-euw!) Much of this waste within landfills actually retards bio-degradation, therefore defeating their intentions.

An overhaul to landfill systems, recycling, making producers and manufacturers responsible for the end-life of their products, biodegradable packaging, and learning to adjust the way we as individuals consume are all part of the long-term solution. But when it comes down to it, it's our own responsibility to reduce, reuse and recycle, and to become more educated about the long-term consequences of landfills, and the endless benefits offered by up-cycling and recycling paper, plastic, glass, aluminum, scrap metal and fabric.

On America Recycles Day, November 15, we remember that although 75% of trash is recyclable, only 25% actually gets recycled. Curbside recycling makes it easy for households to be part of the solution. It's easy to divert materials from landfills and incinerators. Here are some things to consider when you're recycling.

Paper

When adequately exposed to the elements, paper decomposes completely in 2-5 months. But if thrown away as regular trash, once the plastic bag itself eventually deteriorates in about 20 years, then maybe the paper entombed inside the plastic trash bag will finally have its chance to decompose as well. Sadly, paper -- in all its many shapes and sizes -- amounts to almost half of what we end up sending to landfills. However, if Americans recycled just one tenth of their paper, it would save 25 million trees a year.

If you read anything in print you should know that the act of recycling paper decreases the demand for virgin pulp, thereby reducing the devastation of forests, and the overall amount of air and water pollution created during the manufacture of the paper. It's always best to separate paper into white office paper, newspaper, cardboard, and mixed-color paper, and tie each type separately. Once sorted and bundled, carry the items to be picked up curbside at the appropriate time on the designated days for your community.

Plastic

In 1988, the American Society of the Plastics Industry developed the resin identification code that is used to indicate the most common polymer materials used in the manufacture of a product or in packaging to assist recyclers with sorting the collected materials.

To check the recyclability of a plastic item, look to see if there's a Universal Recycling Symbol (URS--usually on the bottom). Next, look to see if there's a number inside the triangle. The numbers are meant to give us a leg up on what kinds of resins were used. If there is no number, then the material is considered "generically recyclable" (in which case there are codes beneath or near the triangle indicating the materials used). Each number, from 1 to 7 indicates what type of polymer was used.

At the moment it's only economically viable to recycle items with a URS triangle with the No. 1, which is PET or PETE (polyethylene terephthalate) or No. 2, which is HDPE (high-density polyethylene). But scattered across our great nation, local recycling programs are stretching the range of plastics that might be recycled as the technology to do so becomes available. (It takes 20 years for a plastic bag to decompose but up to 250 years for a plastic cup to decompose.)

"As a housewife, I feel that if the kids are still alive when my husband gets home from work -- then hey, I've done my job."~Roseanne Barr

"Susie Homemaker" is the iconic (and fictitious) 1950s American housewife who summons up recollections of freshly baked apple pie, a gentle squeeze when you crawl into bed at night, and the ever-ready bandage over a fresh boo-boo. She's the Stepford Wife image of perfection and the ideal wife and mother devoted entirely to her home and family.

Remember Lucy Ricardo, Donna Reed, Laura Petrie and June Cleaver vacuuming in high heels? I mean, c'mon, even the Eisenhower years had moms like the newly exonerated Ethel Rosenberg, Joan Crawford and Mrs. Robinson!!!

As the fog of reality lifts, and November 3rd's Housewife Day fades in memory, we notice that times have changed and so have our (mis)perceptions, if in fact such an "über-mom" ever existed. Today she'd be portrayed in a post-feminist stereotype of a woman on the go juggling family, health, sex, career and home, with enough time left over for scrapbooking, gourmet cooking, volunteering at the local food co-op, and shopping for (and actually wearing) Manolo Blahniks.

Today's stay-at-home mom is more probably a "domestic diva" stuck at the stove "expressing" herself by frying up eggs, sleep-deprived from watching her newborns and toddlers and changing hundreds of dirty diapers a month, ensnared back-at-the-ranch and finding her center by desperately trying to keep up with Martha Stewart (let alone the Jones'), shuttling her kids from soccer practice to clarinet lessons to dance rehearsals. Any which way you look at it, being a housewife has gotta be hard work.

Househusbands and dads, too, have joined the parade of parents who now make up the ever-growing genderless crowd responsible for caring for a household...it's not just for the ladies anymore! The individual who stays at home -- man or woman -- is oftentimes the one who's usually financially dependent on the other partner. To the surprise of those who aren't at home around the clock and are full time out in the workplace, they too benefit from the unwaged work provided by the one working at home. (If compared to what it might cost for each and every task by someone collecting a paycheck, the take-home pay for the average homemaker would be approximately $138,000!)

Still preferred by many, but also thought by scores of folks to be an antiquated and derogatory term, being a "housewife" harkens back to a time when one income could support all of the bells and whistles necessary to keep an entire family well clothed, fed and living within an acceptable middle class style. But unfortunately it was also a time when housewives and single women had less than equal rights. Just within the past 100 years, they couldn't vote; didn't have the right to hold public office; if they worked, the range of occupational choices was very narrow; they weren't offered fair wages or equal pay for equal work; they were denied the opportunity to own property or a home; they weren't allowed an education; they were forbidden to serve in the military; they weren't offered the possibility of entering into legal contracts or even to have the most basic rights including marital, parental and religious rights. In fact, women were considered chattel.

