[Video: the ubiquitous “Last Christmas,” originally by Wham! but here performed by Crazy Frog — per Wikipedia, the “Swedish CGI-animated character and Eurodance musician created in 2003 by actor and playwright Erik Wernquist.” Careful observers of Running After My Hat will note that no versions of the song — original or covers — actually appear in the playlist.]
Another twelvemonth gone by, another ahead. In the meantime — as The Missus and I stagger towards something resembling residential stasis — here’s the exact same 130-song Christmas-music playlist I’ve offered for the last couple years: still about seven hours or so total. As in the past, you can just play it through in the order I added the songs (10 per year), or you can hit that little “Popout” button at the top left: this will open up the playlist in a separate window, automatically playing, in random order. (If you choose the random option, you can at any time close down this browser window and the music will continue.)
Below the playlist, in this post I’ll give you some idea where we are now and where (approximately) we hope to be in 2023… and beyond!
So, anyhow, this December we’re in Durham, North Carolina. We arrived in October, are renting a furnished house, and hope to be moving to another house — almost certainly another and more permanent rental — somewhere within about a half-hour’s driving radius of this one. Why this area in general? Some main reasons: (1) about halfway between The Missus’s and my families (Florida and New Jersey, respectively); (2) access to plentiful and varied healthcare options (not unimportant to a couple in their 70s); (3) actual seasons (more a priority for me than for her, heh).
As for the cross-country road trip on which we embarked starting in June 2021, it officially wrapped up in August, with a nice leisurely (five-day) visit with friends in northwestern Georgia. Thereafter, we jogged (not literally!) south, to Jacksonville Beach, Florida, and stayed there with one of The Missus’s sisters until coming here.
What’s next for us? Well, for people our age, the phrase “permanent housing” carries certain implications that you’ve just gotta ignore — banish from your head — if you want to enjoy life. So let’s just leave it at, as I said, “more permanent”: suitable for us to move all of our own furnishings and possessions from storage in North Florida. (We haven’t seen a lot of that stuff for three years, so we’ll probably be surprised we even decided to keep it at the time.)
I’m not going to promise to blog more often, but that is one prospect I look forward to once the dust settles. In the meantime, I hope you are having the best possible end-of-one-year-start-of-the-next. Thank you so much for stopping by!
Froog says
Nice to see the Christmas playlist treat again – even if unaugmented this year. I’ll never get through all of it, but it’s a great resource to be able too fall back on over the next few days. Thank you!
Do I gather that ‘Last Christmas’ is not a favourite of yours? I find it terribly grating. And believe me, you don’t know ‘ubiquity’ unless you live next door to a karaoke restaurant!
Luckily for me, their Christmas rotation is mostly carols (albeit often in rather strange pop or rap versions) rather than cheesy novelty songs. And their favoured rendition of ‘Last Christmas’ seems to be a cover by some sultry K-pop nymphette, rather than the cloying original.
I grow wistful for Durham: it’s a beautiful area. I hope you’ll enjoy living there. One of my best friends from college days has been teaching at Duke for many years, but it’s been a long while since I caught up with her family there. Still waiting for airfares to come down a bit….
Best wishes to you and the Mrs for a bright 2023!!