My son, Alex asked what I wanted for Xmas -  I said "$6000."  He asked "anything else?"  I said "a responsible adult".  He said "I'll bring chocolate."  Good kid.  He was here for almost two weeks - I really enjoyed the company and I loved...

First, a bit of backstory with minimal relevance to the subject of this actual post... my mom and her family escaped from Estonia when the country was invaded by Russia (creepily similar to what's going on now in Ukraine?). The story is full of exciting adventures and devastating loss and should be a...