Over fifty Nibblets were mailed this year! This marks the seventeenth consecutive year (except 2024) that we (HW & I) have artfully crafted this missive, stuffed it in an envelope and then licked, stamped and mailed it to our many friends and family who, on the evidence of feedback received from them over the years, continue to have a perplexed curiosity in our shared, annual experiences. For me, composing the Nibblet is kind of like that one amusing thing your friends will say only you can do justice to, such that at some mixed party together they cajole you into performing it again and again, and so for their sake you keep it up. Actually, that’s not quite fair; this annual Christmas letter, by now more a New Year’s letter given we seem to be mailing it later and later with each passing year, at least for me (and I suppose HW as well), has become a labor of love. Because let’s be honest, HW and I (and our pup(s)) are as ordinary an American family as there is. So to know that certain people on the mailing list make a point of asking us as early as Q4 each year: “When is my Nibblet arriving this year!” well, it tickles us pink. One year, in fact, an alarmed recipient emailed me to say her Nibblet arrived in her mailbox soaking wet, unreadable, and could she please get a replacement
New friends here invited us to a New Year’s Eve party at their house, for which the ever radiant HW had prepared a fondue to be shared by all, shown here in our house prior to departure, the dipping components packaged and co-mingled in a shallow ceramic dish ready for transport, while the crock pot containing a melange of gooey cheeses was coddled and transported ever so carefully by yours truly. Not so carefully, however, as to prevent the basket inside which the crock pot had been placed from listing a bit during the carry out to the car, causing the glass lid on the pot to shift, enough that a small portion of cheese escaped and found its way onto my pant leg. HW to the rescue: she quickly deployed a Wet Ones from the car’s console and restored my appearance to eye candy worthiness. “Ugh, men.”
Not a lick of pretension or braggadocio was evidenced by any of our fellow partygoers, never mind that many of them, I’m quite certain, had impressive professional back stories to share. Some of the people in attendance we knew from prior interactions in and around the community. Catered food appeared on tables distributed throughout rooms in the house, intermixed with items others had brought (e.g. HW’s fondue), and the drinks were flowing but to a one everybody there was chill and genuinely festive, behaving without airs. I like that. Somebody said to me, Your wife is beautiful. I liked that, too. I rechecked my pant leg, the cheese stain was completely gone