Hello Everybody,

Santa here. We've begun the final countdown to Christmas, with less than a week left! Crates of beautifully-wrapped toys and presents are spilling out of the warehouse, and the Sled3000-GT is all waxed and ready to fly!

Rudolph's nose-cozy remains missing, and the poor reindeer are still suffering from lack of sleep. Rufus Instubble tried to cover Rudolph's nose with a sock last night, but Rudolph couldn't breathe, plus the light was still leaking out. We need that cozy back!

Speaking of reindeer, Coach Bryan has arranged for the team to spend a two-day intensive training in the snow tunnel in Vuokatti, Finland! It's really quite an honor -- it's where the Olympic athletes train -- and hopefully it will spark the team back into prime condition.

One more thing happened, this morning during run training, that has me unhappy with one of the reindeer. Blitzen (whom you remember hadn't kept to his training diet by stashing candy in his stall) took a shortcut on the training course yesterday!

One of the elves, Spooky, who had gone into the forest to gather mistletoe, saw the whole thing. Coach Bryan had the reindeer all start from a clearing in the woods, running a long looped trail up a ridge, down and up another, and then back down again. It's called the M trail, because it's shaped like an M.

Now you remember Spooky is the shy elf who never says anything to anyone (even though he's very friendly and has a great smile). But when he saw what Blitzen had done on the M trail, he knew he HAD to tell someone, so when he came out of the woods with his arms loaded with mistletoe, the first person he saw was ME! I was heading towards the R&D lab when Spooky dropped his crop and came running.

It turns out his voice is absolutely incredible -- deep and sonorous, like a professional opera singer's! He has a beautiful voice, and he's been too shy to use it around us!

But the bad news was the information Spooky gave me about Blitzen. I'm so disappointed in him -- our varsity leader! Maybe the sleeplessness has gotten to him, or maybe he just wants to look good in comparison to all the other reindeer. In any case, I need to confer with Coach Bryan and make a change in the order of our reindeer lineup.

I'll let you know what happens.

Love,

Santa