Warm Holiday Greetings from my Important Writer Friends.

 

I hate to brag, but I've got a lot of important reporter friends who hang on my every post. These eminent writers have taken the time from their busy schedules to email me personally with warm holiday greetings. Here's just a sampling:

Kadet, Anne	6:36 AM (25 minutes ago)
to me

Hello!

I am away and won't be checking this in-box until Monday, December 27. 

If the matter is urgent please contact my editor Jim Fanelli at James.Fanelli@wsj.com.

Happy holidays!

Anne

I am on vacation and checking email infrequently. I'll be back at work on in 2021. Happy Holidays. And please, wear a mask.

--

Sheryl Gay Stolberg

Washington Correspondent (covering health policy)

The New York Times -- Washington D.C.

(202) 862-0366 (office)

(301) 332-0991 (cell/Signal/Confide)

Twitter: @SherylNYT

Thanks for your email. I'm out of the office and will respond when I return.


--
--
Chip Cutter
REPORTER
[image: The Wall Street Journal] <http://www.wsj.com/>
M: +1 513 378 5519 <+1+513+378+5519>   O: +1 212 659 1141 <+1+212+659+1141>
E: chip.cutter@wsj.com
A: 1211 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10036
Sign up for our weekly *Careers* newsletter: wsj.com/careers
<https://www.wsj.com/careers>

I am out of office until Monday, January 4, and will respond to your
email when I return. If this is an urgent matter, you can call me at
718-781-4256. Thanks!



--

*David Ewalt*
REPORTER / STRUCTURED DATA
[image: The Wall Street Journal] <http://www.wsj.com/>
O:  212-416-2689
C:  718-781-4256
E:  david.ewalt@wsj.com
T:  @dewalt <https://twitter.com/dewalt>
A:  1211 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10036
[image: Dow Jones] <http://www.dowjones.com/>

Greetings! I'm out of the office through Monday, Dec. 28. I will not be checking messages at this time. Editor Phil Pina can be reached at ppina@pioneerpress.com.

Many thanks!

--

Frederick Melo St. Paul Bureau Chief / Reporter Pioneer Press 10 River Park Plaza, Saint Paul, MN 55107 651-228-2172 / 651-398-5534 (c) fmelo@pioneerpress.com Kapner, Suzanne 6:26 AM (38 minutes ago) to me I will be on vacation from December 24 through January 3 and may be slow to respond to emails. For urgent matters only, please contact russell.adams@wsj.com. -- Suzanne Kapner Reporter The Wall Street Journal I am out of the office until Monday, January 4, and will respond to your email when I return. Wishing you a happy and healthy New Year!  Tara Kelly Vice President of Policy and Programs The Municipal Art Society of New York @masnyc | 212.935.3960 x1258 John Schwartz 6:23 AM (43 minutes ago) to me Thanks for your note, but I am taking vacation days, and will be slow to respond to email. Please contact me after I get back on January 4. Here's hoping for a better new year. Best wishes, John Schwartz -- John Schwartz <https://www.nytimes.com/by/john-schwartz> The New York Times <http://www.nytimes.com/> twitter.com/jswatz Telephone: 212 556 7353 My new book: "This Is the Year I Put my Financial Life in Order <https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/538767/this-is-the-year-i-put-my-financial-life-in-order-by-john-schwartz/> Hello, I am out of the office and not checking email regularly. If you need to reach someone immediately regarding news please email Patrick McGroarty at patrick.mcgroarty@wsj.com. -- ------- Jesse Newman The Wall Street Journal Mobile: +1 312 697 9418 Email: jesse.newman@wsj.com Twitter: @jessenewman13

Today's Timericks.

 

A tofu wrap will Santa get

with almond milk tonight;

his cookie days are over --

he must change his appetite.

No sugar and no dairy

in this brave new world of ours.

Kris Kringle ain't so jolly now

without his candy bars!

A bitcoin rally is announced,

but what care I for that?

I don't have one satoshi

so the news just leaves me flat.

Had I invested earlier

I'd now have ample means

for caviar and lobster tails

instead of pork & beans.

It's Xmas at the tavern,

where barflies mourn the loss

of their fav'rite venue

for guzzling the sauce.

Going out of bizness,

the local bar & grill

leaves the alcoholic

with naught but yuletide chill.

Gathered home.

 

Gathered home I long to be,

now and for eternity.

Final haven, sheltered shore;

where my sorrows come no more.

Bind my wandering heart to thee,

who roamed the paths of Galilee.

Today's timericks.

 

The issuing of Pardons is a presidential perk;

even when that president is nothing but a jerk.

Perhaps he thinks St. Peter at the Pearly Gates will wink

at his indiscretions and let him into heaven slink.

An autocrat like Mr. Xi

frolics like a lamb, you see,

when at first he comes along --

singing that old siren song

of detente and sweet accord,

then from scabbard pulls a sword;

Chops some heads and stomps on treaties,

telling us "Go eat your Wheaties!"

Something about drinking beer

keeps the sipper from much fear.

Corona is imbibed with ease,

despite the rumor of disease;

when it comes to alcohol

you can't discourage us at all!

Prose Poem: Listicals

 

There may be a Santa Claus,

but there is no list.

I'm talkin' about The List --

the one that has the names

of all those who get to leave

Earth somehow or other

 before the asteroid hits

or the monsters invade or the 

oceans suck all the continents under.

You know, that list.

It's in a hundred movies and TV shows.

Not to mention novels, short stories,

and probably dozens of dirty limericks.

But I gotta tell ya --

I've searched for the past twenty years

for that confounded list,

hunting high and low,

suborning officials of the highest rank

and interrogating lowlife ratfinks.

The salarymen of Japan know nothing of it.

