Inspirations, the Stories Space Coffee House: If you're reading this it just might mean I'm back, sorta. If you're not reading this, well, congratulations.

And since it's not Canadian Thanksgiving, merely American, I'll get things started.

I think that's what they call a "non sequitur" in the trade.

We have a special coffee blend today – Peet's Holiday Blend dark roast coffee.

There are Twinings English Breakfast and Lemon Ginger teas brewed up and ready.

And some Thanksgiving-like treats.

Hope everyone has a safe and sane Thanksgiving – and Gillian, all the best. ❤️ Missing your mom for the first major holiday has to be difficult, especially with your dad having problems.

Hey, everyone.

Thank you, James, for setting things up and for the treats.

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone! ❤️🌹🦃

I have a quick moment by myself. What better way than to share dessert with you all on this wonderful Thanksgiving day?

I hope everyone has a lovely Thanksgiving!

🌹Cora's Creations🌹 offers you these special delights.

Hors d'Oeuvres ~ Cranberry Brie Bites

Pumpkin Pie

Cranberry Apple Tart

Pecan Pie

Enjoy! 😊

Thanks for the setup, Bear, and the lovely desserts, Cora.

Our turkey is ready to goin the oven - it’ll go in about 15 minutes from now. Eat at 3.

It should be a calm, chill, sweet day. I have this turkey thing down cold so not too much stress on the food end. My daughter and her son (my grandson!) are coming over.

Between now and then, relax, watch the parade, play a little No Man’s Sky. Perfect day. A lot to be thankful for.

I hope, whether you are celebrating or not, that you have a fine day, all.

Sorry, I missed American Thanksgiving but I see pecan pie leftover so I'll just take a slice of that.

I will get a pot of Jamaican Blue Mountain coffee going. In the teapots we've got some Earl Grey and Buddha's Blend. Sodas are stocked for those needing a cold beverage. Hot water is ready for other teas or some hot chocolate.

Hope you American types are having a good holiday and don't spend yourselves into bankruptcy at the sales today.

The weekend looms for the rest of us. Have a good one, folks!!

Thanks for the setup Ape.

We are slowly rising from our day of gluttony. Everything came out nice, and I got my ass happily kicked in MarioKart all afternoon by my daughter.

Today? Video games and turkey leftovers. We are off to see a play of Sense and Sensibility tomorrow. The only Jane Austin I have ever read. It’s an early Christmas present for Talia.

Enjoy the weekend everyone, Thanksgiving-flavored or otherwise.

Coffee for me!

Quote by verbal
Today? Video games and turkey leftovers.

Weirdly, that sounds rather like Boxing Day in my family home back in the day. Guess it is kind of the same thing, too, the day after the big day. Even the shopping element, though Boxing Day was a retail holiday in Ontario until, I think, the late nineties. "Boxing Day" sales actually started on the 27th back then save a few stubborn retailers who tried to fight the law in court.

Quote by Mendalla

Weirdly, that sounds rather like Boxing Day in my family home back in the day. Guess it is kind of the same thing, too, the day after the big day. Even the shopping element, though Boxing Day was a retail holiday in Ontario until, I think, the late nineties. "Boxing Day" sales actually started on the 27th back then save a few stubborn retailers who tried to fight the law in court.

It does have a similar vibe to Boxing Day - lots of food, few obligations, chill day.

I wish I knew someone who plays No Man’s Sky. It’s SO fun, and really interesting too. I’m a little obsessed with, yes.

Didn’t sleep well, and dragging a little this morning. We are seeing a play tonight, so I will attempt to take it easy.

Coffee please. Seize the carp!

Good morning!! December is here!! Advent is underway!! I am obsessed with exclamation marks!! Or maybe had too much tea!!

Anyhow, coffee is Christmas Blend from Murchie's. Teas are Scottish Breakfast and the seasonal Naughty & Spice (basically a Christmas themed chai)

And one of the things I get from Author's Publish is promos for courses they offer. However, given they are a writing site, you would think they would proof their content better than the snip below suggests.

