A couple days off

After taking a few days off from writing for the Thanksgiving Holiday, I am back on this cool and thoroughly wet Sunday night… well, Sunday while I’m writing this, but Monday by the time I actually post it.

You may be asking yourself what I did these past few days? Well, lemme tell ya:

• Ate WAY too much turkey, stuffing and potatoes (no yams for me, I just can’t bring myself to eat something that has the same color as Lucille Ball’s hair…) Not to mention too much wine… some really, really good wine though.
• Watched the hated Dallas Cowboys lose to Denver in Turkey-Day Football. At least one of the two games was entertaining…(why the ‘hated’ Dallas Cowboys? Cuz’ that’s how I was raised; to hate, abhor, detest and loathe the Dallas Cowboys… and Notre Dame)
• Went Christmas shopping… on Friday afternoon… the day after Thanksgiving… [Shudder] I’m still having nightmares about it…(Though I was NOT one of the crazy people who got up before dawn to shop… and if you were one of the crazies, my apologies. I did get a great deal on my wife’s present though… a new digital camera and printer-dock. And don’t worry, she knows about it already, so her reading this won’t ruin the surprise)
• Purchased “Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban” for only $5 at Target and, while watching it, realized that Alfonso Cuarón is a brilliant director…
• Decided what to get the twins for Christmas. (Ever since their Abuelo, my Dad, got his corvette, they have wanted one. In fact, every time someone asks them what they want for Christmas, they reply; ‘corvette’. So, that’s what they’re getting, a toy, motorized corvette that they can drive around in. And thus the madness begins…)
• Dropped hints to my wife about what I would like for Christmas… hint: it starts with the letter ‘i’ and ends with the letter ‘d,’ with ‘Po’ in the middle…(I know the best part of Christmas is the giving… and we have gotten friends and family some truly wonderful gifts this year, the same for our daughters, who will be very happy on Christmas morning. Having said that, I dropped hints because she was trolling for present possibilities, and I had to comply… right?)
• Hung Christmas lights and decorations outside (the weather was so nice I just had to do it Saturday; though I have NOT turned them on yet… and won’t until December 1st. BUT… all the lights are up, my inflatable Homer is up, and the inflatable snowman family is up. I just need to get another extension cord so I can plug them all in and fire ‘em up this Thursday… and not a minute sooner. And yes, for those of you wondering, Homer is me and the other three are my wife and daughters)
• Found all the inside Christmas decorations, but we can’t put them up yet until we paint the kitchen (the remodeling is finally done) and the dining room this weekend… yay, what fun.
• Had the twins’ Christmas picture (part 1) taken with the cousins (9 kids… oldest is 13, oungest is 5 months… you can all imagine how that went… [Shudder])
• Realized, while watching snippets of “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory”, that Tim Burton is taking some truly amazing drugs. How he comes up with some of his visions confounds me…
• Went to the Ringling Bros. Barnum & Bailey Circus in Chicago with my wife’s family… all 18 of ‘em. (The circus was entertaining, but I maintain my position that clowns are evil… pure, unadulterated evil…much like this guy)
• Ordered my daughters a gift that I had wanted to get them for some time. They weren’t available for their birthday, and they had been hard to find for the last few months… then I found a website that had them in stock. What are they you ask? Plush Star Wars lightsabers… one green for the oldest who likes Yoda, and one red for the one who likes Darth Vader. (Yes, they are only three years old and I have already showed them 5 of the 6 films – no Revenge of the Sith yet as I still think a few scenes may be too much for them. I.E. Palpatine’s face getting scarred by his force-lighting, Anakin and his implied-slaying of the Jedi Younglings, a few beheadings… things like that)

That’s about it… well-packed 4-day break if you ask me.

Back to work on Monday… with only 26 days until Christmas…no need to panic just yet…