Is there a much lower day in the entire year than New Year’s Day? It’s a holiday but lots of stores are open. It’s the start of a new year but the day seems shrouded in a cottony kind of shroud where time seems suspended between the year just passed and a new year begun but not yet really underway. This year the feeling is especially so given that Christmas and New Year’s fell on a Thursday, making the Friday after a de facto extension of the holiday. At work it seems as if all all industry has been on hold since the week of the 22nd, which is kind of nice. Of course, that means it will (at least hopefully!) be gangbusters once the gates are opened next Monday and 2015 gets off to its “official” corporate start.

I didn’t make it to New Year’s here in the Valley of the Sun. As New Englanders, we consider 10 PM AZ time our New Year’s since that’s when the ball drops in Times Square and my Goodboys friends are ringing in the New Year. Watched a little TV then called it a night 45 mins before midnight. There were lots of folks setting off fireworks (and, from the sounds of it, shooting off guns), and word is we had a little snow mixed in with the rain around that time, but I didn’t see it.

The big project now is to get all the Christmas stuff down. Neither Tracey nor I ever got much into the holiday spirit this year, and, truth be told, I was ready to take down the tree the day after Christmas. As much as I enjoy decorating the house in December, it’s always a joy to get the stuff down and clean the house for a brand-new year come January.

Lots of plans for the New Year both short-term and long-term, but that’s for another post. For now, it’s time to drag out the decorations boxes and bags and get the undecoration effort rolling!