INVICTUS... AND YOU BETTER BELIEVE I AM!

WHAT!!!! Christmas tree time already? It feels like I just packed it away for the year!!! What happened? Where did the time go? [and more ominously, what have I to show for it?] Traditionally, this is the time to sit back with a glass of mulled wine [for the cold climateers] or a nice cuppa, reminisce about the year, take stock and generally beat yourself up thinking how silly you were to do such-and-such instead of this-and-that. But this year, I say f... that s...!!! Bring out the brandy, light the pipes, take out a cigar and celebrate living! Heck, you're not going to relive that year [except in your mind; rehashing the sordid details of each action and the 'wisdom' or lack thereof encapsulated therein]. Why torture yourself twice? Take a long swig, wipe out the taste of regret and salute another year crazily lived as though you are immortal. Who knows, maybe you are!!! THOUGHT FOR THE DAY OUT of the night that covers me, Black as the Pit from pole to pole, I thank whatever gods may be For my unconquerable soul. In the fell clutch of circumstance I have not winced nor cried aloud. Under the bludgeonings of chance My head is bloody, but unbowed. Beyond this place of wrath and tears Looms but the Horror of the shade, And yet the menace of the years Finds, and shall find, me unafraid. It matters not how strait the gate, How charged with punishments the scroll, I am the master of my fate: I am the captain of my soul. - INVICTUS by William Ernest Henley