November is my absolute favorite month, always has been. Something about gray skies, the grass a combination of brown and green, and bare trees and the smell of fallen leaves and that chill in the air was something I always loved while I lived in New England. Believe it or not, we have November out here in the Valley of the Sun: we get those days where the temps fall into the 70s and while the gray of the skies is not the heavy kind you see back East, I always love the silvery sheen of thin clouds and the sun shining behind them. And if I get to missing New England I can always listen to Rhode Island’s classical music station 95.9 WCRI over the Internet. I especially like hearing the local commercials about the various stores and holiday events coming up in and around Newport and ehat they call the “South Country”.

This weekend attention gets paid to the watering system out front and back, checking each drip to make sure everything is in good working order. The tiki bar area also gets its annual sweeping, cleaning, and a new coating of play sand.

Why modern technology is so great: last night in the space of 25 minutes I did all my Christmas shopping in the comfort of our home office. A few website searches, a few clicks, and voila! done for the year. Of course, sinc we’re so focused on paying down our debt it’s not as if there will be piles of stuff under the tree, but just knowing it’s all done always takes the weight off of one’s shoulders.