Kitanzi's Colloquium

Merry Christmas to those as celebrate, and a happy Tuesday to those as don't. (Hey, Tuesdays can be a bitch. Mondays you at least have memories from the weekend to distract you, Wednesday you can figure is hump day and halfway done, Thursdays are almost there, and Fridays are... Fridays. Tuedays can be tough. They need all the help they can get.)

ACat is still asleep, so he doesn't know yet that there's a stuffed stocking on his computer chair. :) Little stuff, but he's not expecting it so I'm looking forward to that reaction. He certainly surprised me! A few days ago a package came from Amazon which he told me I could open. Keep in mind I am a good contender for Most Easily Lost Person Ever, to the point where I arguably have a phobia about it in some circumstances. He got me a prosthetic sense of direction/navigator, a very spiffy GPS unit. I've been squeeing about it ever since and playing around with it. This utterly, utterly wins as a Christmas present for me!

His Christmas gift is a little less immediate or tactile, but I think a good one. There are quite a few people he would like to be able to see this year, sweeties and friends, so his "official" gift is a plane ticket, date and destination to be determined as he chooses. (I feel like this is cheating since I'd have suggested that in general if we had the money anyhow, gift or no gift.)

Today will likely be quiet. We have no family visits to make and little in the way of traditions we follow. We may go out to a movie, and I've got us a nice dinner, but chances are most of it will be doing the same things we usually do on weekends. You know what? That's no bad thing. I hope everyone else enjoys their day too, however it's spent.

After a lot of fussing and growling, I finally figured out how to access my valentines through the Valentinr meme gadget. Thank you, you very sweet people - you know who you are at least as well as I do, especially the anonymous ones! *G* That really made my morning! (And thank you no less to the people who simply left valentines in the comments on the original post - instant gratification's got a lot going for it too!)

ACat and I never have especially dressed up the house for a holiday, or done anything more extravagant than a movie and dinner out, with maybe an evergreen wreath on the door. This is partly because we have no family close enough to celebrate with and no strong attachment to any of the religions that have celebrations right now - frankly, it boils down to celebrating a long weekend more than anything. We plan to keep the movie and dinner tradition this year, but I hope everyone is enjoying all the many celebrations going on right now!

(On the other hand, if we do manage the househunting we've been talking about, I'm having a party next year just for the excuse! *G* Enough room in my home to invite more than four people over at a time without someone getting trampled? Yay!)

That was a good Tday, a really good one. ACat and I went and had Thanksgiving with joyuse13 and her charming husband abovenyquist at their gorgeous home, along with our mutual friend curiousmay9. In fact, the weather was so nice we ate out on their newly renovated (ok, mid-renovations, technically) deck and it was gorgeous. I had fun playing in their excellent kitchen and the food appeared to be a hit, so I am inordinately pleased at how well it went. We got there just before noon and left about ten, and the time was full of food, talk, music, a walk in the unseasonally warm weather (even for GA!), and Christmas tree assembly and decoration. joyeuse13 has posted the photos, but between the food and the company and the unexpected Thanksgiving picnic, I think this was one of my best Thanksgivings ever.

Today's probably the first time I can remember having the day after Tday off, so I'm using the time for a doctor's appointment and a lunchdate with my husband - by which time I just may be ready to eat again!

Christmas was a quiet holiday this year, but all the better for it. On Christmas eve, ACat and I watched our DVD copy of The Fellowship of the Ring since we planned to go see The Two Towers on Christmas day. We showed up for the noon showing of TTT, the first of the day - and it was even, sort of, snowing while we waited for them to open. I don't quite count it as a white Christmas but it was still amusing and neat. Anyhow, the theatre was only half full and we got the best seats in the place which was wonderful. The movie itself was, well... something of a disappointment. What they did well, they did wonderfully well. They made a lot of changes and only some of them seemed to actually enhance the movie as a movie or as a story. They also made one enormous botch of a character that was completely unneeded and completely threw me out of any sense of charity with the rest of it. Fortunately, that was fairly near the end of it, but dammit! Oh well, I'll still go see the third as soon as it's around, since I have to see how they finish this off.
Afterwards we swung by to give greetings and gifts to Telynor and her household, then came home and watched Big (big couple days for movies!) and I made the last of my obligatory family phone calls, all three of which were short and sweet and happy. This was greatly helped by the fact that my brother and his wife opened their biggest gift just a couple days early, and I am once again an aunt! *G* My mother seemed especially happy, since she loves spoiling babies, so I suppose this scrap of a girl is a gift all around