Quote by Mendalla

Good morning!! December is here!! Advent is underway!! I am obsessed with exclamation marks!! Or maybe had too much tea!!

Anyhow, coffee is Christmas Blend from Murchie's. Teas are Scottish Breakfast and the seasonal Naughty & Spice (basically a Christmas themed chai)

And one of the things I get from Author's Publish is promos for courses they offer. However, given they are a writing site, you would think they would proof their content better than the snip below suggests.

Yeah, I find typos all the time these days. The decline of Western civilization, sigh. You would think a writing site would know better. A cat must have walked across the keyboard. That said, I still commit typos regularly.

Saw a GREAT production of Sense and Sensibility. Really funny, really creative. A great way to start the holidays.

Not much else going on. Leave raking and video games. Talia leaves on Wednesday for a short trip to visit her Mom, and I will miss her.

Coffee! Stat!

Quote by verbal
That said, I still commit typos regularly.

But do you publish them? I spend so much time just obsessing over typos, missed words, and such. I freak a bit if I realize one made it through to publication.

Quote by verbal
Leave raking

I was supposed to do this but we have a light layer of snow over everything after 24 hours or so of on and off flurries. Calling for a chance of squalls tonight but doesn't seem too bad right now.

Woke up to two—count em, two—rejection slips this morning. Sigh. What a way to begin a Monday.

My back is barking after raking a TON of leaves yesterday. I kind of enjoyed it, but my back apparently did not. Ape, you are a lucky man, having a good excuse to avoid it.

That’s all the complaints I have though. It’s looking to be a nice day out. And I think I have an early Christmas present coming today….

All for now. Coffee would be swell.

Crickets. grumble, grumble Okay where did that tin of Costco coffee go? And those delicious Lipton tea bags? Ah, here we go. Coffee and teas await you!

No rejection slips this morning (yet). So, we are already doing better than yesterday.

Talia leaves tomorrow. Wah! I do alone fine, but I have found that when she is gone I do not sleep as well. Something about the animal comfort of her body helps me rest easier.

Not much up today. Going to try writing a horror flash. My last physical therapy session looms today as well.

Enjoy your day!

I enjoyed my family Thanksgiving, but I'm a bit relieved that it's quiet in my house now. I took my son and his wife to the airport last night so they could return to Germany. They are very excited that we are coming in the spring that they even bought us an early Christmas present from a Black Friday sale, a set of luggage. So we have no more excuses. I'm very excited about being there in the spring. We haven't gone to see them yet because I did not want to be away from my parents for that length of time while things were unsettled these last few years. But now my father is safely in a place that is taking care of him and I know he is doing fine and he is cared for and I can breathe a little easier.

The actual meal was festive and fun with way too much food, so a traditional Thanksgiving. Everyone has always sat in the same places so deciding who would get my mother's seat was a bit sad. But everyone told their favorite stories about her, that was nice. Back to reality now and the continuation of paperwork that never seems to end. I am happy if I can check off at least one or two things by the end of each day. I think I am almost to the end but it took forever to sort out their weird financial paperwork system and the alarming number of bank accounts they had.

We put our tree up yesterday so this week I'll finish decorating the house. Christmas will be a much quieter holiday. But I love having Christmas decorations up. I hope everyone is doing well and had a good weekend and a good start to their week. Take care of yourselves and try to stay warm for those of us who are having our first winter blast. Cheers.

Glad to see life is finally returning to normalcy, Gill.

Not much new here. Talia leaves today. Wah. For me, that means playing a lot of videogames, reading more, and not sleeping well.

At least I got no rejection slips today.

Any coffee brewed? A cookie? A slice of pie? A morsel? A crumb?

Quote by verbal
Not much new here. Talia leaves today.

My wife is away right now, too. Left yesterday, back tomorrow although her return journey could be adventurous because, yeah, snow squalls in the forecast. We basically leapt from Fall to Winter on the weekend.

You mentioned your back being bad because of raking. We never got a chance to finish. Mine is a mess from two straight days of shoveling. Today is the first day since the weekend that I have not had a shovel out.

Need to get back on my current story effort. It's long and still going. Debating whether to go where I originally planned with it on a couple fronts. One could decide whether it can go on here.

