Christmas Eve. My vacation is tick-ticking away; I go back to work on Monday after nearly two weeks out…only the second week was a vacation, though. I spent all of Wednesday & Thursday last week, plus a sizable chunk of Tuesday, knocked out flat by a cold. Someone asked me if it was H1N1, and definitely nothing so dramatic. Just a really ugly headcold: sore throat, tired, snotty, headachy, with a lot of time spent either sleeping or crashed out in the recliner watching nature shows on Netflix. (The entire Life of Mammals with David Attenborough. I found his quirky delivery startlingly relaxing.)
Which pretty neatly crashed out our plans for card & gift-giving…even writing an Xmas letter to put online! (Yes, C had the same thing, a few days ahead of me…he spent the weekend before out of commission.) Just in the last two days I’ve started manically baking cookies. We’ll make cards together, probably, and then figure out how to pack off cards & cookies. I don’t know if that’s we’re known as lousy as sending holiday cards, or if it actually notes a change in culture, but we only got three cards this year: Mom, C’s folks, and Aunt Susie. At work we switched from paper cards to ecards, and hardly got any cards from our usual vendors. BTW, eCard module for Drupal was pretty decent, although if I’d had/made more time ahead of time I’d’ve made some changes to the module.
This time last year we were slogging through the Snowpocalypse; happily this Christmas looks to be mostly sunny and not too cold. (Last week was WARM and rainy; week before was freezing, but unbelievably dry.) Something in the air has been reminding me of holidays when I was a kid, with the low hazy sun and cool still air. A little colder, obviously, but the same feel. I’m thrilled to be heading the other side of the Solstice. Waking up “late” and having it still be dark out is the pits. If I sleep until the sun wakes me, it’s past 8:30.
I did a tiny bit of decorating, then spent the afternoon making cookies while C, L & J played Gauntlet Seven Sorrows; J brought over a basket of snacks, so plenty to nibble on while hanging out. A lovely way to spend Christmas Eve, all things considered. Happy holidays to everybody. 🙂