Back from Christmas

Hello, I’m back!

My postings have been a bit scarce this season, and I apologize. Since this was our first Christmas together, Skyprincess and I have been enjoying being together. Doing the typical Christmas stuff.

The day after I arrived, we drove to the closest Home Depot to search for Christmas trees. I would recommend the Home Depot every time for your Christmas tree purchase. They had a very large variety of trees, and the staff was very generous in their time. The young man who helped us answered all our questions. Which tree dropped the least amounts of needle? Which tree stayed greener longer? Which tree was the most popular and least popular.

After digging through the pile for the perfect tree, we found one which called out to us. It was the right height for Skyprincess’s apartment and fairly symmetrical. I never want a perfect Christmas tree. I always want one with a bit of a flaw. Maybe a bit lopsided and pudgy. Or maybe has a bare spot that reminds you of your Uncle Charles’s bald spot that you will lovingly bend limbs to perform a Christmas tree comb-over. A tree that reflects my life. One that contains flaws, but beautiful none-the-less.

We tied the tree to the top of Skyprincess’s car and took as many back roads as possible. If we took the freeway, we would have gotten home faster, but who wants to drive 65 m.p.h with a tree on top of their car? Not us!

I haven’t trimmed a tree in over a decade. My mom was always a big tree person, I wasn’t. Not that I wasn’t involved. I would crawl through the attic finding the boxes of decorations. Help with untangling the lights. Help with unwrapping the ornaments and placing hooks on them. But she wanted her tree just so. We knew to help, but “not” help. To stay busy and engaged, but let her really put the tree together. I’m sure she didn’t know how touchy she was, and she has mellowed LOTS. I don’t think she cares now how the tree looks. But in the early years, she did. So we helped, but didn’t.

Skyprincess and I enjoyed picking out the colors for our tree. Gold and Red. Next year I’m going to try to convince her to make an all Orange tree. Even if I have to start making ornaments now! * smirk *

We started by stringing the lights around the tree. I took the word “around” the tree too literally. I went around and around the tree with the strings of lights. We bought WAY too many lights. That’s okay! We’ll just get a larger tree next year! * grin *

After wrapping the tree with lights, it came time for the strings of red then gold beads. This time, I wrapped the exposed tree only, then looped the string up a row and continued. It made it much easier to take the tree down without trying to unwrap the entire tree.

When it came time for the ornaments I let Skyprincess place them on the tree. I tend to clump ornaments. One side would be nothing but large red ornaments and then the other side would be all small gold ornaments. Not very attractive. But we worked out a system. I unwrapped the ornaments and placed hangers on them. She then artfully placed them on the tree. It actually went rather fast. And the tree was beautiful! We really should have taken pictures.

I kept eyeing the presents all Christmas Eve night, wanting to see what goodies Santa brought. But I was a nice boy. I didn’t even shake the boxes! That’s so unlike me. Curiosity is a major weakness.

Christmas morning came before I knew it. We slept in fairly late, much later than my normal 6am wakeup. I am getting better at that, thank you very much! We unwrapped out presents and I got lots of goodies. She had a theme going with her presents. Since I fly a bunch, she got me a travel kit. Ear plugs to tune out the crying babies on the flight. A very very nice travel mask. You can’t see any hint of light when wearing it. I really think the company should sell them to the CIA for use in their sensory depravation interrogations. They make you feel like you have no sight at all.

The final part of the travel kit was a nice travel blankie and pillow. Her stories of what happens with airline blankets scare me. They NEVER get washed, and there is a reason they usually hand them out when the lights are dimmed. My suggestion, don’t pay attention too much to the stains if you really want to use one.

My favorite gift was the ipod nano. I spent most of the week going through her CD collection, finding music to load onto it. It’s really nice we have close to the same taste in music. I’m listening to Simon & Garfunkle’s “Scarborough Fair” right now. Great song.

For Skyprincess I bought an I-Doggie. It’s really just a portable speaker for her ipod, shaped like a dog. It’s very cute. I also got her a JLo watch. I hated that it’s JLo, but it’s really a lovely watch. Not the bling bling watches she has. But a sort of gold looking copper chain. It’s really rather lovely.

Her main present was a new coach bag. I felt so proud thinking of this one! I have a terrible time finding presents for people. I know she likes fine wine, which I’m clueless about. I don’t really drink and didn’t want to bomb out on this. And wine is a personal taste. So are shoes, so shoes were out. Or really any clothing item. But the coach bag was something I thought was very neat.

Well… guess I should go. I have to get back to work. I’ll try to start posting more. I should have some time this week to pound out a couple blogs and maybe a couple to take me over the weekend when I fly back home.

Thanks for being patient!

Mizike