Welcome to Commaspliceville. Can I get you a drink?
Wednesday, December 16, 2009
Now THAT's irony, Alanis Morissette
What with all the H1N1 going around, and the fact that I've been cooking/baking my butt off for the past several days, I have washed my hands so many times that they've begun to crack. And hey, guess what can get in through hand cracks? GERMS.
So as I sit here all crampy and shaky and cold-sweaty going through box after box of tissues, I can't help thinking, "Wouldn't it be funny if I came down with the pig flu right before TWENTY-FIVE PEOPLE OMG arrive at my house for a big party?"
Look here, people. I'm not finishing up my cookies and gift-wrapping and whatnot ahead of time because I'm a monster of efficiency. I'm doing it because (a) there are going to be TWENTY-FIVE PEOPLE AT MY HOUSE THIS WEEKEND OMG and (b) my grandmother is in hospice and pretty much could go anytime, requiring me to travel halfway across the country smack in the middle of the holidays for a funeral. And I would like to be able to relax and enjoy my TWENTY-FIVE HOUSEGUESTS OMG and/or my grief without worrying about what still needs doing.
This COULD work out brilliantly. The TWENTY-FIVE PEOPLE OMG are definitely coming AND THE FIRST BATCH GETS HERE IN THREE DAYS OMG SRSLY and I think I have everything in place for that, so that's all good.
If, God forbid, my grandma does not make it through the holidays and I have to bug out to the midwest for a few days, DH and the kids will have cookies and goodies and all the decorations will be out and the presents will be wrapped and ready to go under the tree.
And if, Deo volente (provided she's not in pain, etc.), my grandma DOES make it through the holidays, then once my guests are gone I will have four blissful pre-Christmas days of RELAXATION, with no cookies to bake or presents to wrap or any of that.
Four days of GLUHWEIN UND SPRITZ, people. As holiday goals go, I've seen worse.
I did not intend to wrap all the gifts today. No, I only intended to pull them all out of the closet, sort them, and figure out what needed a bag and what needed paper and what we were missing, wrappings-wise.
Four hours later, it turns out all we're missing is a giant bag of shiny stick-on bows.
Magnolia trees At night Sparkling bright Fields of cotton Look Wintery white When it's Christmas time In New Orleans
A barefoot choir In prayer Fills the air Mississippi folks Are gathering there When it's Christmas time In New Orleans
You'll see A dixieland Santa Claus Leading the band To a good old Creole beat And golly what a spirit You can only hear it Down on Basin Street Your cares will disappear When you hear Hallelujah St. Nicholas is here When it's Christmas time In New Orleans
You'll see A dixieland Santa Claus Leading the band To a good old Creole beat And golly what a spirit You can only hear it Down on Basin Street Your cares will disappear When you hear Hallelujah Old St. Nicholas is here When it's Christmas time In New Orleans
When it's Christmas time in In New Orleans - Louis Armstrong, "Christmas in New Orleans"
Satchmo! I love this song. I could only find one video of it, and it's not much to look at, but hey! There's a Billie Holiday bonus at the end there for you.
So I woke up this morning and my hip was 99% better. That's how it works with me -- crippled by debilitating pain one day, fine the next. So weird and random, I know. I may not be entirely human.
It's a good thing my hip was better because I had so many errands to run today that I had to type up a bulleted list. And it was two pages long, OMG. And I was doing SO WELL with it, until the big giant liquor warehouse was completely out of the booze my dad wanted for Christmas (shut up, we're Irish) and then the tiny little Sephora near the big giant liquor warehouse did not have the specific item I wanted to get my mom. Bastards!
That is the point at which I began to have a Very Bad Day, but then! While I was on my way home after errand #22, zipping around poky oldsters in my badass Hyundai and almost inadvertently committing multiple squirrelcides, the Pearl Bailey and Hot Lips Page version of "Baby It's Cold Outside" came on the radio. And suddenly everything was okay again.
And then I stopped by my tiny little neighborhood liquor store and they had my dad's booze! For cheap!
And then I came home and ordered my mom's thingie online, along with a few items for myself (I EARNED THEM) and the girl.