Housewife Day at least acknowledges the magnitude of importance that stay-at-home wives and moms (and yes, husbands and dads too) deserve.

My mom, in her own weird way, was a hybrid of an ever-mindful-eco-friendly-Susie-Homemaker long before such status was imaginable. In the 60s, as a stay-at-home parent of three, she made clothes for the entire family, did her own hair ("Hmmm? Nice Toni-home perm, mom!"), knit and crocheted beautiful sweaters by hand, canned and preserved pickles, jams, fruit and sauces, made bread almost every day, made her own yogurt, invented toys out of scraps of this-and-that, gardened, mowed the lawn, painted rooms in record time and even made purses for my sister out of old jeans.

Make Green Cleaning a Game!

Clever as she was, my mom also made cleaning into a game. (This is this week's tip, so listen up. Try it. My mom used it effectively on my brother, sister and me until we were in our teens. We were either dolts or else she had something going on here!)

'Tis the night -- the night
Of the grave's delight,
And the warlocks are at their play;
Ye think that without
The wild winds shout,
But no, it is they -- it is they.
~Arthur Cleveland Coxe

It's hard to say when it came to me, but it haunts me day and night, and not just on Halloween. I know that it's not the spirits that reflect their apparitions onto our windows, the ghouls that trespass beneath our stairs, the wisps of ghosts that spin through our kitchen, the poltergeists that caress the afterlife in our coat closet, or even the multitude of phantoms that possess our pantry.

I actually love living in a haunted house. Oh, but for me, the haunting, haunting, haunting comes from the mess they leave in their wake!

It's their spooky ectoplasmic remains left on our tiled floors they travel -- worn and left dim, pale and filmy blue like the glaring eye of a vulture. Whenever the haze falls upon them, my blood runs cold.

I cautiously stare at the tiles as they taunt me with their cloudy film. I walk over them and hear their slight moan, a groan of lethal fright. Not just a growl of torture or woe, but a whimper of un-dead feet, bone chillingly moving over the 175-year old tiles, the bone crushing "crunch" of ceramic-against-ceramic sound that silently cuts through the night with its low, stifled clattering.

Arising in the night from their horrid screams, or sometimes their quiet siren's songs -- at midnight -- when the rest of the world sleeps, I hear deepening, dreadful echoes of terror that distract me from my slumber...the patter of lifeless footsteps. (How do you tell a ghost to wipe its feet...heh? I can't even get my partner, Richard to do that!). But even as I lay frozen and keep still -- barely breathing -- accompanied by the horrible hush of our 1833 house, strange noises from footsteps excite me to uncontrollable panic.

Waiting in the nighttime darkness until a single dim ray of moonlight appears through the skylight -- like the silken thread of a black widow spider -- falling upon the tiled flooring, igniting a glare upon the surface that mimics the scavenging eye of a raven...again I see the haunting dull blueness with that telltale gruesome veil that chills me to the very marrow of my bones. (Clean-freak that I am, I even have nightmares about this kinda' stuff!)

But no matter, slimed, veiled, bloodied, soiled, or stained by the likes of Beelzebub, fiends, evil spirits, imps, mischievous sprites, or just the day-to-day foot traffic of family, friends and pets -- the tiles of my haunted dreams are actually easy to keep clean:

1. Begin by dipping (not dripping!) a halved lemon into a bowl of borax to create an instant tile cleaner.
2. Scrub using the lemon, juicy side down, rubbing the borax and citric acid mixture onto the tiles.
3. Finish by rinsing with clean water.

Maybe it's the incessant cleaning that makes me a lunatic (out damn spot!); or maybe it's the shrieking souls from the fiery depths of hell that leave their footprints on our hallway tiles that taunt me to madness.

What makes me insane on Halloween or any other nocturnal hour? I'm not sure...that's for you and the creatures of the night to decide. (Deep scary laugh...)

"If you can't feed a hundred people, then just feed one." ~ Mother Teresa

Either single-handedly, with the help of friends or family, or volunteering with an organization, cooking up a large or small project is a wonderful way to score brownie points. Anyone -- small fry or senior, individuals or groups -- can whip-up volunteer projects that help others.

Allow your ideas to percolate, and you'll soon discover what your community needs. "Make a Difference Day" (this October 25) is really all about neighbors serving neighbors.

No matter whether you're a scrambled student, a butter-fingered bartender, or even a half-baked housepainter, there are always a few extra hours to consider volunteering an afternoon of your skills: painting a neighbor's porch or finger-painting with the kid next door; removing a scrap heap of trash from the side of a highway or scrap-booking memories at the Senior Center; granny-sitting or babysitting; swinging your kids at the local park or swinging a hammer to help with some carpentry; twisting a screwdriver to assist with electrical work or twisting taffy with some school kids; you get the idea... You could coach a sporting event, offer computer assistance, replant a flower or vegetable bed, do some office work, visit with someone who's lonely, collect food for the homeless or even work in a soup kitchen.

