December 29, 2007

  • After much waiting, here is the video you've been waiting for!

    Yes, I'm up way too late. I took a 3 1/2 hour nap this evening, and now I'm wide awake. I wish this strategy worked during the day.

    Christmas: I nearly broke my ankle shortly after arriving at Mom's place on Christmas eve. She had ignored my previous requests for her to store her vaccuum somewhere other than the doorway to the living room, and as a result I tripped on it on my way to the bathroom and landed in a pile of spilled cat litter on the carpet. I eventually managed to get up and hobble over to the corner armchair, where I put my feet up and fell asleep with a bag of frozen corn on my ankle while Gilly made supper on her own.

    Supper turned out well. Mom didn't want the carrots Gilly put on her plate, and we ended p having a carrot fight across the table. It was fun, but Gilly stopped it because she didn't want carrots squishing under her feet later. After two bites of supper, Mom toddled off to the bedroom and returned with Dad's ashes. She said we might think it weird, but she didn't feel right having Christmas dinner without Dad. I agreed, and admitted I'd been thinking about doing the same. She put him on the chair next to her and ate her supper.

    During dessert, Mom started asking questions about Dad. We told her about conversations we had with him in hospital that she wasn't aware of. She didn't know we both knew about the cancer before she did, or that I had found out by accident and Dad had asked me to keep it a secret. We discussed a lot of things, and cried in our trifle. There was no animosity at all, just sharing our long-held secrets.

    Mom told us we had to open one present that night. It turned out to be Super Scrabble, which has double the letter tiles and a board almost double the size with quadruple word scores and such. We played right away, it took 90 minutes for one game, and for a change we both kicked Mom's ass. I was in the lead until right at the end when Gilly somehow bypassed me. Mom was flabbergasted that we finally beat her. She tried to cheat as usual, this time using French words as the theme. She kept trying to use "baguette", but misspelled it both times, each time differently. I also used the word "nobler" and Mom said it needed another L in it, prompting lots of laughter. We also taught Mom the words "queef", "quim", and "taint".

    On Christmas morning we woke at 8:30AM and had tea, plum pudding and custard for breakfast, then opened presents. Mom really liked the CD player boom box we gave her, although I doubt she'll figure out how to use it. She gave us a really awesome remote control Dalek that speaks and exterminates, and a large glass bong that is the most inappropriate gift I've ever been given. We've decided to use it as a vase.

    All three of us fell asleep in our chairs after opening presents, and we woke at nearly 1PM. I called our cousin Andrew in England and we passed the phone around, and then Gilly and I took off to Ellen and Brian's for our other family Christmas. We were greeted with very full stockings, a table laid out with muchies, and big thanks for the gifts we gave everyone. Brian was really excited that we'd replaced the lamp they'd broken ages ago, and Ellen was happy for a new popcorn popper. Chris and Mike couldn't wait to drink their beers from their fancy matching glasses, and it turned out the beer was just their taste. We had a great turkey dinner and ad lots of drinks as well.

    I slept until 2PM on Boxing Day, only getting up after Gilly woke me twice and informed me of the time. I could have slept all day. I didn't even stay up that late the night before, I guess I just overdid the partying. We went to Mom's place and helped Mike and Monica move Mom's unwanted mattress downstairs and into Mike's truck. Gilly took me to Jenn's house and I had dinner with them, and thoroughly impressed them with my trifle. I told them I'd treat them to mushy peas next time! Jenn played her violin for me for the first time, and I was impressed that she could play a few simple songs only a month after picking up the violin for the first time. Something tells me she's going to be quite decent at playing it.

    Later on, Gilly picked me up and we took Mom to the movies to see The Water Horse. It was a really cute movie, and we all enjoyed it. The cast was the same cast that did the movie Millions, and they were very good. I hope to see more films by them later.

    Alright, I'm sleepy now, so I'm going to go to bed, finally.