Overcoming the post Christmas doldrums

Watching the Michigan 3-peat highlights now!  This gives me joy - the other one with sad grown men does not.  

It's not freezing, so no skiing.. but playing tennis or pickleball with family while burning end of year vacation time is nice..

I tend to feel the opposite.  I feel better after Christmas is behind us.  Probably just the build-up, gift expectations, family expectations, etc, is a drain.  Then it's relief that it's over.

I get that feeling when football season ends 

I actually look forward to the week between Christmas and New Year's. Things slow down on the billable front and I get to catch up on non-billable tasks that I need to knock out in order to improve efficiency and productivity.

yea the weekend before Xmas to New Years is my favorite time of year. Both kids here for Christmas, they came down Thursday.

they’re leaving tomorrow so a bit sad about that but nice to have the house back to normal with just the wife and I. We can relax and take care of chores, cleaning up etc. before going back to work in January.

excellent vids tho +1

I am having pepper steak to deal with the emotional trauma.

The real struggle starts after the super bowl when we have to collectively wait half a year for any sort of meaningful football again.

Well we do play Alabama next week

Grab a helmet and get back in the game.

For Chanukah, Yule, and Christmas, we received:

a) GE/Baker Hughes seem to respond to big dog legal pressure to find missing inventory from their repair depots. You really cannot hide valuable machinery which requires back to birth records. We'll see how it goes.

a) "a gift from the gods": water coming down (again, merde) from a concrete slab ceiling and down the walls in a newly refurbished condo (which refurb was due to the same issue on a larger scale earlier this year). Found the bad water line pressure fitting in the unit above us; the installing company seems to both own the problem and the repairs. Time to refurb it again on someone else's dimes and find a different place for senior son. This is BS.

b) a gift from Asus + Microsoft: random BSODs from a gaming PC I'm now building with junior son. Looks like firmware issues bombing the BIOS (a first for me, honestly). The nice thing is that after decades of him being my "extra hand(s)" building stuff --- this time I was the "helper". It felt like a proper hand off to him of adult tasks/responsibilities. He *still* struggles listening, a bit, when I nudge about problems that he's going to see but I now let him struggle and find his solutions. If he owns the problem, the solutions are more satisfying to him. I am loving this "Dad of adult sons" role. I take a quiet mental bow every time they stumble and recover. Planet benefits from good men like him and his brother. Great job, Dad (and Mom).

c) the enthusiastic presence of both boys with us for meals and Cruis'n Blast on the big screen. Goofy times - Mom and I loved them still "playing a game" on our couch.

d) Saban v Harbaugh. The Showdown on New Year's Day. Great way to start what's going to be a great year.

No doldrums here. 👍😁

Just a random thought between Thanksgiving and New Years....

MSU and OSU blog operators should be extremely grateful (and/or directly sending cash) to Connor Stallions for this year.  The main M "cheating" thread at tRCMB now has over 30k posts and 2.25MM page views.  I am not internet savvy, but I have to believe that this represents a sizeable revenue stream for these people. 

I would also guess that most OSU sites have seen similar traffic, but I refuse to spend much time there -- at least at tRCMB I can occasionally see MI-centric topics not common here in the desert...

No doldrums here. Christmas is nice, but also busy and potentially stressful. Glad to have gone through it, but it's nice to wind it back a little.

I’m working on mastering the old fashioned cocktail. It’s my only goal of my week off. Almost time for smoke infusion. 

Only 2 days of work this week, I’m flying high! 
 

also, the final season of Letterkenny drops today on Hulu so there’s no way it can be a bad day (highly recommend the show if you’re struggling with doldrums)

This week is definitely great, especially for those with down time. Presents still new, and plenty of time to decorate for our annual NYE (family) party. 

For me, it gets tough once the decorations get put away (indoor and outdoor). Then, you are just left with the two snowiest, coldest months with only really our Superbowl party to look forward to (and I guess valentine's day, which we try to make a big thing for the kiddos).

But everything is all good once we get to March, Spring starts to think about coming, have St Patrick's day - and of course, March madness (even better if can ever go dancing again)!

SAD is definitely a thing.

I appreciate your concern for my mental health.  The guys in the white jackets are telling me I'm doing fine.

Day 5 with the in-laws. 4 more days and a colonoscopy to go.

I don't think "doldrums" is quite the right word.

This is the best day, the insanity and exhaustion of xmas is over and now I can chill...except for all the shit i have to put together and set up, ugh.

Love that 3-peat video! Thanks Man!

I golfed today… in Michigan. As fun as it was I very much miss being able to ski this time of year 

What are these “doldrums” of which you speak? I just opened my two French hens. Got 10 days of gifts to go.