I'm leaving for Japan tomorrow morning. While the rest of you will be in sunny (or rainy) weather, I will be freezing my buns off in snowy weather. In any case, have a Merry Christmas and a happy New Year ahead!

Christmas is for children. But it is for grownups too. Even if it is a headache, a chore, and nightmare, it is a period of necessary defrosting of chill and hide-bound hearts. ~ Lenora Mattingly Weber

But I am sure that I have always thought of Christmas time, when it has come round... as a good time; a kind, forgiving, charitable, pleasant time; the only time I know of, in the long calendar of the year, when men and women seem by one consent to open their shut-up hearts freely. ~ Charles Dickens from "A Christmas Carol"

For centuries men have kept an appointment with Christmas. Christmas means fellowship, feasting, giving and receiving, a time of good cheer, home. ~ W. J. Tucker

And the Grinch, with his Grinch-feet ice cold in the snow, stood puzzling and puzzling, how could it be so? It came without ribbons. It came without tags. It came without packages, boxes or bags. And he puzzled and puzzled 'till his puzzler was sore. Then the Grinch thought of something he hadn't before. What if Christmas, he thought, doesn't come from a store? What if Christmas, perhaps, means a little bit more? ~ Dr Seuss

Best of all, Christmas means a spirit of love, a time when the love of God and the love of our fellow men should prevail over all hatred and bitterness, a time when our thoughts and deeds and the spirit of our lives manifest the presence of God. ~ George F. McDougall

Christmas is love in action. Every time we love, every time we give, it's Christmas. ~ Dale Evans Rogers

Blessed is the season which engages the whole world in a conspiracy of love. ~ Hamilton Wright Mable