My Christmas '09 report
Dec. 26th, 2009 03:24 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
zouzounakiFirst off, a big thank you! ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
may_child, thank you for the card and the gift certificate, which I'm still trying to convince Ann to use a part of! lastwordslinger, thank you for the package, the doodads and action figures and card; I joked with Ann about getting her White Witch figure and recreating the scene from Prince Caspian where Edmund pwns Peter, Caspian and Jadis, ahahahaha! And you have no idea how hard it is to find a Spalko figure and you send me a set with her and Mutt and Indy?! musetrax, thank you for the gift of fic! Hugs! rohajavongareth, for the beautiful vgift! dreamybritactor, for the lovely e-card! moetushie for the card and the gift of a Christmas zombie! To quote Futurama, "Sweet zombie Jesus!" writeangel1, for my drop-dead gorgeous Arthur/Gwen/Lancelot fanvid!
You all made my season that much brighter. Actually, all my flist did by being the marvelous lovelies you all are! Huge hugs!venckman, your Christmas posts were the very epitome of seasonal excellence!
As for my own day, I'm going to cut this into two parts, because one gets kind of RL TMI perhaps for some, heh.
We exchange our gifts on Christmas Eve, after eating some hors d'œuvres and watching some Christmas shows and specials. My sister let me watch some of my cartoons and then we watched The Blue Carbuncle (her choice) and The Pee Wee Herman Christmas Special (mine, though we both adore the other's choice!) We opened prezzies, and I got some lovely swag, including a set of Mighty Boosh figures (I tried to take a picture of me kissing Vince but it didn't work out. He's a wee slip of a man, too, and is the only one who doesn't stand on his own, so I have him propped against Bollo and it looks like he's getting bummed by him, hee! I think Noel would appreciate that!), two t-shirts I picked out for myself at Hot Topic, one from Chowder and one Percy Jackson and the Olympians, the third season of Doctor Who and the complete set of Percy Jackson books in hardcover and kept in this adorable trunk-shaped box, like a camp trunk--so cute!
I loved watching Ann open hers and was just sad that her Judas Priest t-shirt didn't get here in time, woe! It was a wonderful and relaxing night.
And then, there was the next day, when things were a bit more eventful...
So there was this big hoohoo beginning at the start of this month when our neighbor asked me to pet sit for her because she didn't want to board. Well, I pet sit a few dogs around the neighborhood and I'm always eager to help, so I of course said yes. The nice payout from it didn't hurt either. However, I started getting more and more anxious about it because she was obviously nervous about leaving her puppies and I wanted to do the best job possible. I also wasn't sure exactly what she wanted me to do.
She moved the date up from the 26th to the 25th about a week ago and, okay, I went along with it. I guess I should also explain that I haven't been feeling well lately: I have a touch of a cold and sinus infection, and my insomnia's been rampant. I had PMS, even though I was post-period, up until about three days ago. So all of that fed into my natural anxiety condition. I didn't sleep the night before Christmas Eve, or I slept my normal amount which is about three hours. And then we stayed up late on Christmas Eve, as is our way and I got about an hour of sleep and found myself watching the clock thinking about when it would be acceptable to get up and look in on the doggies.
Ann of course said she'd help but I was way too nervous about it, so I got up at about a quarter after 8 and trekked over there in my pajamas, let them out of their corral as she'd told me she did at that time in the morning, and was coming back when our phone rang. It was our neighbor, surprised to hear me awake because I'd told her I don't normally get up until noon. Well, their car had broken down somewhere in Georgia and she was having it towed back to her house. She was coming back. She insisted I keep the money and I was feeling pretty good, free of that burden, I have to be honest.
And then my sister come back in from walking her dogs and, well, she has a way of sort of exacerbating my condition when she gets upset so the first thing she says to me is, "We can't keep the money!" So I'm panicking, close to almost breaking down. Our neighbor's a very practical, ex-military type, so not only did I truly believe she didn't want to negotiate about paying her back, I didn't want to give the money back because I had spent so much on presents with the idea that I was going to add the payment to out collective accounts after Christmas for bills and such.
So I try to go back to bed but playing in an endless and infuriating loop in my mind is giving the money back, offending our neighbor, giving the money back, etc., etc. After about an hour, just when I thought I'd go absolutely mad, I just got up and sat on the couch in my pajamas to watch the Disney parade on TV. I start to make peppermint green tea, hoping that'll calm me down and I get about halfway through the parade when my sister starts fretting about going over to see the puppies again. She does and they've wreaked havoc in the house, so she prompts me to walk them, which means getting dressed and forgetting my tea as it gets cold sitting on the kitchen counter. They won't walk: they don't like that it's raining and wet, and one of them is scared to go past the point where our dog attacked her.
So now, feeling completely stressed and stretched to my absolute limit, I go back to our house, pick an outfit for Christmas day and we get ready to eat our first round of hors d'œuvres. We visited the puppies one last time and then my neighbor came home around 1, mentioning to my sister that she had no food in the house. So Ann's now convinced we have to make our dinner early and share it with them. Thank goodness she realizes we can just give them the two extra game hens we bought without cooking them and that solves that.
