I finished Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince this morning.  I wept when Dumbledore was murdered and spent a good part of the day mourning my loss.  I know I have said it before, but J. K. Rowling is brilliant.  The first book (Sorceror’s Stone) did not impress me that much, but by the second book she had really hit her stride, and by the fourth book (Goblet of Fire), it was no longer a young adult series.  Book seven (Deathly Hallows) has started off as a fast moving action adventure (with more deaths, sadly) and already I am very aware that it is only 316 pages long.  My time with Harry, Hermione, Ron, Hagrid and the others is coming to a close.  It is hard to imagine another book or series of books that will ever measure up to Harry Potter.  The Lord of the Rings is the only thing I can think of that is on par.

I ran after work, so I am officially back into my routine.  I did not weigh myself. I have decided that I should go down to perhaps every other day.  The scale does not seem to move anyway.  Here is my run:

I am struggling with what to do for my next fitness watch.  I havea  Polar right now, but it is old and begins to be dodgy.  I don’t want it to be a yet another means of getting in touch with me — I don’t need it to text or phone or have the dreaded Facebook app on it.  I want it to have several fitness program options, connect to a chest strap heart monitor, and look decent enough that I don’t mind wearing it.  I run, I do strength training, and I ride horses.  Perhaps it will be Apple Watch, or the Polar M600, or I don’t know what.  Maybe you have a suggestion?

I am also struggling with Christmas cookies.  As you know, I love to cook, and part of the enjoyment of the holidays is baking.  This year, I have refrained.  Baking cookies and cakes means that cookies and cakes are sitting around here, and we could easily lapse into hobbit like behavior, with several meals per day.  Eventually, I will break down and start baking, but I’ll have to find someone to foist all the baked goods onto.

A follow up good thing to yesterday’s good thing happened today.  It looks as though I will be interviewed on a Chicago news program later this month about the pet custody issue.  I’ll write more on that as the time approaches.

Today ended on a very high note. I don’t know why I consider The Sound of Music a holiday movie, but I do.  We watched it this evening.  How can anyone watch Fräulein Maria frolicking in the Austrian alps with the Von Trapp children and singing with her amazing voice and not think the world is a wonderful place?  I know I do.