10 tips for making better conversation

As someone who aspires to becoming a witty conversationalist, I found a number of these tips
https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/fulfillment-any-age/201712/10-must-know-tips-making-better-conversations
to be particularly useful, such as the tip to listen with one's full attention instead of worrying about what one is going to say next. I notice the tips did not include Kestrell's number one conversation starter: Read anything new lately?
Also, I just realized that the holiday season must seem like a marathon for those who feel anxious about having to make conversation, so I'll just point out the tip about silence being okay, too.

An example of the disability tax

I just made the mistake of reading a gift guide for visually impaired peopleand the first item was a talking color identifier ...for $95. $95 people!! How much did your color identifier app cost? Also, the talking version only IDs 40 colors.

The holly and the ivy

I am planning on this year being the year I plant a hedge but, for now, I have a small (very small) holly tree in a pot in my window. I also have an ivy so the holly doesn't get lonely. The holly is very well-behaved but, no matter how many times I try to train the ivy, it keeps reaching for the box of Fruit Loops. Or maybe it's reaching for my plush coyote.

I may have to write the fan fic for the holly and the ivy. And the coyote.

Winter Solstice blessing

This is the blessing I asked Teenybuffalo to read at the close of our Solstice party:

Some say that ever 'gainst that season comes,
Wherein our Saviour's birth is celebrated,
This bird of dawning singeth all night long;
And then, they say, no spirit dare stir abroad;
The nights are wholesome; then no planets strike,
No fairy takes, nor witch hath power to charm,
So hallow’d and so gracious is the time.
Hamlet Act I, Scene I