And the bushmen of the Kalahari simply shrug

their bare shoulders.

So once I satisfied myself The List didn't exist

 I decided to fill that obvious need with my

own List --

with a money-back guarantee; if you didn't 

get off the planet in time, your five-hundred dollar

fee would be cheerfully refunded.

So far, the following persons have signed up

and paid in advance:

Robert Reed

Nathan Draper

Robert Strong

Michael Fedo

Clarke Woodger

Bart Seliger

Oscar Halvorson

Sue Ellen Yund

Jed Boal

Jennifer Graham

Peter Rosen

Ethan Bauer

Joseph Palazollo

John Schwartz

Dan Kelly

Tara Kelly

Johnny Diaz

Chip Cutter

Penelope Green

Don Van Natta Jr

William Wan

Coral Davenport

Paul Farhi

Andrew Ackerman

Amy Wang

Christina Zhao

Rachel Abrams

Margaret Young

Bruce Young

Ted Freedman

Motoko Rich

Peter Baker

Noah Bierman

Cindy Boren

Amy Snyder

Bruce Veldhuisen

Tom Hanks

George Clooney

Jordana Green

Ben Ellis

Lizette Alvarez

Joe Morgenstern

Rob and Laura Petri

Jacob Bunge

Mark Mauer

Jerry Seinfeld

Mitt Romney (and family)

 Jesse Newman

and others too numerous

to mention.

Anyone reading this post

and wanting to take advantage

of my December Sale

(two passengers for the price of one)

should contact any member of the

outgoing Trump administration --

they're ALL paid in full, and, in fact,

eager to get off world as soon as possible.

They'll sell you a ticket pronto, pup.  

At the going down of the sun there was no darkness

 

The scriptures say one moonless night

this land was bathed in broad daylight.

A sign that in far Bethlehem

the Christ was born, all woe to stem.

And wicked men did topple o'er,

their lethal plans secure no more.

Today's timericks

 

Uncle Sam says Walmart stores

pushed opioids like cheap s'mores.

Walmart counters with the claim

that Uncle Sam should take the blame.

The only winners that I see

are lawyers with their big fat fee.

Amazon, upon the sly,

has a finger in each pie --

shoes and food and books and lamps;

giving rivals money cramps.

Bezos seems to want to try

to emulate the octopi.

I'm old and gray and full of smarts,

and like to lean on shopping carts.

So heed my counsel, boys and girls:

Depend on swine and not on pearls.

Wealth brings friends quick to renege;

but you can always kiss a pig.

(Dedicated to The Naked Cowboy of

New York City.)

Here's to buskers everywhere,

who, dressed in only underwear,

strum guitars or practice mime,

and rarely ever make a dime.

They are rich in chutzpah, chum --

thank heavens we can't see their bum!

 

Prose Poem: The Inspector.

 

"No! No! No!" cried the Inspector shrilly,

when I tried to hang a string of pickled walnuts

on my Christmas tree.

"That item is NOT on the approved list."

I was about fed up with him.

He had arrived the week before,

shown me his credentials,

and then proceeded to lord it 

over me ever since.

Each bauble, bangle, and bead

had to bear his imprimatur

or be tossed on the dust heap.

I'm all for enforcing tradition --

but this was pouring it on a bit thick.

I had already complained to the Home Office;

like always, those bureaucratic fuddy duddies

had gabbled and gobbled and done nothing.

The Inspector stayed put; spraying down my

tree with rosewater once a day and

keeping track of the number of fallen needles

on the carpet in a miniature chapbook. 

The last straw in the creche came

when he told me the angel on top of 

my tree was too amorphous. 

"It looks like a sack of potatoes" he said.

"So?" I replied. I was in a mood to feud.

"Find something more like a seraph 

or cherub" he rasped.

"The devil I will!" I replied hotly. 

That angel was a gift from my phrenologist. 

"You know the penalty for noncompliance"

he said ominously. The candlelight made

his shadow dance like a demented fiend

on the damask curtains.

"Do your worst!" I shouted. 

"I'm all done with Tree Inspectors,

and Sugar Plum Enumerators and Blixem Collectors!"

I crammed his inspector's cap on his head

and pushed him out the front door.

I had the satisfaction of watching him

stumble down the front steps and fall

on his face in the gray murky slush.

Then I packed my bags,

set fire to the house,

and, under an assumed name,

 took the night boat to Scituate.

As far as the world knows,

Clement Clarke Moore

died in a house fire on Christmas Eve.

"

This life is a probationary state

 

This life is a probation,

to see which we will choose --

to live with God forever,

or His alliance lose.

You cannot have it both ways,

mixing right with vice;

you'll either be rewarded

or have to pay the price.

Prose Poem: Dead Sailors.

 

There was one too many in the pool.

I did a surreptitious head count, just like everyone else.

"Alright!" yelled our instructor, 

a short woman with bright red hair,

"When I call your name hold up your

hand -- and keep it up!"

That's hard to do when you're in a fourteen

foot deep chlorine scented pool at the Rec Center.

But we managed. All of us.

She ticked our names off the list,

her voice muffled through the mask.

Then she did it again. The morning sun

glared through the plate glass windows.

Our class time was leaking away --

we only had one hour. 

Most of us had jobs to get to.

"I still count thirteen, and there's only supposed

to be twelve in the deep water pool at one time"

she said helplessly, throwing up her hands in despair.

So we had a dirty stowaway among us --

too cowardly to give himself or herself up.

The lifeguard did a head count.

"Yup" he said stoically. "Thirteen."

"Do we have a volunteer who'll get out

so we can get started with class?"

asked our instructor hopefully.

No one volunteered.

We refused to make eye contact with

each other.

We just floated there, silent and flabby --

like dead sailors.