Wednesday, December 12, 2012

WNBP: The Tree Should Have Been A Clue...

Well, I am the very picture of befuddlement!  I've been hearing rumors for a while now about the holidays.  People kept telling me that they drew nigh, but I somehow found that hard to believe.

"Why, I have weeks and weeks to go," I said in an annoyingly lofty tone.  "I refuse to be one of those people who start panicking at the first sign of tinsel or cry when silver bells toll!"

So now here I am.  The last Sheep standing.  At least the last one standing in the very-picked-over Christmas card aisle.  It is nothing if not humbling and somewhat panicking.

I'm going to take a quick minute to knock out a Wednesday Night Bullet Post but let's not get carried away.  It seems I have quite a bit to do and far less time that I originally thought.

*The last full week of school before the holiday break is...interesting.

*Half the kids don't even seem aware of the impending wave of holiday cheer.

*The other half were done several days ago and are only showing up to keep their parents from returning all their gifts.

*I have a very small class on the best of school years.  Sometimes I only have one or two kids working in the room at a time, particularly during study halls.

*Today, two girls from one of the 7th grade teams came around to ask if they could come in.

*They seemed like the purposeful type of 7th graders who were on a mission and I know better than to deny that particular animal.  I welcomed them in.

*"Hello," they intoned, reading from their prepared script.  "We would like to ask for a moment of your time so that we could speak with your...um...(after looking around somewhat helplessly)...student?

*I guess they were used to a bigger audience.  

*But they persevered and delivered their plea for donations to the local animal shelter with aplomb.

*Then they asked if anyone had any questions.

*Which was a mistake because the only ones in the room were me and He Who...PROJECTS.

*HW...P always has questions.  They might not always be relevant, but I can assure you he has questions.

*Lots of them.

*About the time he got to asking the poor girls if he could donate his Lincoln Logs to the cats and dogs, I decided I probably should intervene.

*It's too bad.  We don't really get all that much company.  I kind of thought we were heading for more sociable days...

*I am going to the pet store tomorrow and will purchase a suitable toy for the little doggies/kitties/other critters in order to spare them the large bag of leftover Legos and mismatched action figure torsos I suspect might be coming in later this week.

*It's all good. HW...PROJECTS is having a hard time with the whole "it's not vacation yet so please sit down and stop projecting your displeasure with the time/space continuum in the middle of math class" concept.

*I put up the Christmas Tree this weekend.  It's a coin flip every year.

*I don't really need a tree.  It's just a big thing taking up space in the living room and inciting the cats to new and exciting levels of poor behavior.

*But, I dunno.  I guess I just sort of like thinking I'm still a "tree person."

*Not putting up a tree kind of crosses the line between "active, involved individual" and "grumpy old person who throws shoes at people on her lawn."

*I realize that isn't true, but I can't help getting that shoe image in my head come December...

*Putting up a Christmas tree is usually a hint, the kind that urges people to recognize the dire situation the holidays present.

*It took me a while.  Longer than it should have, frankly.

*I finally got around to reading  Trapped (The Iron Druid Chronicles, Book Five)

*And now I can't imagine why on earth I waited so darned long!

*What a great addition to the series!

*Then, with holiday shopping in mind, I went with a less expensive read.

*I found an omnibus edition of a series I'd been considering and shelled out the eight bucks for it.  

The Business of Death: The Death Works Trilogy

*Less expensive, yes, but quite fun.  

*And a really interesting take on the concept of the psychopomp.

*I love the way some people in this novel are Pomps.  Who Pomp other people.

*Because saying, "pomp" is fun even if actually being pomped is kind of a downer.

*Cuz you're dead.  Well...most people who die get pomped.

*A few are unpompable.

*Like I said...interesting!

 *Having suddenly realized the 25th draws nigh, I spent some time reviewing the finances.  

*Then I spent some time reviewing the contents of my baking supply cupboard because homemade treats are probably my only hope for gifting a few of the people on the periphery of my shopping list.

*So I started baking Christmas cookies on Saturday.

*When you bake Christmas cookies, you say, "cookie" a lot.

*As in, "Who the heck stole all the vanilla I need for my cookies?"

*Or, "What's that I smell?  Is it my cookies burning????"

*And the ever popular, "I really should stop eating these cookies or I won't have any to give as gifts."

*That's fine.  Even if you live alone, you are aloud to vocalize and it's nice to stay on topic.

*Except that, in this house, the resident felines have come to know their nighttime treat as, "cookies."

*Which means that I pretty much upset the entire social order for two straight days and didn't figure it out until Sunday night.

*Every time I babbled on about my cookies, everyone got a really hopeful look in their eyes and started scampering around the kitchen.

*Every time I returned to the living room to watch TV and wait out the timer signaling the next batch, there was a general sense of betrayal.

*I'd feel bad except for the part where a certain Absurdly Gi-normous Kitty took it upon himself to relieve me of some raw cookie dough.  

*I think that evens the score.

*Should cats eat raw cookie dough?  I'm fairly certain they shouldn't but if I pushed the panic button every time the AGK decided to start sampling in the kitchen I wouldn't have time for anything else.

*And no.  I didn't bake up that batch.  

*And yes.  I did consider it.


And, speaking of cookies, I probably need to get back to the gingerbread I've planned to knock out tonight.  When you leave it all until the last minute, you kind of have to plow through the baking even if it is a school night and you really don't feel like doing anything except collapsing on the couch and trying to forget that you still have five more days with kids before they are Santa's problem.  Next year, I'm going to be more on top of things.

And I don't mean like how I said it last year and then forgot all about it.  For real this time.  I'm sure of it...

SA


4 comments:

Elaine said...

Gingerbread at 7pm? You are a Goddess!
Have fun!

sheep#100 said...

And after the children are home with Santa, you can finally read Cold Days!

knitseashore said...

Wow, you are brave, baking at night by yourself after a long work day. I've called in reinforcements this weekend for the cookie baking adventure. Hopefully they'll keep the cats out as well as help me make edible human treats. :)

Do you make zombie cookies?

Donna Lee said...

The only thing I have baked is the fruitcakes. The only reason they're done is I baked them before we tore apart the house. I have to find the time to do the rest of the baking but can't seem to find any urgency here. I have a feeling I may spend next week sitting in a corner quietly pulling out my hair....