next week's column: The Mustache Who Saved Christmas or: A Hairy Situation

Santa’s back! I announced his demise in my last column, but some good elves -- I’m thinking my daughter Charis and her boyfriend -- reconditioned the jolly old elf while I was in Missouri last week. They cleaned his graying beard, replaced his burned out bulb, and removed the wrinkled, unreadable “Ho ho ho” from his hand. When Emily and I arrived home there he was, waving from the front yard: jolly again, cleaned up, and maybe a little tipsy from eggnog.

So, to celebrate, I present you with one of my occasional attempts at poetry. Here’s the story of another time when the Christmas spirit was saved, inspired by my girlfriend’s nickname for me as well as, possibly, too much pasta just before bedtime.



THE MUSTACHE WHO SAVED CHRISTMAS

( You don’t free a mustache, everyone knows – They’re usually led around by the nose. )