Moderate jaw-drop

Okay, we're browsing down the aisles of a local Brooks Pharmacy for this and that, and pass the paperback-and-magazine rack. And what does Wife spot?

Copy of DRAGON'S EYE mass-market edition. In with the assorted bodice-rippers and best-sellers.

Must be the beefcake Gary on the cover...

The downside of living with a professional naturalist...

Okay, we went looking for an . . . artificial . . . Merchantmas tree and found puzzled amusement -- several of the constructs defy taxonomy. Mixes of spruce needles and pine, Douglas fir and balsam fir, spruce and balsam...

Wife won't buy chimeras. Says they'd drive her crazy, every time she looks at them.