(We’re not ready, the decorations aren’t up, and we’re still putting on our pants!)
Once upon a time there was a very tiny horse that sat on top of a hill that lurked inside of a sinister and unyielding forest and it whinnied and neighed until the cows came home or until the coffee and pork and beans were ready to eat. No one knew better than the tiny horse what a seriously great deal it had with all the coffee it could drink and the pork and beans it could eat–being tiny, a little went a long way, but there wasn’t a little: there was a lot! Still, it was a lonely life, being a tiny horse, very far and very high away. If only, the tiny horse thought, I could find someone or something to while away the time with, perhaps with a game of chess or checkers or backgammon or something more modern like Stratego, or even just in silence whittling. Not me, the tiny horse thought, I can’t whittle, lacking fingers and thumbs, but it might be comforting to watch or maybe not watch someone whittling away at a piece of wood until some interesting shape emerged or maybe just until the wood all got whittled away. I’m not picky, the tiny horse thought, slurping its coffee and chewing on the pork and beans (“Especially delicious today!” it thought, because what was the point of saying it aloud, there being no one to hear it. And then the tiny horse ruminated, philosophically for a time on what it meant for a tiny horse to say something when there was no one there to hear it. Did it make a sound? The tiny horse brayed (neighed! he was no donkey) with laughter at his silly “philosophical” musings) that were its dietary mainstay and for some reason didn’t have any negative nutritional effects. “Must be magic!” the tiny horse thought, staring moodily at the cows going home, far far away.