Happy first month of this brave new year: Let's talk new year resolutions: The old perennial – lose weight. I got an idea here: use only a dessert plate (that's right, dump dinner plates, bring them out only for skinny company), load up dessert plate once, and that's it. Walk thirty minutes 3 days a week and you'll be fit and ready to turn heads in how long? How about six months, if you don't cheat and you don't have a lot of skinny friends to dinner.

Merry Christmas One and All: So many of you have posted your Christmas decorations, particularly your trees, on my Facebook page. I'm always astounded at the creativity and uniqueness of what you guys come up with. On another note, those of you who are grieving this year and don't want to even recognize Christmas, please do me a favor: put up a tree, doesn't matter if it's big or small, and string lights. I swear to you every time you pass it, you will smile and the world will seem just a little brighter. And everyone, forget any disagreements with friends or family, put them aside and join together to celebrate this amazing time of year.

Happy Thanksgiving: I know most of you will have turkey, dressing, cranberry sauce, and all the other goodies plus pumpkin pie for dessert. Moi? Nope, not this year. This blessed beautiful year I'm going to make pasties, our generational family steak pie (with thin sliced potatoes, bite-size steak, celery, onion, in layers) And a brand-new bottle of catsup. Then Black Friday's breakfast will be glorious – cold pasty (with tons of cold catsup). I'm already salivating. If you're a traditionalist, please do not mock me out or give me grief for this culinary aberration.