RESOLUTE

Don't Fall In Love With A Dreamer. Remember that song?

I'm the kind of guy who has many fingers in many pots. If I only had one idea a week that I thought was brilliant ( if I do say so myself ), I'd have my head examined. If I pursued less than a half dozen of them a year, you'd have my head examined! Sometimes I get so excited about an idea, I share it with you before its a plausible concept. Sometimes you see the manifestation, sometimes you don't. Its the Idea Man's curse.

Hard to believe, but next week marks the 2nd Anniversary of this blog. It's become something quite different than what I originally intended it to be, and that's cool. By the end of January, the other Bee's blogs will also commemorate 2 years on the World Wide Web. What can you expect from them in 2011? Well January is shaping up to be a jam-packed month! Cassandra and I are planning to finally get Season 4 of  THIS IS WHAT I KNOW SO FAR filmed and edited. We also hope to film the first installment of her inspirational her new web series DESIGNER LIFE by month's end. In the new year, Stacey has decided to go ALL VIDEO over at STACEY'S HOT DISH, which I'm very, very excited about. 

And Cherrie? Cherrie and I are about to embark on a Bubblicious Adventure...stay tuned.

What will I be up to here?

Well, its time to launch Killer Bees 3.0

Quite frankly I'm bored with me. My life, my experiences, my world. Blah, blah, blah. I'll finish the 16 TO 40 Series for sure, but look for the content of KBMTMDH to turn to the ideas, dreams, and accomplishments of others...prepare to BEE inspired! My solo content will be focused on my new Interior Design blog, which I promise is still on the way. Its gonna be cool, kids. How will I find time to do it all? I'm not sure. I just know that what will transpire, will be. The rest of it won't, and that will be cool beans too.

In the past year I have witnessed so much change, that at times I feel like a luge navigating a fast and slippery course. I suppose I could feel scared, like an existence sliding out of control. Instead, I feel  the momentum. The  building of a dream, the adventure of a new course...

Just as I have been for 2 years now, I'm thrilled to be sharing this adventure with you. Are you up for another year? C'mon, you know you want to...

I'm wishing you all a Happy New Year, filled with peace, light, much love, and the fruition of promise- 

Michael Patrick

MUSICAL TREAT OF THE WEEK

 "...It's the end of a decade. In another 10 years time-  who can say what we'll find, what lays waiting down the line...in the end of '89..."

MIRACLE ON 47TH STREET

I believe there's a difference between luck and blessings. I still believe in miracles...

QUIPS & QUOTES

Youth is when you're allowed to stay up late on New Year's Eve.  Middle age is when you're forced to.  ~Bill Vaughn

An optimist stays up until midnight to see the new year in.  A pessimist stays up to make sure the old year leaves.  ~Bill Vaughan

Many people look forward to the new year for a new start on old habits.  ~Author Unknown

A New Year's resolution is something that goes in one year and out the other.  ~Author Unknown

Be always at war with your vices, at peace with your neighbors, and let each new year find you a better man.  ~Benjamin Franklin

No one ever regarded the First of January with indifference.  It is that from which all date their time, and count upon what is left.  It is the nativity of our common Adam.  ~Charles Lamb

New Year's Day is every man's birthday.  ~Charles Lamb

Never tell your resolution beforehand, or it's twice as onerous a duty.  ~John Selden

Year's end is neither an end nor a beginning but a going on, with all the wisdom that experience can instill in us.  ~Hal Borland

The merry year is born
Like the bright berry from the naked thorn.
~Hartley Coleridge

New Year's eve is like every other night; there is no pause in the march of the universe, no breathless moment of silence among created things that the passage of another twelve months may be noted; and yet no man has quite the same thoughts this evening that come with the coming of darkness on other nights.  ~Hamilton Wright Mabie

The Old Year has gone.  Let the dead past bury its own dead.  The New Year has taken possession of the clock of time.  All hail the duties and possibilities of the coming twelve months!  ~Edward Payson Powell

Cheers to a new year and another chance for us to get it right.  ~Oprah Winfrey

Ring out the old, ring in the new,
Ring, happy bells, across the snow:
The year is going, let him go;
Ring out the false, ring in the true.
~Alfred, Lord Tennyson, 1850

The proper behavior all through the holiday season is to be drunk.  This drunkenness culminates on New Year's Eve, when you get so drunk you kiss the person you're married to.  ~P.J. O'Rourke

Every man should be born again on the first day of January.  Start with a fresh page.  Take up one hole more in the buckle if necessary, or let down one, according to circumstances; but on the first of January let every man gird himself once more, with his face to the front, and take no interest in the things that were and are past.  ~Henry Ward Beecher

New Year's Day:  Now is the accepted time to make your regular annual good resolutions.  Next week you can begin paving hell with them as usual.  ~Mark Twain

The new year begins in a snow-storm of white vows.  ~George William Curtis

For last year's words belong to last year's language
And next year's words await another voice.
And to make an end is to make a beginning.
~T.S. Eliot, "Little Gidding"


