A Christmas mini-anthology

I have noticed my wonderfully gifted writer friends posting holiday stories all over the Web. This morning, I decided that I'd aggregate links to those that I could find as a sort of Christmas anthology. These pieces are awesome: some are dark, some are funny, but they're all entertaining. For my friends who celebrate, and for those who bask in the residual holiday cheer: enjoy!

Reindeer Games, a noirish tale of reindeers and fat men, by urban fantasy author Kat Richardson

One Foot in the Grave, which posits that a spot by the chimney may not be the only place for a stocking, by science fiction/fantasy author J. Steven York

Elf Shit, the dark truth about Santa and his elves, by science fiction/fantasy author Jay Lake

Bedlam Inn, a Victorian Christmas fantasy, by alt-history fantasy author Madeleine Robins.

And some random holiday delights:

NORAD Tracks Santa: I follow him every year. At this writing, he's over Kazakhstan.

An eel-powered Christmas tree in (where else?) Japan.

Holiday fiction from the New York Times by Tea Obreht

For the Seattle locals, 5 ideas for the week between Christmas and New Year's

Merry happy!

Random thoughts on Christmas eve

I can't count how many friends have posted either here or on Facebook about the enormously expensive/extremely heavy/unusually shaped/other modified adjective piece of meat acquired for Christmas day dinner. Either it's a thing this year or I just never noticed it before. Funny.

I had a perfectly lovely evening with three friends tonight, but for some reason I was feeling prickly, short-tempered, and poked at, and I'm afraid I snapped a couple of times when I shouldn't have. Not very holiday spirited of me and I feel bad about that. I'm going to write apology notes before I go to bed. Seems like the right thing to do.

We saw True Grit this evening. If Jeff Bridges and Hailee Steinfeld aren't nominated for Academy Awards, then they wuz robbed. Bet they will be nominated, though, both of them. Excellent movie. Just excellent. Bridges' Rooster Cogburn is an awesome character, and I believed his respect for Steinfeld's Mattie in a way I never quite did with Wayne and Darby. And if Steinfeld continues to act and not get drawn into stupid teen comedies, she'll be a force to be reckoned with.

I hope Spanky is in a better mood tomorrow. He's been as snappish all day as I was tonight.

::grumble::