When you ask most people what things they are afraid of, there is a list of usual suspects most of the time. A lot of people are afraid of heights. I am, so I can understand that fear quite well. My wife is afraid of spiders. I am afraid of snakes. My wife doesn't mind snakes so much and I don't really have a concrete opinion of spiders, so it works out for both of us.

If I have already done a column on this particular topic, please forgive me. I try my best not to repeat anything, but it's inevitable that I repeat a phrase, a sentence, or possibly a whole topic. I used to be able to access the previous columns where I stored them on the laptop, but my trusty old laptop bit the dust and I cannot access my archives. That said, I ask your forgiveness if I have broached this subject before. 

After a few weeks off, I'm returning with the first column of a new month, year, and decade. 

(Note: This column was originally published in 2015 and the author has requested it run every year around Christmastime.)

I’d like to take a small survey of the readers of this column. It’s a simple question. How many of you believe in Santa Claus?

As the three of you who read this column already know, I took off last week to celebrate Thanksgiving. While enjoying my time off from the column, I was thinking of some things I could do with my spare time and what to do if this big-time columnist thing would ever come to a conclusion.

As we get closer to Thanksgiving, I, like a lot of other people, begin to take inventory of all for which I am thankful.

I was looking through the TV listings — well, that scrolling thing on the television that tells you the television schedule — and I noticed that now, one week before Thanksgiving, the Christmas shows and movies have begun to appear. 

In an effort to be a more transparent journalist, I am informing the readers of this column that it was written about five minutes after I ate some hazelnut almond biscotti ice cream directly from the container. 

It's no big secret that I am not a North Carolina native. I've lived here for almost 10 years. I wasn't one of those folks who move from a northern place to North Carolina and try to make it like it was back home. I came here to get away from all that nonsense, so you don't have to worry about me being one of the transplants who moves here only to complain that life was so much better back home. 

When our younger daughter moved back home a few months ago, we knew it was going to be a bit of an adjustment having her in the house when we had just gotten used to her being out on her own.