We will open the book.  Its pages are blank.  We are going to put words on them ourselves.  The book is called Opportunity and its first chapter is New Year's Day.  ~Edith Lovejoy Pierce

Yesterday, everybody smoked his last cigar, took his last drink and swore his last oath.  Today, we are a pious and exemplary community.  Thirty days from now, we shall have cast our reformation to the winds and gone to cutting our ancient shortcomings considerably shorter than ever.  ~Mark Twain

People are so worried about what they eat between Christmas and the New Year, but they really should be worried about what they eat between the New Year and Christmas.  ~Author Unknown

And ye, who have met with Adversity's blast,
And been bow'd to the earth by its fury;
To whom the Twelve Months, that have recently pass'd
Were as harsh as a prejudiced jury -
Still, fill to the Future! and join in our chime,
The regrets of remembrance to cozen,
And having obtained a New Trial of Time,
Shout in hopes of a kindlier dozen.
~Thomas Hood

Drop the last year into the silent limbo of the past.  Let it go, for it was imperfect, and thank God that it can go.  ~Brooks Atkinson

Good resolutions are simply checks that men draw on a bank where they have no account.  ~Oscar Wilde

Oh really, Oscar Wilde?

Was it really a decade ago that we worried about Y2K, and said goodbye the end of a millennium?

5 To 40: Have Myself A Merry Little Christmas

 

The other day at work,  I opened a can of Roundy's brand pinto beans for lunch. Hey, times are tight.

 I removed the lid, only to find that there were no beans, but creamed corn instead. While I am not opposed to creamed corn, it wasn't at all what I was expecting...

In years past, the bounty of gifts passing beneath my tree on Christmas Eve could have been construed as a gluttonous feast. It was not  unusual for there to be 7, 8, or more gifts under there for every person in attendance. My, how times have changed. My people, as I'm sure most of your people, have been greatly affected by the continued downturn in our country's economy. For the second year in a row, we have a strict "No Gifts" policy enforced. Yet this Christmas finds me brimming with gifts...

While I have never been homeless, 2010 found me without a home of my own. It was a year of both emotional and great financial challenges. At one point Stacey, my friend of 25 years looked at me and said "How on earth are you not completely melting down?" My answer was a Cassandra-ism that I adopted for my own; "I choose not to struggle." I know this might sound pretty on paper, and spiritually "high falutin" in theory...but it really worked! Was I completely without worry? Not entirely, but the decision to focus on what I have vs. what I may have perceivably lost in the eyes of others, was definitely a test of faith. Do you know what I learned? What I have known all along, but forgotten from time time. That by the Universe I am always loved. Always provided for. Most importantly, that what we focus our spiritual energy on, well, it grows things...

A couple of weeks ago, I had a opportunity to leave my temporary housing behind, and move literally  right into the house of my dreams.With the aid of a roommate, I will be able to live there less expensively than I did in my last apartment! The other day I cashed in my coins at the grocery store to buy a Christmas tree. I was a little nervous that I wouldn't be able to find one I could afford, and that the good ones would be long ago picked over. Really, what were the chances that just 6 days before Christmas I would find the PERFECT 8' tree for just $10? I did.  There won't be any presents under it, but people I love and adore are coming over, and we're having homemade meat pies. Everybody's pitching in a bottle of booze for Martha's best ever egg nog, and there will be a roaring fire fueled by my gracious new neighbor's abundant stockpile of wood.

I kinda feel like Natalie Wood in Miracle on 34th Street every time I approach the front door...

When I started 2010, I had no idea that things would escalate to the place where I would have to forfeit my  comfortable apartment, nor that by years end I would be living in a dream house. The real gifts are not the ones in shiny packages, but the ones that are unexpected, wrapped in love, and contain wisdom.

I hadn't had creamed corn in ages. It was delicious.

ONLY KINDNESS MATTERS

While this classic Jewel cut may not be Christmas song, its message is universal, much like the spirit of Christmas. Therefore, its your Musical Treat of The Week...

THE JOY OF GIVING

A CHRISTMAS MESSAGE FROM CASSANDRA

SHARE THE WEALTH

Have you ever thought that you might be in possession of something that for what ever reason no longer belongs to you? Sound odd? Well I have often thought that the one thing I needed, that thing that would make the road a little easier to travel- was the thing that some one was tripping over cause it was in their way!

Don’t get me wrong,  it doesn’t even have to be tangible.
It could be something as simple as some information or even a smile, some thing that if given wouldn’t even be missed, but something that if given could be the help or the blessing that someone else needed. You see I’m thinking that life would be much sweeter if we would just share the wealth.

Oh, I know some might say, “I am barely getting by myself”. Still I say if you would consider unloading yourself of some of the things that your holding on to, you might just find or make room for wealth to appear. And if we would all just pass along those things we are no longer using not only would our loads be lighter, but the things we release could just be the blessing that would make a profound difference in the lives of other. But we’ll never know if we don’t share the wealth.

