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2. I like cooking again. I knew I would, once I quit catering. I just didn't expect to like it again so soon. Last night's menu:

• Pan-Seared Flank Steak with Mushrooms in Butter and Garlic
  
• Roasted Salmon with Tangerine, Chili and Ginger with Arugula, Tangerine and Dried Cherry Salad
  
• Really Terribly Goopy Fondue That Would Have Made Excellent Wallpaper Paste, but Everyone Ate it Regardless.
  
• Blue Cheese with Toasted Pecans and Sage
  
• Pumpkin Spice Donut Pudding (which is my granny's bread pudding recipe, made with Krispy Kreme pumpkin spice cake donuts instead of bread)
  

All my recipes. And it was fun. Cooking is fun again! This makes me insanely happy.

3. I really don't know what possesses me to throw holiday parties. There are just too many other things going on and it's hard to get everyone I'd like to see together at the same time. From now on, I think I need to forgo the holiday stuff and do something in, say, mid-January, when everyone's bored senseless. This isn't to say that last night wasn't great. It was. I should host more small gatherings. It was nice to be able to sit and actually converse, instead of mingling.

4. Mindy makes the most fabulous things with paper and photos. She surprised me with an amazing Clara Jane photo book. Seriously. Damn near made me cry, it was so perfect. I wish I could show it to you, I really do.

5. Although Angie couldn't make it to the party, she did leave a Starbucks gift card in the amount of a venti eggnog latte on my porch yesterday morning. I think that means I owe her a blow job. Feel free insert the "fluid pudding" joke of your liking in this space.

6. Speaking of being horrible, I was actually very well-behaved in the presence of Mr. Greenlight. He was the one who brought up sodomy. Not me.

7. My 8.5-year-old Basset hound, Chloe, finally succeeded in leaping over the back of the couch after months of trying. While I avoid giving her table scraps, I felt like she earned a bit of fresh-from-the-oven salmon for that feat. So not only is her old body feeling the brunt of the jump, but she also has a burnt tongue.

So overwhelming was Chloe's night that she slept where she dropped:

Yes, she's asleep. Yes, I'm headless. Yes, Mindy has the cutest headband and boots in the world. And yes, B.'s totally drunk.

8. This morning, my codependent little elf and I had our own little Christmas morning gift exchange. Because we're all about the schmoop, we surprised our men-folk with stockings of goodies. They both got Emmet Otter's Jug Band Christmas on DVD. Why yes, Kara and I are both involved with 11-year-olds.

9. Kara gives good codependent loot. There's the Vertigo 2005//U2 Live From Chicago DVD, partially filmed at one of the U2 shows we attended (new link - I originally posted the wrong one). Since Greenlight gave her the same thing, we've discussed synching the DVDs and watching them at the same time, at our respective homes, and looking for ourselves. Codependency: the gift that keeps giving.

She also gave me a big pile of porn in the form of sweet, sweet sweaty Tyler Florence's new book. You do know how much I lah-uve Tyler, right? His new book, Eat This Book (yes, SIR!), should be sold in a brown paper wrapper, because it's pure porn! I love it. I love it so. And I apologize to everyone in my house this morning who had to witness how much I love it.

As if that wasn't enough, Kara also loaded me up with goodies from Lush. I haven't tried the two bath bombs yet, but I've become intimately acquainted with their lovely Candy Fluff and Silky Underwear dusting powders. A word to the wise: when desperately trying to open the can of dusting powder, don't pound on it with the antennea of your cell phone, no matter how good of an idea it may seem. Because when the antennea finally penetrates the plastic with the use of much force, the geyser of sugar-scented powder that erupts will leave you looking like you've spent an evening in a toilet stall at Studio 54 with Liza, Bianca and a Colombian named Hernando who wants cash from you now.

10. Clara "Thank God I Missed This Soiree" Jane is visiting her grandparents and having a lovely time gorging herself on Bugles. B. is punishing himself today by hauling his hungover ass to the stores to Christmas shop for me. I'd love to see this, this, these, or this, which doesn't smell nearly as slutty as you might think. But really, I'll be thrilled with whatever he gets me. The fact that I'm home, in my pajamas, alone all day today is just about the best gift in the world.