Glad to hear your Thanksgiving went well, Gil. You needed it, I suspect, after the past few months. And Germany. Cool. I made a couple stops there on my Baltic cruise last summer and was in Berlin in 1993.

Good evening, folks. Take care.

Good morning everybody!

I see that the coffee urn is waiting to go, so I'll get things started.

We've got some nice Costa Rican medium-roast in the urn, and some Darjeeling from Sri Lanka for the tea.

I can see that there are some leftover Thanksgiving cupcakes, and some fresh-made spice bars, so that should tide folks over until someone with more talent arrives with goodies.

Lady Jay has many of the Christmas decorations up. She used to play a game where she would put up a few a day, and then, when I got home from work, I had to see if I could pick out the new ones.

"This one?"

"No – that's been up for a week."

"Oh. THIS one!"

"No, that went up yesterday."

…and so on. The kids always got a giggle at Dad's expense because I was so bad at it.

Now that our kids have their own kids, she has the 16 or so big Rubbermaid tubs of decorations labeled by kind.

"Bring up the Santas box…Now bring up the Angels box…now bring up the forest and lights…"

Then, the Big One … "OK, we're ready for the three Christmas Village boxes!"

We have a big bookshelf in the sitting room, and she clears three levels off, then carefully builds up the infrastructure so that our son and DIL can actually lay out the village – from photos taken last year.

It's a big production. And I'm an integral part of it. I'm the BFI – Brute Force, and Ignorance.

Just call me "Fetch".

Here's a photo of this year's edition of The Village…

It started with a relatively modest set that Jay had before she met me. I was so entranced with it, that she kept adding to it. Then it became a travel thing. We have houses or buildings that come from several countries, including the US, Portugal, Australia, England, and so on.

I doubt if there is a real village anywhere that's like this, but it's a reminder of lovely times and visits past. And isn't Christmas about nostalgia?

Incidentally, the lowest level, at the bottom left, is there to allow the 4-year-old granddaughter to arrange things as she pleases. All the items there are non-breakable, so she gets to feel that she's part of it.

That's cool. I'll be happy to get a tree up (maybe this weekend). Weather continues to be dicey here. Not totally suckish, but dicey. Windy with blowing snow today, squalls maybe later. Not much new snow yet, anyhow.

Psst. Darjeeling can't come from Sri Lanka. It's an actual tea growing area in India. But I'll take some. And one of them there spice bars.

Been too worn out in the evenings to progress on my current work. It's long haul stuff anyhow. Maybe a novelette or novella by the time it's done.

Thanks for the setup everyone!

Your Christmas village is quite cool, Bear. Back in the day, I had big blue bins, all labeled with masking tape, full of decorations. I've passed most of those off to my daughter, who does Christmas pretty big, while we've downsized on Christmas here (Talia is Jewish). My parents, after we left home, decided to be eco-conscious and not kill trees for Christmas, so began decorating a beautiful rocking chair with lights and a few ornaments, and put presents under it. It was a nice tradition. We are doing something similar here.

Sorry you are too worn out to write, Ape. Been there.

Coffee!!! And one of those turkey cupcakes.

Was out shoveling. Nasty, nasty day. Snow ranging from flurries to squalls, fairly high, cold winds. Think Hoth in Star Wars but minus the tauntauns and wampas.

Sorry about the nasty day, Ape. We are cold but sunny here.

Talk about cat drama! We put a calming collar on our more aggressive cat to hopefully get him to calm down and stop attacking his sister. The second we put the collar on, he leapt into hiding. Worse, every time his sister, the LESS aggressive cat, saw him, she’d freak out and attack him, viciously. She was smelling the pheromones and thinking he was an intruder cat. After two days of hiding punctuated by crazed fights, he finally let me pet him, and I quietly slid the collar off. We are finally back to normal.

Well, maybe not that normal. But as normal as it gets around here.

Peace. A coffee would be swell.

Good morning! Looking nice here. We did end up getting some snow yesterday but not enough to bother shoveling.

Got a story or two on the go and some writing time, so will keep plugging away at those.

