Happy New Year everyone! We are bringing in 2005 with wind, rain, and very cool temperatures in the islands. The revelers from last night might think they are still foggy brained, but the fog is real. The mist and rain in the air is so thick I cannot see St. John, which is quite close to St. Thomas.

After listening to the neighborhood celebrate until 1 a.m. last night I gave up and went to bed. Was awakened at dawn to dueling roosters. Turned the fan up higher to drown them out and went back to sleep. These are the kinds of days that deserve a hot cup of tea and a book. I would say in front of a fireplace, but those are not common down here.

Or a good chic flic. My "daughter" Annika (foreign exchange student who joined our family years ago in Alaska) who lives in Finland said she and friends went to see the second Bridget Jones movie and that it was wonderful mindless entertainment, but no one laughed during the scenes set in Thailand. Thousands of Scandinavians died in the tsunami and the region is reeling from the blow of so many deaths. These are sparsely populated countries to begin with.

I do enjoy the Brit chic lit and movies and the slang. I had just gotten used to snogging being kissing in Rennison's Angus, Thongs, and Full-Frontal Snogging and its companion titles, when along comes Tyne O'Connell's Pulling Princes. Pulling is defined in the book's glossary of Brit terms as "to make out, score, kiss, etc." Hmmm - wonder how extensive the "etc." is!

In O'Connell's vicarious look into the lives of girls in a posh British private school, pulling refers to kissing. The more boys you pull the higher your popularity quotient. Calypso, the "freaky American"who doesn't fit in, decides to start out the school year with a boyfriend back home in LA (her mom's gay personal assistant), but has no idea that her popularity will soar to great heights during the school year - to the point that HRH, Prince Freddie, bestows upon her her first kiss. Honey, whose name should be Arsenic, had her eyes on Freddie and attempts to make Calypso's life miserable, but her vicious behavior back fires on her when the girls support Calypso. The escapades of this group of rich Brits and a LA born American is quite hilarious and would be a good curl up and read on a rainy day book, if I hadn't already read it. I started reading Frederick's Head Games and I don't think I am not going to be snort-laughing over this one.

All for now. And to the person who keeps blowing his/her car horn going around the corner by our apt. - "Don't get your knickers in a bind!" :-)