The Christmas Phenomena

Yesterday after my family finished a delectable Christmas dinner, Eboogie, Moose and I decided to embark on a little excursion in an effort to alleviate feeling like a gluttonous mass. Eboogie put on her babushka and the three of us headed out in the balmy 50° Christmas air for a walk around the neighborhood.

As we were walking and chatting, Moose stopped suddenly with a quizzical look on his face. Eboogie and I followed his perplexed gaze which was fixated on the front lawn of a house we were passing. A front lawn that was covered in snow and had a snowman.

We looked to the lawn on the left.

No snow.

We looked to the lawn on the right.

Again, no snow.

We walked up to the lawn and touched it. It was real snow.

As we were standing there theorizing about the origins of this meteorological phenomena, a man walked out of the house. Thinking he was going to shed some light on what we were witnessing, we waited patiently for him to speak.

He didn’t.

Instead, he picked up a pre-made snowball from the front lawn and heaved it at us. We stood there confused for a second before moving out the path of the oncoming projectile. The snowball landed harmlessly in the middle of the street.

The three of us looked at the snowball, looked at each other, and then collectively looked at the man.

He brushed the snow off his hands and walked back inside the house. Without a word.

We kept walking.

Feigning Interest

Last Saturday night, I spent the majority of my evening engaged in interesting conversation with a gentleman I met at my favorite local bar. We got the initial pleasantries out of the way; what do you do, where are you from, etc. and then our conversation turned to the perennially loaded question…what do you do for fun?

As I started in on my interests, I mentioned that I like football. Mr. Interesting quickly turned to Mr. Dubious. Suddenly I was peppered with questions like: How many games are in the regular season? Who is the Giants coach? Which player has the most rushing yards in the NFL this year? He asked these as he sat back, crossed his arms and looked at me with a self satisfied grin on his face as if he had just caught me in a lie. And I found myself getting pissed.

What is with the pop quiz?

This isn’t the first time I have come across this situation. Because I am not the textbook definition of “girly”, I am often accused of being interested in things solely because it is something men would find attractive. I find myself quizzed often.

If you say you like to cook, I don’t ask you to rattle of the ingredients for crème brule. If someone tells me they like movies, I don’t challenge with “Really? Well who won the Oscar for Best Cinematography in 1972?” (For the record: Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid)

Maybe there are girls out there who take a page from the Cosmo playbook and pretend to be interested in something because it seems more attractive? If the only way to get a man’s attention is to pretend to like the same things that he does, there is a serious problem.

Interests are just those…interests. You shouldn’t have to qualify them with anything. It is what makes people different. If we all liked the same things, life would be pretty boring. In any case, I find the quizzing to be juvenile. You should at least give the person the benefit of the doubt.

At any rate, he didn’t get my number.

The Joy of Getting

Ray Liotta is out in full force. For those of you who are unfamiliar with the reference, that is my Christmas nickname. It was derived in homage to an episode of the now defunct TV show “Just Shoot Me” where Ray Liotta, playing himself, is totally obsessed with Christmas. So much so that he decorated his whole house like Santa’s workshop and even goes so far as hiring midgets to wrap presents for him…his very own elves.

I love Christmas. I love the decorations, the constant family gatherings, the food, the gift giving, the carols and just the general warm and fuzzy feelings it evokes.

My Christmas season kicked off on Sunday morning when I decided it was time to put up my tree. So I trudged down to the basement to pull my fake, perfectly pre-lit tree out of storage. I acquired this tree last year on Black Friday…or as I like to affectionately call it, The Most Stressful Day of My Life. Never again.

Anyway, much to Gail B’s astonishment, I put my huge muscles to work in getting that sucker upstairs by myself. It took me the better part of an hour to get the tree up and to separate all of the branches that had gotten flattened over the year it had spent in the box. Then I took a deep breath of relief…only to inhale that most festive of tree smells…basement. Enter a healthy dose of Fabreeze.

Once the tree was standing and electrified, I started on the decorating. I pulled out my roll of ribbon and started winding it around the tree. My compulsion to have things balanced and even made this a daunting task. I put the ribbon on the tree and stepped back to observe my work. It wasn’t even. I tried again. Same result. I got it right by about the 5th time but when I looked at it from a different angle, it was still not right. I started again from scratch. This went on for about 20 minutes before I finally let it go. But from now until Christmas, I will be making minor ribbon adjustments daily.

Then I moved on to the ornaments. I had forgotten what I had bought in previous years so unwrapping the tissue paper surrounding each one was like my first taste of Christmas morning. When I set them all out on the table, I realized just how girly my tree was about to become. I am thinking that one day I will hear my own version of the “Christmas Tree, Unfair to Zach” song being sung around my house.

Now that the tree was up, I needed to get some presents under it. There is nothing sadder then a lonely Christmas tree. So last night, in the company of the Midge (my own elf!) I wrapped the four presents I have bought so far.

So now that the tree was done and presents were being compiled and wrapped, it was time to get down to the real business of the holiday season. Those damn Christmas cards. Last night, I defeated the beast…I finished writing and stamping all 56. I had to up the ante this year if I have a shot at winning the Christmas Card Competition as described in last year’s blog.

To date I have received 5. I think this is a good start given the fact that it is December 6th and I haven’t even sent mine out yet. The taunting and the phone calls relaying the daily totals have not started, much to my dismay. Does this mean we are growing as people? God, I hope not.

So here is to a great holiday season filled with joy, the spirit of giving and some serious ass kicking. Bring it on!