On top of all this, my sister had invited my brother over, something she didn't ask me about because she knew I'd flat out say no, and now she was regretting it and putting off writing to him about what time to come over, etc. So, I offer to call. Which turns into me, yesterday, calling him to tell him to bugger off, that we're not having Christmas this year because of the upset and it'd be better if he stayed home. Well, he gives me a hard time, sounding absolutely pathetic and suggesting about ten times that he could come over to keep me company (after my sister drives him here, by the way, and then back at night!) So I felt utterly miserable and guilty over that all day.
Believe it or not, after a very confusing and upsetting start, the day, as strange as it had began, settled into a nice, low key sort of thing. We watched our favorite Christmas specials and I fell asleep for at least a short period of time during Runaway Bride so I got a sort of second (well, actually, first) wind. We had a lovely day together, ending it with the annual rewatching to Return of the King EE.
The holidays are still difficult without my parents, and especially my mother who adored Christmas. She loved me particularly, I think because I still liked getting toys and surprises as an adult, LOL, and her cooking was divine. I've tried to reconcile the fact that I just have to find what the holidays mean now without them and her, and I'm sort of on... uneven ground with it. Not to mention that I just flat-out miss them most at the time of year when you're supposed to be surrounded by those you love. They're in my heart.
It's easier now after a good night's sleep to see how I was overreacting and everything, but as I discussed withlastwordslinger, when you're in the middle of panicking your little mind out, it's kind of difficult to find that calm. Sighs, sometimes I hate having a defective brain! xP But everything's okay, I can laugh at some stuff now, and it was a wonderful holiday so I'll hold on to those good memories above the others! I've made it all sound so tragic, LOL, and I'm sure at times I felt the world was ending but it was a good time, so trust me, I'm not complaining even about the stress!
Peace, Ghani
may_child, thank you for the card and the gift certificate, which I'm still trying to convince Ann to use a part of! lastwordslinger, thank you for the package, the doodads and action figures and card; I joked with Ann about getting her White Witch figure and recreating the scene from Prince Caspian where Edmund pwns Peter, Caspian and Jadis, ahahahaha! And you have no idea how hard it is to find a Spalko figure and you send me a set with her and Mutt and Indy?! musetrax, thank you for the gift of fic! Hugs! rohajavongareth, for the beautiful vgift! dreamybritactor, for the lovely e-card! moetushie for the card and the gift of a Christmas zombie! To quote Futurama, "Sweet zombie Jesus!" writeangel1, for my drop-dead gorgeous Arthur/Gwen/Lancelot fanvid!You all made my season that much brighter. Actually, all my flist did by being the marvelous lovelies you all are! Huge hugs!
venckman, your Christmas posts were the very epitome of seasonal excellence!As for my own day, I'm going to cut this into two parts, because one gets kind of RL TMI perhaps for some, heh.
We exchange our gifts on Christmas Eve, after eating some hors d'œuvres and watching some Christmas shows and specials. My sister let me watch some of my cartoons and then we watched The Blue Carbuncle (her choice) and The Pee Wee Herman Christmas Special (mine, though we both adore the other's choice!) We opened prezzies, and I got some lovely swag, including a set of Mighty Boosh figures (I tried to take a picture of me kissing Vince but it didn't work out. He's a wee slip of a man, too, and is the only one who doesn't stand on his own, so I have him propped against Bollo and it looks like he's getting bummed by him, hee! I think Noel would appreciate that!), two t-shirts I picked out for myself at Hot Topic, one from Chowder and one Percy Jackson and the Olympians, the third season of Doctor Who and the complete set of Percy Jackson books in hardcover and kept in this adorable trunk-shaped box, like a camp trunk--so cute!
I loved watching Ann open hers and was just sad that her Judas Priest t-shirt didn't get here in time, woe! It was a wonderful and relaxing night.
And then, there was the next day, when things were a bit more eventful...
So there was this big hoohoo beginning at the start of this month when our neighbor asked me to pet sit for her because she didn't want to board. Well, I pet sit a few dogs around the neighborhood and I'm always eager to help, so I of course said yes. The nice payout from it didn't hurt either. However, I started getting more and more anxious about it because she was obviously nervous about leaving her puppies and I wanted to do the best job possible. I also wasn't sure exactly what she wanted me to do.
She moved the date up from the 26th to the 25th about a week ago and, okay, I went along with it. I guess I should also explain that I haven't been feeling well lately: I have a touch of a cold and sinus infection, and my insomnia's been rampant. I had PMS, even though I was post-period, up until about three days ago. So all of that fed into my natural anxiety condition. I didn't sleep the night before Christmas Eve, or I slept my normal amount which is about three hours. And then we stayed up late on Christmas Eve, as is our way and I got about an hour of sleep and found myself watching the clock thinking about when it would be acceptable to get up and look in on the doggies.
