Is this gif giving you a headache?  It's killing me just to write this.

Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go
...but not this time.   When I'm "sorting through some issues" like my favorite male super models - or just muddling through one of my less than favorite holidays, nothing gets me out to the car and singing like the offer of a  ORANGE MOCHA FRAPPUCCINO!!! trip to Half Price Books.  But I intended to use this day to hang around with the family, write more, dust some stuff and certainly not buy books.  This is a tough exercise in self-control; knowing that Martha is on her way there and I do have $20 left on the gift card Bee gave me for Mother's Day.  August and early September have become my traditional fast from book acquisition, since the Friends of the Library book sale is in mid-September.  Why buy anything now when I just might come across it at the sale, right? 

Eddie would like to read that Steve Jobs bio but even used prices are relatively high.  The book sale has a big table right up front with bestsellers that donors have read once (if at all) and then left on the back doorstep of the library.  Mr. Jobs should be an easy item.  And all the other wonderful books I didn't know I wanted.  Not to mention the Christmas shopping I can get done.

This year I'll hide the gift purchases a bit more wisely.  Last Christmas Eve I was tearing my closet apart to find the books that I knew were in there - in a discreet hiding place that would keep them hidden and unbent/unwrinkled.  I've already broken my promise to wrap Christmas gifts as I buy them.  I usually start finding things that are 'perfect' gifts in June - but still wind up wrapping them on December 23.  Or worse, farming out the wrapping to non-recipients because I am too tired and addlepated from the Advent demands of work to take care of my duties.  So...there is Christmas wrap in my closet, ready to go.  All I need is a bit more of that self-control I've previous referred to.  In hopes that I can enjoy the spiritual gifts of the Advent/Christmas season as a time to be savored rather than a chore to accomplish.