For coffee, we've got some Deathwish Dark Roast.

Teas are Assam Organic and Wakoucha.

Sodas are stock for anyone needing a cold drink.

And the hot water is ready for other teas or hot chocolate.

Hope you're all having a fine weekend.

Later, alligators.

So, my knee went out. It really hurts to put any weight on it. And…Talia is out of town. My daughter got me home yesterday, and I’m going to bribe her to come over and take out my garbage cans tonight. Other than that it is just me, hobbling around, swearing a lot, scaring the cats. I’ve been using my Dad’s cane a lot, which is bittersweet.

So, I’m mostly confined to bed. I’ll get through today and go to an urgent care or the doc on Monday. Today is writing for a comp and playing video games.

Cats are here! Gotta run! Thanks for the coffee Ape!

You have my sympathy, Jeff. My knees are less than reliable these days. I hope yours heals quickly. Your cat's antics made me laugh. I miss having pets, but I am putting off getting another until after I travel to Germany.

James, your Christmas village looks great. I have always loved Christmas Villages. Mine has been with me for a while, primarily light-up pieces. I want to visit my son in Germany around Christmas at some point. They have the most amazing Christmas markets, including various village pieces.

I hope the weather has improved for you, Scott. It is chilly here, but there has been no winter precipitation so far. Have a good week, everyone. Cheers.

Quote by gillianleeza
My knees are less than reliable these days. I hope yours heals quickly.

I had some trouble with mine this year, too, but they seem to be better now. Age, I guess. X-rays showed "mild deterioriation" meaning my arthritis is starting to get in there, I guess. It's mostly in my hands, still, and a bit in my feet.

Quote by gillianleeza
I hope the weather has improved for you, Scott. It is chilly here, but there has been no winter precipitation so far.

We are actually losing some of the snow today. Positive temps and showers. Supposed to be back to winter by mid-week, though.

Nice village. My parents never had a full village, just a nice church that someone build as a handicraft.

Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaand good morning!!

I'll put on some Tobermory Grotto coffee for you lovers of the bean. For the lovers of the leaf, we've got English Breakfast and Earl Grey Supreme. Hot water is ready for other teas and hot chocolate. Sodas are stocked in the fridge if you're needing something chillier.

Sadly, the marshmallow stock looks like it will last out the season this year. Anyone heard anything from Sara lately?

Good morning, and thanks for the coffee Ape.

Waiting for Urgent Care to open, so I can get old balky knee taken care of. It's been a long weekend. Snow is coming around noon, so I want to get it everything taken care of before it hits.

The Mets signed Soto. Yay!

Seize the carp everyone!

Hey, hey, hey, it's ... coffee time!!

We've got some Nicaraguan Dark Roast brewing in the coffee machine. For teas, I have selected some Darjeeling and Buddha's Blend. Sodas are looking good. Hot water is on standby for other hot beverages.

Just saw an article about the incredibly prolific James Patterson. Apparently, he gives out money to staff at independent bookshops at Christmas, a Christmas bonus basically. Cool guy. The article also talks about his philanthropic work.

Hundreds of bookstore staffers receive holiday bonuses from author James Patterson

Good morning all.

Yeah, James Paterson seems cool. Over 200 novels, and pretty consistent quality. That was very nice of him.

My knee is still out, I didn't sleep well, and so I am grumpy and missing Talia. Adding insult to my injury, I entered a comp on another site, only to learn I misread the theme. Sigh.

Gonna stay in bed and give this knee a rest. Coffee please!

Gooooooooooooooooooooooooooood Morrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrning!

We gots coffee, some Fire-Roasted St. Drogo. It's a blend of 3 roasts, 1 dark and two medium, with beans from the 3 different countries. Sounds like a recipe for disaster if you ask me, but I don't drink the stuff.

As for teas, I've got Naughty & Spice from Tea Haus, a holiday-themed spiced tea, and a Darjeeling.

Hot water is out for other hot bevvies.

If you're needing something cold, there's sodas in the fridge.

And I picked up some goodies from a local bakery since we are short on cookies these days.