Okay, so what does it mean and how is it done? Especially if you feel you have little to give? Well some of us have a wealth of experiences, share them! Some of have a wealth of information, share it! Some of us have a lot of time. I don’t know who, but you know who you are- I say share yourself! Some are rich in compassion, please by all means share it. And some of us have far more things than we will ever need or use…“Share the wealth”. And of course some of you really have actual wealth, the financial kind, um you can pass that along…to me.

Releasing is a spiritual principle, and it is the only way to keep things flowing. Otherwise we become blocked, backed up and bogged down. I have found that the more stuff I have, the more stuff I have to keep up with, the stuff I have to clean and dust. The more stuff I acquire, the less room I have to enjoy my stuff. Releasing things has a way of lifting one higher, making one’s load lighter.

It is the opposite of hoarding. Imagine yourself sitting guard inside your warehouse of goods so nothing can escape, blocking the doorway so nothing gets away…blocking the path, well that blockage also prevents everything from getting in. Now this, like most things is personal, it’s your decision whether to share or not. What you share, if anything, you do get to decide.

But you see this is what I know so far;
The one who does the giving is the one who receives the most.
Merry Christmas, and peace...
Cassandra

AND THE WINNER IS!

Ladies and Gentleman!

This year's Killer Christmas Cookie Contest winner is...Bryon Stewart of Chicago, Illinois! His delicious recipe for Chocolate Spice Drop Cookies is flush with both cocoa and spicy goodness, making him the recipient of this years Penzey's Spices $40 gift certificate!Congratulations Bryon, and thanks to everyone who shared their yummy recipes...we'll be enjoying them at my house Christmas Eve!

CHOCOLATE SPICE DROP COOKIES

2 cups sifted flour

1/4 cup shortening

1 cup sugar

1/4 teaspoon ground cloves

1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg

1 teaspoon cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon baking powder

3/4 teaspoon baking soda

1/4 cup ground pecans

1/4 cup natural, unsweetened cocoa powder

1 cup milk

Sift flour into a large mixing bowl, and cut shorteneing in with a knife or pastry blender. Add spices, soda, powder, cocoa, and nuts, mixing well. Add milk gradualy, and mix thouroughly. Drop by teaspoons onto a cookie sheet greased, or lined with parchment paper. Bake at 350 for 8-10 minutes. Cool completely, then frost the centers.

FROSTING

2 cups powdwewd sugar
3/4 tablespoon shorteening
3 tablespoons evaporated milk
2 tablespoons warm water
1/4 teaspoon almond extract

*EDITOR'S NOTE: I had a package of finely chopped pecan pieces that I ground for this recipe. After I frosted them, I sprinkled the left over pieces over the cookies.It was a good idea!

THE BLOODY OLIVE: A Christmas Tradition

CBS will bring back Frosty, Rudolph, and Charlie Brown. Turner Classic Movies will air Miracle On 34th Street at least a dozen times ( Make the color go away, I'm begging you Ted. ), and TBS will undoubtedly play A Christmas Story daily until the first of next year. Here at KBMTMDH, I've decided to bring back The Bloody Olive, which was a featured video last December. There are more twists and turns in this delightfully-dark 10 minute short film set on Christmas Eve, than on Mulholland Drive.
Enjoy and behold- a new Killer tradition!  Pun intended.

THIS HO MADE IT!

For several years now, we've gone the route of handcrafted gifts. Cherrie makes the most  amazing bath bombs and luscious soaps, tapping her inner alchemist to create custom fragrances for each of the lucky recipients. I bake, decorate, and package dozens and dozens of cookies from an heirloom Christmas cookie recipe. And Stacey? Stacey makes his own gift wrap. Need I say more?

If you've got the time, I highly recommend it. There's not only something special about being on the receiving end of a handmade gift, but I have found its also most rewarding for the giver. As well, in these trying times, it can be a very economical solution. Sometimes the initial outlay for materials and supplies can seem steep, but atomize the breakdown per gift, and you'll more than likely come out with a few extra candy canes left over in your stocking! Ho, ho, ho!

 

While the gift that can either be consumed or used throughout the year might be more practical, making seasonal decorations to give away can be just the thing to put you in the spirit if your having a hard time getting there on your own. Want to bust out your trusty glue gun and make some festive decorations like these? Directions and tips are FREE and at mathastewart.com  Natch.

MUSICAL TREAT OF THE WEEK

A very interesting behind the scenes glimpse at the making of one of the most brilliant Christmas discs in many years... thank you Annie.

SING!

Yesterday was WORLD AIDS DAY. While I was familiar with the efforts of Annie Lennox's SING campaign, I was not  aware of how ambitious she has been with it personally, or how far reaching its benefits have become. What they have managed to accomplish in just 3 short years, is truly remarkable.

As we close in on the end of the year, I'd like to nominate Annie Lennox Killer Bee of The Year...

CHRISTMAS, 1950