We've got a lot of hope hanging on 2009.

I interrupt what would normally be another blog about holiday cheer and merriment to bring you some important news: The economy is bad. I know that is not really what you would call breaking news (an investigative reporter I am not!), but it is really and truly starting to freak me out a bit.

The city that I live near is a GM town. The automaker has contributed to the local economy in the form of jobs at their local plants as well as all of the jobs in the companies who tie their existence to the auto industry. This includes steel plants, engineering firms, auto supply manufacturers and the hundreds of other small businesses around town who rely on the auto makers for their livelihood. This is not a post about the auto industry, they are just one of the more recent victims of the recent economic downturn. I read an article on Yahoo last week that named the town 12 miles to the south of us as one of America's Top 10 Dying Cities.

I've been watching all the news reports on the economy, just as I know you have. Mr. Crackers & I (like countless other Americans) have watched our retirement accounts & kid's college funds dwindle to mere shadows of their former value. But for some reason none of this really started to freak me out until it started affecting our friends & family in a much more direct way.

About a month ago the woman who lives next door to me, who by the way is raising 5 boys between the ages of 10-17, lost her job. Did I mention that she is a single Mom, raising these boys on her own? Yes, her husband lives about 15-20 miles away, but he's not what you call "involved" in the finances or the actual hands-on raising of the kids. So, my neighbor has been hard at work trying to find a new job. She has been focusing her efforts on a couple of local universities, so that she can get reduced tuition for her boys when it comes time for college. She figures the salary cut she'll take will be more than off-set by the savings she'll get on their education. She's an attorney & one smart cookie. I am hoping that 2009 will bring her some good news in the form of a new job.

Today we heard some more upsetting news. The engineering firm where a good friend of ours worked was closed today. They shut their doors at 3:00 & told the employees that they hope to re-open right after the New Year. There was no advanced warning & there will be NO PAY until the company opens it's doors again. This family has 3 sons, 2 of whom are my son's very best friends in the whole world. We see them almost every day either during our daily carpool to school, in church or just running around the neighborhood. Tonight, we were supposed to go to a Christmas light display together in a neighboring town to soak up some holiday cheer. Instead they will be sitting down to figure out how to make the money they have in their bank account last them until the next paycheck comes.

They are a single income family like we are, so I know it will be extremely tight. We've invited them over for dinner tonight & we will do whatever we can to help them through the next few weeks. I hope they decide to come and eat with us. We will pray and keep our fingers crossed that the plant opens back up in the New Year and that his job & pay will be restored.

I could go on about other people who have been affected by this downturn - whether they be relatives of our friends or other neighbors (I won't even mention here my parents who are just 1 year into retirement & have already seen the value of their investments plummet more than I can fathom. Ooops, well I guess I did just mention it, didn't I?). These are truly freighting times.

Mr. Crackers & I have have been trying to tighten our own belts just in case. We have racked up some debts of our own while I have taken off work the last few years to stay home with the kids. We figured that we would get ourselves back into the black once I rejoined the workforce in a few years. But I am now afraid we might not have a few years to wait. We need to get ourselves in a better position financially now, just in case we get caught up in this whole mess too. I fear that no matter what we do it will not be enough. As we discussed all of these goings on earlier, Mr. Crackers & I decided that we need to do more - so we will be joining our good friends and try to live off much less. I'm not sure how we will do it, but until things turn around in the economy we need to make it happen.

I know that it might be a bit early to start talking about wishes for the New Year. We haven't even gotten to Christmas yet, but as this is all happening now, I'm going to do it anyway. So here is my wish for 2009: I hope that it brings more security (whether that means financial security, better health or keeping you and those you love out of harm's way) to all of us. I think we all could use it.

Now, we return you to your normally scheduled programming of Christmas Merriment.

Fowl Play?

I went to dinner last night with the other Moms in my neighborhood for our annual ornament exchange. Right as dinner was winding down, I found out that our resident peacock was found poisoned over a month ago! Apparently, I was the only one at the table who didn't already know this. Now, you are probably brimming over with a lot of follow-up questions like:

1. What do you mean "resident peacock"

2. How do you know he was poisoned?

3. Where did go for dinner?

4. What did you order?

5. Should I get my loved one a peacock for Christmas this year?



I'll answer each of these pressing questions in turn.

