Wednesday, December 01, 2010

Let's get ready to Rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrramble

What does it say about my life lately that all the people who are marked as ‘available’ on the Office Communicator are IT HelpDesk people?

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So, Happy Hanukkah to all y’all out there who celebrate such a thing. I was listening to the commie-hippie-pinko-liberal radio station (NPR) this morning on my way to work, and on it was an interesting story about the holiday and how it’s evolved over the years.

Bottom line – BOTH Christmas and Hanukkah used to be kind of ‘meh’ occasions, until someone decided to bump up the volume with gift-giving and festivus poles around which young people dance clad in robes of baby hair while their elders beat on drums made from the skins of albino bats. Also, CANDLES!

I think I have that right. I might not have been paying very much attention.

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So, the holiday season is in full swing. We’ve had the spooky one, the stuffing one, and now the Big Daddy Holidays are upon us, when we crack out the lights, open the champagne, and drive ourselves NUTS trying to make everything ‘perfect’ so the ‘memories’ can be made and everyone will look back on the perfection and forget all about the evil and pettiness and hatred they’re conducted or been exposed to over the past year.

Because, seriously? Nothing chases away the memory of your house burning down quite like twinkly lights. It’s like the bad never happened, right?

Not, I might be full of enough hyperbole to have swallowed my own tail (or is that paraboly? Hmmm), but don’t most of us go whole hog for our chosen mid-winter festival and drive ourselves crazy in the so-doing? I know I used to, but somewhere in the past few years I’ve taken down the crazy a few notches so that it’s possible to actually ENJOY Christmas (my chosen mid-winter festival).

This year, to further continue with the notch taking, it’s quite possible that we’ll celebrate by renovating the kitchen. We are partiers like that. Heck, with a choice between spending gobs of cash to go someplace that might be fun and tearing out the cabinets, flooring, and ceiling, I’m pretty sure most of us would choose the latter. There ain’t no fun like DEMO fun, amirite?

Now, I’m not a Scrooge, nor even a Grinch. I LOVE me some Christmas, and fight to keep the tree up every year for 'just a little bit longer,’ but this year (as in the few previous years) the Things are going to be with their Dad for Christmas and The Biffster and I, while clever and inventive people, don’t find much jolly about sitting around wondering why there isn’t more FAMILY in this most family-oriented of holidays. So, why NOT embark on a huge project to fill the time between eggnog breaks?

Exactly.

Plus which, I'm taking something like 10 days off right around then. The 'use it or lose it' vacation days policy is MAKING me do it. *Snicker* Shoot - it might take us 5 of those days just ot decide on what kind of wall treatment to use, for, sadly, we cannot retain out current cute checkered paper. What would YOU suggest we do for decor in the most-used room in the house? I'm all ears.

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I’m off to try to vanquish and Spin Doctors tune from my head. Y’all be good now. Tiff out.

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