It may be the day before Christmas, but the holidays aren't usually as idyllic as they portray on It's a Wonderful Life. In my world, anyway.

Just got a call from my dad's girlfriend. It's the time of year when a lot of old friends call around the holidays. She's having a tough time with a lot of health issues. She just had surgery to remove her thyroid, cancer, and now there's an issue with something they saw on her mammogram. She's had breast cancer before. And she's got her mother down for about a week or so, and they don't get along too well. If I lived closer and didn't have my own family up here, I'd go down and spend time with her to break up the one on one stuff with her mother. (She has no siblings.) My dad will be spending tonight at his brother-in-law's place. (His second wife passed away years ago.) I know, it gets complicated.

I had invited my neighbor over tonight for some brie and crackers, but she's having trouble with her hip and doesn't want to do my stairs. She's overdue for hip surgery. Had the knee done last summer. I was debating whether or not to suggest we go out driving with a thermos of hot chocolate and look at all the Christmas lights on the houses, but maybe I'll just stay inside.

I'm still editing emails for the IT director at the Yeshiva school in NYC. He must always be in hot water with his boss, the rabbi/principal, becus in many of the letters he's apologizing for certain things going wrong. I get the feeling this rabbi is not the easiest person to work for.

I did spend a nice afternoon at The Author's yesterday. I got to see her beautiful home. She is an interior designer, after all. Some neat hand-painted rugs on a wood floor,crystal chandeliers and lots of moldings and trim on the walls. And every interior door in her downstairs was a French door, to let the light in, she said.

A while ago I offered to go thru her book again to scan it for any final errors that might jump out at me. i planned to spend maybe a few hours doing that, and I told her it was on me, no charge.

Well, she had gone in and made some changes to the copy, here, there and everywhere. When she was done, she gave it to me for my final look and it was riddled with errors. Missing punctuation, the wrong punctuation, random words that didn't belong,misspellings....It really forced me to go through the entire book again, line by line.

So I regret saying I would do this at no pay. I must've spent about 24 hours on it already. Oh well. I know she'll be giving me her next book to edit. It's half the size of this one. Book 3 is also ready to go.

I made some chocolate/walnut/cranberry cookies, put them in a Christmas tin and picked up a pretty butterfly tree ornament at a local gift shop,and that was my gift to her. She also gave me a gift, a butterfly necklace and matching earrings! The butterfly figured prominently in her book.

On Thursday I finished up with the nutrition study and got my final payment. I also got the results of my 2 DEXA exams, which were part of the study. The good news is, according to the scans, my bone density is slightly higher than the average 20 to 40-year old. (I'm 52.) I believe you have peak bone density when you are 30. I'm not at all surprised at my good results, because I do a ton of yard work and lawn mowing that most women my age don't do. Heck, if I were married, i wouldn't be doing it either!

But the tests also showed that I lost a half inch in height in the 6 months between the 2 exams. The grad student who I've been working with and I both wondered if that's becus someone else, another student, took my first height measurement and she took my second. Given how good my bone density is, it's a little hard to believe that I lost a half inch in height in such a short time. Maybe the guy who measured me just didn't put the metal thing flat against my head or something. I don't think I'll worry about it, but I will bring the test results to show my PCP at my next physical to see if I can learn any more about the results.

Ah, well, another year is almost over. One can only hope that 2012 will be better. I hope everyone enjoys their holiday.