And so as of noon today, I am all done with my Christmas shopping. Including stocking stuffers! Yes!
But OMG I have about 800 dozen cookies to bake between now and next Friday.
I woke up at 2:30 this morning with an excruciating pain in my left hip. When I finally rolled out of bed at 6:00, I couldn't put any weight on that leg. As longtime readers and pals know, this is something that happens to me every now and then. I guess it's a fibromyalgia thing, maybe? I dunno. It used to happen a couple of times a month but for the past few years it's only happened maybe twice a year or so. And so OF COURSE it had to happen today, when I have so much shit to do.
Argh.
Running errands (OH MAN do I ever have errands to run) and hobbling around the kitchen mixing up cookie dough (OH MAN do I ever have cookie dough to mix) were out of the question, HOWEVER I did manage to get the Christmas cards in the mail and finish the boy's handmade gift so HA! I AM UNSTOPPABLE.
But this shit had damn well better be gone by tomorrow because I have pretty much finished all the pre-holiday tasks for which I do not need both legs. Oy.
In other news, they auctioned off my grandma's house today. I haven't heard anything about how that went, but I am sad for my grandma and for my dad, who lived in that house from the time he was a very small boy until he married my mom. Grandma had lived there for 60 years. Sigh.
Oh well. The neighborhood had gone to hell anyway.
OH PEOPLE. I have spent the entire day with my parents, running hither and yon helping them pick out and purchase gifts for DH, the girl and the boy because my father refuses to shop online. It was fun and all, and they bought me lunch (Thai food! win!) but OMG I AM SO FAR BEHIND ON HOLIDAY PREP NOW.
Do you know how many batches of cookie dough I could have made in the 7 hours we spent perusing DVDs at Target and ridiculous slippers at Claire's? A LOT, I'll bet.
Not to mention I still haven't finished that super-secret handcrafted holiday gift I'm making for the boy.
Nor sent any Christmas cards (the A list cards are ADDRESSED, however).
As for the fact that 20+ people are descending on my house in LESS THAN TWO WEEKS and I have done NOTHING to prepare for this event, we are not talking about that.
Dudes! It DID snow on Friday! For about 30 minutes. Pretty hard at times, too. It didn't stick to anything but it looked pretty damn cool. Of course, I was trapped upstairs in the bedroom while the carpets were being cleaned and the camera was waaaaaaayyyy downstairs in my office so I failed to get pictures. Heh. I suck.
Also, guess what? DH took the hint and right now I am typing at you on my brand! New! Laptop! YES! It's been a bit of an adjustment, what with its flat keyboard and its Windows 7 and whatnot, but he spent all day yesterday setting it up for me and so far I freaking LURVE it. Oh, and DUDES. It has a WEBCAM! I know! Things might get horrifyingly videotastic up in this mofo! Or maybe not.
All of the trees are up. ALL of them. And hello, you people are bad at math. Four trees plus the two I bought the kids = SIX trees. SIX OF THEM. And some of those are tiny. But still, yeah. Yesterday was a labor-intensive day, I'll tell you what.
Last night for dinner I made the root beer short ribs from the December issue of Everyday Food and OMG, they were AMAZING. I can't find the recipe on the Everyday Food website, but Google led me to the blog of another Austinite who made and loved them and she has typed in the recipe for you here! Isn't that swell?
Two weeks from today is the big family Christmas blowout thing with DH's siblings and their spouses and kids and grandkids, OMG. SEND VALIUM.
Dudes! I more or less exhausted my list of favorite Christmas songs during last December's Song Lyric Saturdays, so I dunno what I'll be able to come up with THIS month, but hey! This song at least MENTIONS Christmas, right? And I like it!
Hello, the carpet cleaners are here and I am trapped in the bedroom.
I am waiting for snow.
There is a 60% chance today but I've seen nary a flake.
Where is the snow?
I WAS TOLD THERE WOULD BE SNOW.
Anyhoo.
I've been making SERIOUS headway on my Christmas shopping.
My step-niece's stepkids and her new baby: DONE.
The sister-in-law (step-niece's mom) I got in the gift exchange: DONE.
