The Home Stretch

Tomorrow begins the marathon of Christmas gatherings. It will be a three-day extravaganza, like it is every year. We just have so much family that it takes that long to make the rounds. I am in no way complaining about this.

Today was the day of the three-hour spasm where upon all the stress of the season came flowing out of me and piled atop those loved ones of mine who were unlucky enough to be near me at the time. Something finally clicked and just like that I was over it. I think I was running low on seretonin and it just took that long for the backup supply to make its way across my neurotransmitters, if that makes any sense.

With all of that out of the way, Zach and I made our last trip to the mall. We still are not done with our shopping but we will not be going back. I have to pick up one last thing from Target tomorrow, so it looks like that's where your present will be coming from, Mom. Sorry. I'll be sure to save the reciept. After that all we have to do is go to the grocery store. Doesn't sound like a big deal, but just you wait. The grocery store on a Sunday morning is not the best place to be if you want to keep your sanity intact, nevermind the fact that it'll be Christmas eve.

We decorated our tree last night, which was fun. It's up high on a table, but Mango has already managed to chew one of the ornaments. I made sure to put the special ones near the top..


Remember the guy at the picture maker the other day? I was so frustrated that I had waited in line for 30 minutes with no means to be productive. Later that same day I had to make a mad rush to the post office and got there just seconds after they closed. So I headed out to the one post office in the area that stays open til 8pm, which is at the mall. I was prepared this time with some light reading, a snack to keep Jacob happy, plenty of kleenex for his runny nose, a waterbottle, and a backup activity for Jacob. What's the boy scout motto? Yeah, that's me. I waited in line for about 20 minutes, just as happy as a clam. But everyone else in line was bitching away. Jacob was totally cool with the wait. If you're going to be at the post office in the late evening on probably the last day you can mail things for a pre-Christmas arrival, then expect to wait. And shut the hell up.

The best part of those couple days was that after the post office we went into the mall and I took Jacob to see Santa. We hadn't expected this to be in the cards for us because Jacob's usually scared of stuff like that. Infact, last week at the mall Zach and I both asked Jacob if he wanted to see Santa. He said no and we thought that was that, but on the way out of the mall we passed the then-closed Santa's Village and Jacob got excited about it. So, having promised a visit to Santa, we made it a priority on Wednesday. Jacob waited patiently in line for at least 20 minutes and was more cute than I could have imagined talking to 'Santa'. He had an actual conversation with the jolly man. At first I tried hard to hear it, but then started to feel like a bit of an intruder so I backed off and let Jacob have his private moment.