Welcome to the Only Child Diaries Podcast. I'm your host, Tracy Wallace. Have you ever felt like you didn't receive the how-to brochure on life? That you didn't get enough guidance about major life issues? So did I. You don't have to be an only child to feel this way. In my podcast, we'll explore some of the best ways to better navigate adulthood. In doing so, with humor delight. Welcome everyone to the Only Child Diaries Podcast.

Today I'm gonna catch you up on some things and well, talk about Christmas. It's Christmas week here and everywhere, right? How does the song go? Do they know it's Christmas? I think everybody knows it's Christmas. There's increased traffic, the stores are busy, everyone's got that kind of semi-crazy look in their eyes everywhere you go. Anyway, yes, it's Christmas. The weather's been really wonderful here in SoCal, but it's changing. And next week, coming up in a few days, we're gonna get a lot of rain here in Los Angeles. And I mean a lot. Well, I've heard estimates anywhere from five to ten inches, depending on the area that we live in. And well, even five inches is a lot for us. For me, I'm concerned, of course, because I put a lot of effort into the decorations out in the front yard with my friend Lauren. And there's a lot of stuff out there, and most everything is outdoor friendly. The things that aren't will be up on the porch. But when they get saturated with rain, everything automatically for safety shuts down. The electrical system shuts down, which means it not only gets muddy out there, but it gets dark. None of the lights will work, none of the inflatables will inflate, and everything will be kind of coated with a splattering of mud all over it. Still, I'm grateful if that's all we have, because last year, right after the first of January, we had to deal with the winds, the tremendous winds that turned into the fires. And that started on I think January 7th. So we're coming up on the year anniversary of that. So anything that's not that windy or that creates a fire situation is is okay, I guess. But I'd rather not have the torrential rains really. But I mean, could it have just waited until I took the decorations down? Does it have to start before Christmas when I've put all that work into it? Anyway, I digress. So, yes, we're getting ready for rain. There's really not much you can do to get ready for it. I mean, it's coming and it's gonna go all over the place. But this time, in in addition to being worried about the decorations, I'm also worried because it seems that I have some sort of an issue in the backyard with water. I don't really know what that issue is, but there's an area of the yard that, well, now remember, I grew up here. And yes, I moved back with my husband, but I spent a good amount of time here growing up through my college years, through my young adult years, and even when I wasn't living here, I would go out in the backyard, right? And so this particular area of the yard, I have never seen the cement wet on its own. There's not necessarily a water source that I know of that would cause this cement to be wet. And yet it is. It's like a mystery. It's well, it's it's another reason why a house is always the gift that keeps on giving, right? So the plumber came uh yesterday, took a kind of a quick look at it, asked me some questions. I had sent him a video, but he said he wanted to look at it in person. And he has a plan, but he has to come back next week. Hopefully he'll come back next week, but it's gonna be raining. Anyway, he we do have a plan, but I don't know where the water's coming from. And right now it's not you know causing any damage uh that I know of, but water, excessive water is always problematic if you're a homeowner, among other things. And water damage always to me spells expensive. So anyway, uh there's that. So yes, the decorations and the water, it's yeah, and the rain. It's wonderful. But looking forward to some extra days off, some extra rest, I have to say that this week, um, for whatever reason, I just felt I had well, I had three days where I just felt really tired and really just not in the mood for anything. Uh and I wasn't getting sick, I didn't get sick, I didn't feel sick, I just felt really tired. And that's just not like me because I have a lot of energy uh and you know, I like to go, go, go. But I felt really tired. And, you know, my mantra now is try to get as much sleep as you can. And I was sleeping, but I just still felt tired, but happy to report that I do feel better. I feel back to my old energy self. So it just didn't seem to, you know, no matter what I did, I felt exhausted. And that could be because I'm still doing a lot, right? I'm still I still have to do a lot. I mean, Bill's recovery is still going at an upward trend, but there's still a lot that I have to do for him. There's still