1. First, and probably most importantly, I'll explain my relationship with the above peacock. When my husband and I bought our house 4 years ago, we thought there was something really special about the neighborhood . It didn't feel like a typical subdivision. There were just 60 homes situated on one dead end street, which was flanked on all sides by family farms & woodlands. There were sidewalks and tons & tons of kids. It really seemed like Pleasantville. All we knew at the time was that we loved the house, the property and the feel of the place. What we didn't know when we purchased the house was that the neighborhood came with an extra "amenity" - it's very own wild peacock.



We, or I should say, Mr. Crackers, didn't discover this fact until he moved into the house alone (while waiting for my son & I to sell our house back in Atlanta) in June - which he came to discover is near the end of the peacock mating season.

He discovered this one night at about 4:00am after he heard what he at first thought were a woman's screams coming from the woods behind our house. After a long and sleepness night, he met a new neighbor, who asked him if he got any sleep with all the racket the peacock was making. Ummm, what? Peacock?

Mr. Crackers, being the inquisitive sort, asked a lot of questions about our new "friend" and then called me the next day filled with all sorts of interesting tidbits. We learned that the peacock had lived in the neighborhood since it had been built 15 years earlier, that he loved peanut butter Captain Crunch and perhaps most importantly that he was a confirmed bachelor with absolutely no peahen with which to mate. This was good news and bad news... The good news, was that there would be no little peacocks running around the street. The bad news was that mating season for this poor guy was a sad and lonely time punctuated by months of loud (& I mean LOUD!) mating calls. A typical mating season lasted from about April - early July. Oddly, the previous owners of our home never mentioned this amenity during the closing process. Hmmmm..

2. Now on to the next question. You know, the one about the peacock poisoning. Outside of mating season, when the peacock understandably, got a little grouchy (19 years is a long time to go without a mate!), he was usually a pretty docile and decent neighbor who would come by occasionally for visits & poop on my front porch, but would generally leave everyone alone. That is, until this year. This year for whatever reason - old age, pent up hormone problems, loneliness - he became really aggressive. He was particularly combative with any service people who happened to be on the street. This meant that garbage collectors, lawn care specialists or anyone else driving a large truck in our little subdivision was subject to the threat of peacock attack! So, when these service people were on our street, we would try to ensure, usually by spraying the peacock with a water hose, that no harm came to these brave men and women.

Unfortunately, I learned over dinner, we were too late to help a garbage collector about a month ago, who fell victim to a peacock attack in my neighbor's driveway. To add insult to injury, he tripped over the curb while fighting off the peacock and fell hard to the ground face first. Thankfully, my neighbor and another garbage collector were able to rush to his aid and chase off the peacock, who felt much less aggressive now that we was being pursued by 3 angry people. Luckily, the man was unhurt and although my neighbor was initially very concerned that he was missing all of his teeth, she learned from him that they were not knocked out in the fall, he just had not put them in that morning (this is completely true - I am not making that up.)

It was the next morning, I was told, that the peacock was found dead in a different neighbor's yard. I am not sure that he was actually poisoned (I don't think anyone actually performed an autopsy). It may have just been a coincidence that he passed on right after this latest attack, but regardless, he has ascended to the big peacock farm in the sky. He was given a modest burial in the land he had called home for the last 19 years.

Now before anyone gets upset & reports this incident to any authorities, I must tell you that he had been increasingly aggressive this year. In addition to besieging the service people I already mentioned, he had also attacked several neighbors, many of whom he had known for years. He was a wild animal, and everyone had grown increasingly nervous about his existence in a neighborhood so filled with small children. And I will state again, that I am not sure that there was any fowl play involved (get it?, and yes I know I am I complete dork).

3 & 4. Next, I'll answer these 2 important questions in tandem. We went to the new Melting Pot restaurant that just opened up in town. I had some cheese fondue followed by fillet mignon and then topped off with dark chocolate fondue. Most importantly, perhaps, I had a couple of their Pomegranate Cosmopolitans, which may have just been my favorite part of the whole meal. Is that so wrong?

5. Now onto our final question. Would a peacock make a good pet for your family? Should you purchase this bird for your loved one this holiday season?

Umm, no. Not unless your "loved one" likes to clean up lots of poop while armed with a push broom and watering hose to fend off attacks from a bird to whom they just fed a handful of Peanut Butter Captain Crunch.

In closing, let me just say that I will miss our peacock. He was a beautiful wild creature who until this year was a pretty good (although sometimes loud) neighbor. I know that he is now living out the rest of eternity in heaven on a peacock farm filled to the brim with peahens. Lots and lots of peahens.