It will give us more time to focus. We had a lot of time off during the Christmas holidays, but we were able to stay focused and come back and win the holiday tournament at Chicago State.

I've never spoken to Coach Weber about Patrick. Big-time head coaches know they talk to the high school coach. This is why the top city kids are going outside the state. I'm not trying to belittle Illinois. My son goes there. I love Illinois.

There are many things from which I might have derived good, by which I have not profited, I dare say,' returned the nephew. 'Christmas among the rest. But I am sure I have always thought of Christmas time, when it has come round—apart from the veneration due to its sacred name and origin, if anything belonging to it can be apart from that—as a good time; a kind, forgiving, charitable, pleasant time; the only time I know of, in the long calendar of the year, when men and women seem by one consent to open their shut-up hearts freely, and to think of people below them as if they really were fellow-passengers to the grave, and not another race of creatures bound on other journeys. And therefore, uncle, though it has never put a scrap of gold or silver in my pocket, I believe that it has done me good, and will do me good; and I say, God bless it!

When purchasing gifts becomes the focal point of the season, we lose focus on what's truly important.

Christmas it seems to me is a necessary festival; we require a season when we can regret all the flaws in our human relationships: it is the feast of failure, sad but consoling.

The market was very quiet because most investors didn't want to take any significant positions ahead of the Christmas holidays.