Christmas Gifts

What does an eccentric artist get/make for his family as a Christmas gift?

Sardines!

Each card is a hand drawn pencil sketch of 3 sardines. Each card is slightly different. The cover of each card reads “Merry Christmas”. Inside each card reads “Live Long and Prosper”. On the opposite inner page reads “Christmas 2008, hand drawn by John Beck, x of 9”

Each tin of sardines is lovingly wrapped in Maker’s Mark wrapping paper.

Merry Christmas!

It's Lunch Time

I just made myself a pork roll and cheese sandwich. Of course I used Case’s pork roll, cause that’s the best. It was delicious. I know you wish you had some too.

Cosmi's Pastries and Potito's Bakery

After work today Big Rick and I went down to Philly. He ordered 20 boxes of honey balls from Cosmi’s Pastries. He had, earlier in the week, got boxes of honey balls from Nino’s Pastry Shop, which is usually pretty damn good. The honey balls were made all wrong at Nino’s and he went to complain, this is after he gave most of the boxes away as gifts.

So I accompanied him down to Philly. We had a lot of fun. He’s been ordering from Cosmi’s for a while now and said he should have gone there first instead of Nino’s. He gave me another box of the honey balls and these were a HUGE difference. Very good. Then he took me to another bakery not too far away called Potito’s. There he got me a tray of cookies for coming down to Philly with him. He met the owner of Potito’s a few years ago at Jefferson hospital. They ended up befriending each other. Rick often visited his shop when he was in town. A couple years later the owner died from leukemia at a relatively young age. Anyway, when we got to Potito’s the daughter remembered Rick, even some details, from Trenton, owns the pizza place. I guess he’s a hard one to forget. It was a very sweet moment.

Now I must get back to drawing my Christmas cards and back to watching Battlestar Galactica.

Favorite TV shows of the week: December 7th to December 13th

1) Boston Legal – “Made In China/Last Call” +2
2) Dexter
– “I Had A Dream” -1
3) The Office – “Moroccan Christmas” -1
4) My Name Is Earl – “Orphan Earl” +2
5) 30 Rock – “Christmas Special” -1
6) Kath and Kim – “Friends” +2
7) Chuck – “Chuck Versus the DeLorean” +2
8) Pushing Daisies – “The Legend of Merle McQuoddy” -1
9) Eli Stone – “Help!” +3
10) House – “Joy to the World” No Change
11) Heroes – “Our Father” No Change
12) The Simpsons – “The Burns and the Bees” No Change
13) Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles – “Alpine Fields” No Change

My Horn Can Pierce The Sky

Princess Unicorn: http://www.princessunicorndoll.com/

Princess Unicorn is from a distant land on a distant planet far away in the future. She came from her father, king of the unicorns, and her mother, queen of the princesses. Sorcerissa, the evil witch, cast a spell on Princess Unicorn’s parents, forcing them into another dimension, and doused Princess Unicorn in radiation. The radiation did not hurt Princess Unicorn, but gave her magical powers. She can summon her magic by holding her wand and calling out, “My horn can pierce the sky!” Now she uses her magic and beauty to write for her school paper, defend her kingdom, and battle Sorcerissa so she can be reunited with her mother and father some day.

Maker's Mark Gift

Every year Maker’s Mark sends me a unique gift around the holidays.This year they sent me Maker’s Mark wrapping paper along with Maker’s Mark gift tags and Maker’s Mark ribbon. Thank you Maker’s Mark for the gift and thank you for making such great tasting bourbon!

NetFlix Customer Service

2 weeks ago I added the Battlestar Galactica Season 3 six disc set to the top of my NetFlix queue. It was in order from disc 1 to disc 6. They sent disc 4 first. That’s no good, especially considering I’m on the 1 DVD out at a time plan, so I filed a complaint and sent it back and they sent me disc 1 right away. I had sent that back and then they sent me disc 3. What’s wrong with them?

So this time I called them up after a wait of 20 seconds I was patched through to Sara at NetFlix customer service. She has a wonderful voice and couldn’t be nicer. She told me that she would sent disc 2 out right away and to hang onto disc 3 when I get it. She told me they were having problems with sending seasons out in order so she would delete the other 3 discs from my queue and for me to just add them one at a time until they correct the problem.

Sara was more than helpful and extremely pleasant. I wished her happy holidays and the total phone called was 2 minutes long. Less than a minute after I hung up I got an email from NetFlix asking me to rate my experience.

I wish I could put in additional feedback on the experience because I found it more than satisfactory and though Sara at customer service was wonderful. Happy holidays Sara!