We're Treed!

As I said I would in yesterday's post, after I hit "publish" I dug out the tree, unpacked the ornaments, and we got to decorating.  We even punched in the "sounds of the season" cable music channel so we could sing, or mumble along when we didn't remember the words.  (we should have had a maiden aunt tickling the yellowed ivories of a tinny sounding upright piano, but made do with Johnny Mathis, Rosemary Clooney, and Nat King Cole)  It didn't take very long and it was fun with the two of us working on it.  I don't know why I drag my feet over putting it up every year.  Nostalgia blindsided me when I picked up a little golden bell to hang.  It was the only ornament I could touch when I was a tiny girl (and the only one I kept) and it was always hung low so it'd be in reach.  I picked it up and burst into tears.  Poor Durwood, he had no idea what the deal was but I think he might have been a little jealous that he doesn't have an ornament from when he was a kid.  Hmm, I might just have a box of a few of his mom's ornaments downstairs, I should go look.

After a spot of recovery we got dressed, made a list, and went to the grocery.  A few weeks back I went to Festival around 5 o'clock on a Saturday and I almost had the store to myself.  Not this time.  This time we split up so that Durwood could get a couple secret things and I took the list.  I got waylaid in the entry to the liquor department and ended up with a bottle of red wine in my cart but in my defense it's the first red wine I really liked.  Someone will help me drink it, I'm sure.  I filled the list and we met in the soup aisle to look at some broth that was on sale (did you ever hear of aseptic broth?  we hadn't either, turns out it's low fat and no MSG.  I have no idea how that makes it aseptic, unless it's specially pasteurized or something, maybe it was a typo, we didn't buy it).

On the way home I drove us past that house at Dousman & Platten Streets to get more pictures.  This time I parked the van and walked to get a few pictures.  There were a good number of people there, a lot with kids.  The one that touched me the most was an adult sister with her older, developmentally challenged sister.  They were having so much fun seeing all the displays and finding the funny ones, the pig on skis and the hippo on skates were two that made them dissolve into giggles.  A few flakes were falling too, kinda made it seem like a whole different world for a minute.

I got the window over our bed plastic-ed since it won't close right so I can lock it and keep out the breeze.  I can't find the folder from when we had them installed, I suppose I could go to Home Depot to inquire but plastic is cheaper and less annoying right now.  It's a quick and easy fix, plus I got to stand on the bed, a big no-no when I was a kid.

December 21--Cypriot, Water Spout.  His elfin ears stuck out of his hair and looked they would wiggle when he laughed.  Faye couldn't take her eyes off their pointed pinkness even though she knew it as rude to stare.  His white hair blew wispy in the wind but the hair never covered his ears.  The old man stood on the boardwalk near a geyser waving his arms and going on about how the volcano was thirty-thousand years overdue to erupt.  "There goes Doomsayer, off on one of his rants," a park ranger said, as he passed leading a tour group. "If only his argument wasn't so logical I'd feel better about shutting him up."  Faye walked faster.

The rest of today's going to be all about sewing, and maybe gift wrapping since I got the laundry done.  Mrs. Boss called yesterday to say that I only have to work Monday this week and Monday the following week.  I love the time off but won't it be silly to get two one-day paychecks in a row?  Maybe she'll combine them to conserve paper.  Pardon me while I descend into the sewing cave.  I decided "studio" is just too fancy a word for a Masonite-walled room in the basement.

--Barbara