(Many thanks to Patricia Benware for sending this box  – above – of Agatha Christie mysteries, a favorite for the Mansion residents, and a half dozen copies of Classic Car, a magazine that Art, a car-loving resident in my meditation class, will love. Thanks, Patricia – she lives in New Jersey – this is the perfect gift at just the right time. I’ll bring them these books on Tuesday. They will be thrilled.)

Paryese Bates Becker asked me for help in supporting a new idea she has for Christmas this year: an ugly Christmas sweater party. The idea is for the residents to collect all the ugly Christmas sweaters we can gather, and they will wear them to a special Ugluy Sweater Christmas Party.

Christmas is a rough time of year for many of the Mansion residents. Some have families to visit with, and some don’t. This will give them a great laugh.

I was preparing to scout various thrift shops for old and ugly Christmas sweaters, but a blog reader and friend – Wendy Pine – had a better idea. Why not ask the Army Of Good to look through their attics and basements and musty drawers and send their ugly and discarded Christmas sweaters and send them to the Mansion: c/o Paryese Bates Becker, Activities Director, the Mansion, 11 S. Union Avenue, Cambridge, N.Y., 12816?

I think it’s a great idea all around. If you like the idea, please send your old, no longer-used ugly Christmas sweaters to Paryse at the Mansion; the planned party is a few weeks away. 11 S. Union Avenue, Cambridge, N.Y. 12816. I suspect a lot of people have these sweaters lying around gathering dust. We can put them to good use.

What constitutes an ugly Christmas sweater? I can’t say precisely. It’s a personal and individual decision, but we can mess them or mark them up a bit on this end to make them a little uglier if necessary. I define it as any Christmas sweater no longer in use.

I’ll check with my thrift shop/consignment store network and see what I can scrape up.

This is a perfect request for the Army of Good, which has been sending truckloads of art supplies and discarded objects to Sue Silverstein at Bishop Gibbons High School for her very busy art students with the greatest success. Thanks for considering this. I have a good feeling about it.