I lost count of the number of envelopes I stuffed this morning, and my back started to give out so I finished around noon. To ease my pain I shopped for a few Christmas presents at the Natural History Museum store.

The sun keeps appearing and disappearing, but the day is bright enough to keep me happy. Gracie, my live barometer, stayed out in the yard a long while: the longer she’s out, the nicer the day. It’s sweatshirt weather.

When I was a kid, Woolworth’s uptown was my favorite store. It was an old store with a wooden floor that sloped in places and squeaked when you walked on it. The cash registers were in the front by the windows. The toys were in the second aisle. Comic books were on a rack toward the front. We’d always pick up and read a couple while we were there. Nobody ever yelled at us to put them down. I remember the balsa model planes we’d buy for 10 cents. They’d have only a couple of flights before some piece would break, usually the tail-piece. Woolworth’s was where we bought our kites and string. It was also our Christmas shopping mecca. With a dollar in hand, we could find something for the whole family. For my dad, it was a white handkerchief every Christmas. He used handkerchiefs all of his life. My mother was a bit more difficult. I’d have to go up and down the aisles until I found the perfect gift. Perfume in small glass bottles made a great present. I suspect it smelled pretty bad, but I thought the etched bottles were pretty. My sisters got doll bottles or doll rattles and my brother often got that plane from me.

I wrapped those gifts myself and used plenty of tape so no one could peek though my sister Moe probably did. She was known for peeking through tiny holes she’d rip in the wrapping paper and was an expert at not getting caught. Over time, she has parlayed that talent into being able to guess what is in just about every wrapped Christmas present. She does her parlor trick on Christmas Eve and scores nearly 100%. Outwitting Moe is one of the challenges of Christmas. It takes ingenuity and guile, and I have both. This year Moe goes down!