things that he can't do for himself. He's been walking in the house, which is good. Um, but you know, I have to keep moving things out of the way for him. Um, things that the cat has put in place, or things that the dog moves, or, you know, whatever. And so I have to make sure that the path is cleared. Um the, you know, the Christmas decorations are out of the way, things like that. So uh it's still a lot. You know, our I think I might have told you that our washing machine broke, and that was back in I mean, was it April? Was it May? So I've been going to the uh laundromat since then, and I found a guy through a friend who thinks he can fix the washer because I was willing to buy a new washer, and I would have just done that, except that the space uh the new washers are larger, they're wider, um, and we only have like a half an inch to spare, and the new washers are like an inch and a half wider, so it meant that we would have to take out a cabinet. And um, and again, that's my plumber, and he was gonna come back and do that, but he didn't. Anyway, found a guy that said he could find the part that we needed, and he's now found it, but now we're waiting for him to be able to come because with the holidays, you know, it slows you down, right? It slows everybody, it slows everything down because it's the holiday. So uh anyway, going to the laundromat. Laundry in general is not one of my favorite things. I feel like if there's a hell, it's a laundromat or it's something to do with laundry, because I hate laundry. But I admit that if I ever have a working washing machine again in the house, I will never complain because it's so much better than schlepping all your stuff to a laundromat where sometimes the washers smell bad. I've learned now I go in and I smell each washer and I find the one that smells the best. Because some of them don't smell very good. I mean, they smell like mold or they smell dirty or they smell like I don't I don't know what. So at least I want to find one that smells better. I mean, you know, talk about challenges, but because I don't want my clothes to smell like dirt, right? I mean, anyway, uh yeah, so there's that, so yeah, I've been doing a lot. I, you know, and I feel like I've been sleeping, but anyway, yeah, looking forward to some more time off, which I always feel like I get lazy around Christmas because they sit around too much, but there's always so much to do. Um, and I don't know if you feel that way, but I think everybody kind of becomes lazy around Christmas time, and you don't really want to do anything. This is how I feel. Like I don't really want to do anything, I want to just be lazy, I want to just sit around the house and do nothing, but if it's raining, then I can't really, it's gonna be harder to do stuff anyway, right? So, here regardless. Uh yeah. Yeah, still have to walk the dog. Um, our neighbors have been walking her, but they're going away for I think, what, nine days uh to go back east to see their families, which is great. Um, and then the dog's gonna look at me and be like, you're it? Because every day about 3:30, she starts getting excited that her friends are coming to take her for a walk. And I hate to tell her, but it's just gonna be me. Uh but I mean she she loves to go on a walk, whoever takes her. But, you know, I think sometimes she likes our neighbors even better than than me. Um, but anyway, maybe she likes them equally. She greets them with happy tail wags and joyous, you know, she's jumping and she's very excited, so um, that's it. So just, you know, we didn't do a tree inside, we don't do trees. My husband and I don't really exchange gifts because we're really kind of past that. We don't have, you know, family. We just have his brother here in town. We don't have kids in the family, right? We don't do um stuff like that. So very easy, very low-key holiday. Um, maybe some more eating, but there's always eating. But that's kind of where that's at. Watching Christmas movies. Yeah, first world problems. Worried about my Christmas decorations. Speaking of which, we did pick up another country in the listener list. Um, now we're in 68 countries, so thank you very much. Not sure who the new country is, but I did see the list, and we're we have listeners in almost 700 cities, which is really exciting. So thank you for listening. Um very, very touched that you're listening, and uh, I want to wish everybody a very Merry Christmas and best wishes for a happy, prosperous, and healthy new year. This is really um very important. We all have a good new year coming into 2026. It's hard to believe, but it's true. I will keep you posted on other things, but for now, uh I'm just gonna laze around and binge something on TV. And next week we'll tackle another topic together. I hope you'll join me.

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