Ann of course said she'd help but I was way too nervous about it, so I got up at about a quarter after 8 and trekked over there in my pajamas, let them out of their corral as she'd told me she did at that time in the morning, and was coming back when our phone rang. It was our neighbor, surprised to hear me awake because I'd told her I don't normally get up until noon. Well, their car had broken down somewhere in Georgia and she was having it towed back to her house. She was coming back. She insisted I keep the money and I was feeling pretty good, free of that burden, I have to be honest.
And then my sister come back in from walking her dogs and, well, she has a way of sort of exacerbating my condition when she gets upset so the first thing she says to me is, "We can't keep the money!" So I'm panicking, close to almost breaking down. Our neighbor's a very practical, ex-military type, so not only did I truly believe she didn't want to negotiate about paying her back, I didn't want to give the money back because I had spent so much on presents with the idea that I was going to add the payment to out collective accounts after Christmas for bills and such.
So I try to go back to bed but playing in an endless and infuriating loop in my mind is giving the money back, offending our neighbor, giving the money back, etc., etc. After about an hour, just when I thought I'd go absolutely mad, I just got up and sat on the couch in my pajamas to watch the Disney parade on TV. I start to make peppermint green tea, hoping that'll calm me down and I get about halfway through the parade when my sister starts fretting about going over to see the puppies again. She does and they've wreaked havoc in the house, so she prompts me to walk them, which means getting dressed and forgetting my tea as it gets cold sitting on the kitchen counter. They won't walk: they don't like that it's raining and wet, and one of them is scared to go past the point where our dog attacked her.
So now, feeling completely stressed and stretched to my absolute limit, I go back to our house, pick an outfit for Christmas day and we get ready to eat our first round of hors d'œuvres. We visited the puppies one last time and then my neighbor came home around 1, mentioning to my sister that she had no food in the house. So Ann's now convinced we have to make our dinner early and share it with them. Thank goodness she realizes we can just give them the two extra game hens we bought without cooking them and that solves that.
On top of all this, my sister had invited my brother over, something she didn't ask me about because she knew I'd flat out say no, and now she was regretting it and putting off writing to him about what time to come over, etc. So, I offer to call. Which turns into me, yesterday, calling him to tell him to bugger off, that we're not having Christmas this year because of the upset and it'd be better if he stayed home. Well, he gives me a hard time, sounding absolutely pathetic and suggesting about ten times that he could come over to keep me company (after my sister drives him here, by the way, and then back at night!) So I felt utterly miserable and guilty over that all day.
Believe it or not, after a very confusing and upsetting start, the day, as strange as it had began, settled into a nice, low key sort of thing. We watched our favorite Christmas specials and I fell asleep for at least a short period of time during Runaway Bride so I got a sort of second (well, actually, first) wind. We had a lovely day together, ending it with the annual rewatching to Return of the King EE.
The holidays are still difficult without my parents, and especially my mother who adored Christmas. She loved me particularly, I think because I still liked getting toys and surprises as an adult, LOL, and her cooking was divine. I've tried to reconcile the fact that I just have to find what the holidays mean now without them and her, and I'm sort of on... uneven ground with it. Not to mention that I just flat-out miss them most at the time of year when you're supposed to be surrounded by those you love. They're in my heart.
It's easier now after a good night's sleep to see how I was overreacting and everything, but as I discussed with
lastwordslinger, when you're in the middle of panicking your little mind out, it's kind of difficult to find that calm. Sighs, sometimes I hate having a defective brain! xP But everything's okay, I can laugh at some stuff now, and it was a wonderful holiday so I'll hold on to those good memories above the others! I've made it all sound so tragic, LOL, and I'm sure at times I felt the world was ending but it was a good time, so trust me, I'm not complaining even about the stress!Peace, Ghani
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no subject
on 2009-12-26 11:05 pm (UTC)*hugs* about you missing your parents. That was a devastating blow, and it's only natural that you'd miss them especially around the holidays. I met your dad once but I wish I could have met your mom.
*hugs* again, and various kitty sounds from Tim and Molly.
no subject
on 2009-12-27 05:33 pm (UTC)I wish you could have met my mother, but I'm always so very pleased that you did meet my father, and that he was even more impressed with you and happy that you were my friend than he had been before that (and that was a great deal!) Hugs!
no subject
on 2009-12-28 04:04 am (UTC)I'm glad I met your dad and he gave me high marks. :-) I wish you could meet my counselor; based on what I've told her you'd get high marks. But, unfortunately, she's not going to be my counselor for much longer -- I go to a community center where the counselors are grad students, and she's completed her hours. *sniffle* I'll get a new counselor, but it won't be the same -- she was a big SW fan.
no subject
on 2009-12-29 07:11 pm (UTC)You need to meet Ann! Sometimes, I don't even remember that you haven't yet! 0_0 I still hold that hope that one day, hopefully not in the too far future, we'll both be well off enough that you can come and stay with us! Hugs!