Ho Ho Heave

Well, it seems that I got a bit of an early Christmas present this year – in the form of THE FLU! Not a present I asked for, wanted, or needed. I guess I opened the window and in flew Enza…

Suffice it to say that the flu and MS don't play well together.  As a result of their unholy alliance, I'm forced to compose this blog post from bed, using my iPad and a blogging app. The iPad is a wonderful little device, but it's voice recognition capabilities suck, at least for composing anything longer than just a few sentences. So, I'm going to have to keep this short, if only to keep from getting so frustrated that I throw the thing across the room, and I don't think Santa has a new iPad for me loaded up and ready to go on his sleigh. I am hoping that he leaves a new central nervous system for me under the tree, and if he doesn't I'm prepared to bring a lawsuit.

Just wanted to wish everybody a very Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah, Great Kwanzaa, and also a Happy New Year, just in case I don't get the chance to post again before 2015 rolls around. May the holidays bring all of you happiness, joy, and good health. Multiple sclerosis is no gift, but the ability to rise above it, even if only occasionally, most certainly is. Please try to make good use of that gift whenever you can, if only to stick your thumb in the eye of this Grinch of an illness.

The following is probably my favorite Christmas song of all time, released by a band called The Royal Guardsmen in 1969. I had this record when it first came out, when I was six years old, and I played it over and over and over again. I was a super big fan of the Peanuts gang, and Snoopy was my favorite character. The heroic little beagle's struggles against the dreaded Red Baron fired my six-year-old imagination, and this song, celebrating a short and thoroughly unexpected break in their epic battles, sparked a tender emotion in me that still smolders 45 years later.

This is the long version of the song, complete with a rather elaborate intro mimicking a radio broadcast from somewhere on the Western front in the middle of World War I. I hope you enjoy, and as the Red Baron says to Snoopy at the very moment that Snoopy thinks his number is up, "Merry Christmas, My Friend(s)!"…