The Columnist Manifesto

You can't fully appreciate this song without the drawn out notes of a wispy melody that makes it oh so wistful.

Forced hilarity? No, how could it be so? People who you like around a table late at night -- how could it be forced?

Still, have a wonderful quiet evening if that is your preference. Me, I drive for miles and search out the places that put plates of good food in front of my nose in the last hours of a good year.
 

Clay Aiken?? Do you really listen to Clay Aiken? If so, maybe I need to make you some mixtapes. And I'll include U2's New Year's Day.

Anyway, I'll be at Katy & Chris's annual New Year's Eve/wedding anniversary party. There will be hilarity, drinking and dancing, but none of it forced. Maybe next year you and B will join us. (Don't worry -- there's no entrance charge.)

Have a Happy New Year!
 

We were planning a nice quiet evening at home, but the Fates are trying to pull us into the criminal justice system and bail my oldest stepson out of jail. Personally, I think he should spend the night in lock up. It would do him some good to actually face the consequenses of drinking and hitting one's girlfriend. Well, it wouldn't be a holiday without some frickin' drama, I suppose.
 

We are invited to a neighborhood party of all Jones trying to keep up with each other.
We plan to first go out and eat, either barbecue or a joint that specializes in southern fried fish or Cajun, then come home and watch the rented DVD "Mr.& Mrs. Smith", then about midnight or a few minutes afterwards, show up at the party and wade among the drunks and pretend we have been there all evening.
Eddie Hunter
 

Clay Aiken? Really?

I'm going to a friends house. I'm hoping it will be a quiet evening of board games and drinks, but I doubt it.
 

R and I are just as boring as you, and for the same reasons.

I think we'll break out Pac Man on our PS2 and have a tournament.
 

too too funny. the tv stations have figured out that there are thousands of homes filled with groups of single women, and other thousands filled with single men. the former are watching TBS for its Meg Ryan fest, with Kate & Leopold, Sleepless in Seattle and You've Got Mail, the latter featuring a great moment when Meg Ryan shakes her head at how all men can recite all the lines from The Godfather. meanwhile, WGN is playing all The Godfather movies. now if only these two stations would just start a dating service, and get all the homes filled with single women and all the homes filled with single men to hang out and find a movie to watch together, happiness would reign, rather than this television-enforced new year's eve gender apartheid.

anyway ... happy new year to one and all.
 

Please, don't call it Clay Aiken's song. It's a lovely old standard written in the 40's.
 

My favorite version of that song is by Karen Carpenter. Gorgeous voice!

I spent New Year's Eve drinking lots of champagne and watching movies with a friend. Just about perfect in my estimation. :) Happy 2006!