With all of this not-so subtle discussion of food, food, and more food...on "Make a Difference Day" how about cleaning a neighbor's kitchen appliances? (You knew I was going there now didn't ya'!) It doesn't need to take a month of Sundays to quickly and safely clean a kitchen. Here are a few quick pointers and eco-recipes to make your visit speedy and easy as pie.

Coffee maker:
To clean an automatic drip coffee maker run full-strength white vinegar through a normal brew cycle. Rinse by running plain water through the cycle twice. The pot will be remarkably clean and your coffee will taste better than ever. (Tip: coffee sometimes tastes bitter because of soapy residue...so never wash your pot with soap.)

"I'm looking for loopholes." ~W. C. Fields, when asked why he was reading the Bible.

Ptolemy believed the sun revolved around the Earth. Linus believed in the "Great Pumpkin."

(Sally to Linus, after missing Halloween... "What a fool I was. I could've had candy, apples, and gum, and cookies and money and all sorts of things. But no! I had to listen to you! What a fool I was. Trick or Treats come only once a year, and I missed it by sitting in a pumpkin patch with a blockhead!")

When I was a kid I believed in the "Push-Me-Pull-You" -- the two-headed llama from the Dr. Doolittle stories. (I was such a sucker!) In my 'tweens -- upset and completely horrified -- I stood in front of a caged, one-headed, completely healthy and whole llama and said "How could this have happened...where's its other head!"

I did ultimately find some comfort for my naivete when I learned that Cher thought Mount Rushmore was a natural phenomenon!

Our culture is filled with mountains of myths and mythinformation -- Santa, UFOs, the Tooth Fairy, the Easter Bunny, Bigfoot, Crop Circles, the Loch Ness monster. In the famous words of Benjamin Franklin, "It is so; it is not so. It is so; it is not so." I'm not always certain, either...perhaps you could call me a Doubting Thomas.

In case you don't know, to be called a Doubting Thomas means that you're someone who -- without straightforward, tangible, right in your face proof -- refuses to believe in any number of things. (e.g. See the list above.) The expression is based on the doubt of the Apostle Thomas concerning the resurrection of Jesus. Although Jesus had been crucified, Thomas only became a true believer when he was able to place his fingers into the resurrected Jesus' wounds. (After that llama incident, I think I'd require a demonstration like that, too!)

Skeptics are everywhere, and we remembered them on October 13, International Skeptics Day. If you're not certain who they are, take a mindful look around: they're easily identifiable as the folks who doubt truth and accepted theory. They just won't see or accept what's "a given," what's believed by the majority of the people based on scientific scrutiny. When I'm asking questions, I'm curious, and when I'm questioning, I'm skeptical. But when I refuse to separate fact from fiction, that makes me just plain-old blind to reality.

"Come out, come out wherever you are..." (From "The Wizard of Oz") ~ Harold Arlen & E.Y. Harburg

I have "special" needs -- some might call them obsessions -- but I prefer to call them standards. I like a clean home and orderly storage. But more than that, I want my junk where I can find it and I want it all to look like something -- a place for everything and everything in its place!

In an average afternoon, as part of a cleaning ritual, I'll iron sheets for the bedrooms, wipe down the kitchen, rearrange our living room, organize the bathrooms, tidy our basement and yes... even organize our closets.

By today's standards -- depending on your lifestyle, needs, and desired outcome -- uniquely crafted closets offer a meaningful use of space in any home or apartment. Considering all of the options, the perfect closet can be a swell place to hoard your handbags, stash sport-coats, stockpile shoes and allow lingerie to linger. It's also a place to relegate last season's dresses, abandon busted umbrellas, forget those fake-fun-furs, put presents meant for re-gifting, and bury baggage otherwise used to travel to far away, sandy and sunny ports.

Although we think of closets as places to squirrel away stuff and hang our clothes, historically for the very rich, they were actually small secret, private, concealed rooms usually attached to a bedroom.

But nowadays, to be kept hidden or "closeted" is most often used as a way of describing something or someone whose behavior might be embarrassing, controversial...or even gay.

National Coming Out Day was founded 1988 by Dr. Robert Eichberg and Jean O'Leary, in celebration of the second Gay March on Washington, D.C. the previous year. The purposes of both were to promote awareness of gay, bisexual, lesbian and transgender rights and to rejoice in it all. For 20 years, October 11 has been a day to publicly celebrate being who you are, and is often used as an opportunity to tell others as well.

Coming out, while different for every individual, is a critical part of accepting that you're gay, bisexual, lesbian or transgender. (Imagine if heterosexual folks had to have a tear- and angst-filled moment when they made the brave decision to declare their sexual orientation or gender identity and risk being rejected, fired, beaten, thrown out of their home, etc.?) For some LGBT people, the experience is joyful; for some it's uncomfortable; for some it instills anger in those they come out to; for some it's a tragic time of rejection and depression. But for many, once proclaimed, it's a time of freedom, relief, and often a