The one actual niece who's still young enough to get an automatic gift instead of going into the exchange (sister-in-law's stepdaughter, biological daughter of DH's second-oldest brother)(DH has a large and complicated family, OKAY?): DONE.
The girl child: ALMOST DONE.
Ditto the boy child.
Except he just told me last night that he'd like a foot massager.
(That is one internet shopping search that is FRAUGHT WITH UNEXPECTED PERIL, let me tell you.)
Also nearly done with DH.
Still need to do my parents and get stocking stuffers.
I haven't baked A THING.
Nor put up a single decoration, much less TREE.
(There are FOUR trees this year, not including the trees I bought for the kids to put in their rooms.)
(I KNOW, RIGHT?)
(I am thinking of buying another one! For my office!)
DH's sisters keep emailing, asking what they can bring to the family shindig in two weeks, and I keep trying to tell them nicely that we don't have any room for our OWN crappe, much less THEIRS.
Gah!
Let's see, what else is going on?
The girl child has been invited to join the school band next semester.
Apparently she's making HELLA progress in her private flute lessons.
The boy, meanwhile, will most likely be QUITTING band next year.
He doesn't practice, and therefore does not turn in practice logs, and therefore band is always the lowest grade on his report card.
Considering band is AN ELECTIVE, that's kind of ridonkulous.
Also, next year is HIGH SCHOOL, God help us all, and I don't think marching band would agree with him at all.
We are going to boost up his guitar involvement instead.
I have recently and inadvertently read three books having to do with World War II, all from vastly different perspectives. The first was The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society by Mary Ann Shaffer and Annie Barrows, which had to do with the occupation of the Channel Islands, Guernsey in particular, by German troops during the war. The second was The Reader by Bernhard Schlink, which dealt with the aftermath of the war in Germany, when former Nazis were put on trial for war crimes. The third was The Medusa Tree by Mylene Dressler, which concerned the Japanese occupation of the Dutch East Indies (Java in particular) during the war.
Now, if you attended public school in the United States then you know that everything you learned about WWII can be contained in one paragraph that goes something like this:
Germany went nuts and invaded everything and killed a bunch of people, but then we stormed the beaches at Normandy and kicked their asses. Meanwhile Japan bombed Pearl Harbor, so we bombed Hiroshima. In short, WE WON. The end.
A lot gets left out of the history lesson, is what I'm saying.
My grandfathers both were in the army in WWII. My dad's dad was a medic in the infantry and spent most of his time in France and Germany. My mom's dad was in a field artillery unit in Burma during most of the war. My dad's dad would not talk about the war at all, period, end of story. I don't even want to contemplate the things he saw and did during that time. My mom's dad will talk about it if you ask him. He's the one who volunteered to bury fallen soldiers along the Burma Road. Same war, vastly different experiences.
But holy crap, I had no idea about all these invasions and occupations outside of mainland Europe. Either I was asleep in class that day (likely) or we just didn't learn it. So reading all three of these books right in a row was an absolute revelation. I found fascinating that the stories told by the survivors of the German occupation of Guernsey were so incredibly similar to the stories told by the survivors of the Japanese occupation of Java -- tales of people being sent to camps, of starvation, of the native population losing literally everything but the rags on their backs. (Note: these books were fiction, but they are BASED on stuff that actually happened.) It really kind of blew my mind.
Review-wise, of the three I liked Guernsey best. I loved the letter format and the relationships that developed between all the characters. The Reader was compelling but ultimately unpleasant. The Medusa Tree was just strange and dreamy, but in a good way.
I was desperately in need of Something Completely Different after finishing those, so now I'm reading Joe Hill's Heart-Shaped Box and OMG it is AWESOME.
In other news, we have a 50% chance of snow with some fairly significant accumulation tomorrow, holy crap. My kids will be THRILLED if this happens. DH is having our carpets cleaned tomorrow (assuming it's not canceled due to SNOW) and I plan to camp out in the bedroom with my TiFaux, all the gifts I've purchased so far, and a whole mess of wrapping paper.
And maybe a bottle of whisky. Just to make it a party.
posted by Badger at 11:13 AM
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