Christmas and etc.
As always, I don't spend much time near the computer on Christmas. I get up, walk away, and spend time with the family.
Christmas Eve was nice, as usual. My mom's brother and family came over for dinner, we exchanged some gifts, talked, and had a good time. Then, the four of us exchanged presents and went to bed early, so Santa could come. Because if you still believe in Santa, he still brings you presents. So, I got a Wii from Santa! A Wii! Neat! And if you want, I can send you my friend code. Or you can provide me with yours. I'm still learning my way around, but I think I've got the hang of most of it.
I also got some tools for my toolbox (including a nice utility knife and an AC voltage detector), some new clothes, a couple movies, some music, and the Lego Batman game for my new Wii. Not all of this is "from Santa," by the way. That's the overall haul, excluding a very special present that deserves its own paragraph.
Since there are six of us grandkids on one side of the family, we draw names every year to see who we're going to get a present for. My cousin Scott got my name, but got sick with some kind of nasty stomach virus for several days right before Christmas. As such, he didn't really have time to go shopping, so he decided to go the gag gift route. And he did it better than just about anyone. I got: a coupon to Super-Cuts (note that there isn't a single Super-Cuts within 30 miles of my house), a tacky coffee mug with cats on it (I do not drink coffee), a plastic thing that you press into a slice of bread so that it comes out of the toaster with Jesus' face burned into it (I didn't even know they made these things), a DMX CD in a broken case ("Listened to only once."), and the $17.93 left from the $20 limit. I haven't laughed that much in a long time, and I've got the perfect use for the cat mug.
The day after Christmas is always a big family reunion up in the country. My grandfather is one of seven kids, who all had kids, who all had kids, and some of them had kids already. Not everybody was there, of course, but it was well over thirty people. It was a pretty good time, all told, even though the church fellowship hall where we had the thing has teriffic acoustics for bouncing the shrieks of small children directly into my ears. The food was great, to be sure, and I got to talk with some people I hadn't seen in a long time.
Then, there's the 27th, a national holiday in at least one person's mind. It's my friend Ryan's birthday, and since it's right after Christmas, he's home to celebrate with all us losers still stuck in North Carolina. See, he lives in New York now and is all fancy-pants with his apartment and Metro Card. But it's OK, because every time I see him, we pick up like we just saw each other yesterday. And we always have a lot of fun.
So, we got together with all our local friends and went to The Old Printing Press Sandwich Factory. No, that's not actually its name, but it's what we decided it should be called because it's funny and conjures up images of a movable-type sandwich making machine and bread stored in card catalog drawers with dividers separating it by date. We came up with all that in about 30 seconds and no, we're not entirely mentally sound. But we had a great time talking, laughing, reciting Jim Gaffigan routines, watching clips of a British comedy called "Look Around You" on Ryan's iPhone, and all that nerdishness. Then, we went back to Jeremy and Robert's for Wii Sports and Rock Band 2. Much to the surprise of everyone, I tore it up singing Boston's "Foreplay (It's Been A Long Time)" and then flailed around like a spasmodic chimp trying to play the drums on Dinosaur Jr.'s "I Feel the Pain." Stupid kick pedal. After I got home really late, I did some research and am pleased to find that Rock Band 2 on the Wii has all the same downloadable content as the 360 and PS3 versions, so I'm buying it. My parents will learn to enjoy video games, by crikey.
And then, today I went down to Charlotte with Ryan and his brother Casey to see a mutual friend of ours who works in the coolest library I have ever seen. It's downtown, right on the new light rail line and is designed to cater solely to kids and teenagers. It's got all the usual things: books, magazines, computers, places to study and read, all that. But it's also got two theaters and a television studio. Not directly linked to a cable channel, mind, but it's got a green screen, costumes, an animation setup with a white-board & specially-rigged camera, and a sound booth! It has at least three eMac workstations and an aluminum Mac tower running Final Cut Pro. To say the least, it is fancy. And Seth (said friend) just stumbled into working there while trying to get a job as a regular librarian. It's fantastic, except when people come in smelling overwhelmingly of urine, but I guess that's true everywhere.
After Seth got off work, we walked down to the Rock-Bottom Brewery and had dinner. The conversation led to a lot of updates to the ol' quotes site and a resolution on my part to get out and hang out with my friends more often. And I will, too.
Christmas Eve was nice, as usual. My mom's brother and family came over for dinner, we exchanged some gifts, talked, and had a good time. Then, the four of us exchanged presents and went to bed early, so Santa could come. Because if you still believe in Santa, he still brings you presents. So, I got a Wii from Santa! A Wii! Neat! And if you want, I can send you my friend code. Or you can provide me with yours. I'm still learning my way around, but I think I've got the hang of most of it.
I also got some tools for my toolbox (including a nice utility knife and an AC voltage detector), some new clothes, a couple movies, some music, and the Lego Batman game for my new Wii. Not all of this is "from Santa," by the way. That's the overall haul, excluding a very special present that deserves its own paragraph.
Since there are six of us grandkids on one side of the family, we draw names every year to see who we're going to get a present for. My cousin Scott got my name, but got sick with some kind of nasty stomach virus for several days right before Christmas. As such, he didn't really have time to go shopping, so he decided to go the gag gift route. And he did it better than just about anyone. I got: a coupon to Super-Cuts (note that there isn't a single Super-Cuts within 30 miles of my house), a tacky coffee mug with cats on it (I do not drink coffee), a plastic thing that you press into a slice of bread so that it comes out of the toaster with Jesus' face burned into it (I didn't even know they made these things), a DMX CD in a broken case ("Listened to only once."), and the $17.93 left from the $20 limit. I haven't laughed that much in a long time, and I've got the perfect use for the cat mug.
The day after Christmas is always a big family reunion up in the country. My grandfather is one of seven kids, who all had kids, who all had kids, and some of them had kids already. Not everybody was there, of course, but it was well over thirty people. It was a pretty good time, all told, even though the church fellowship hall where we had the thing has teriffic acoustics for bouncing the shrieks of small children directly into my ears. The food was great, to be sure, and I got to talk with some people I hadn't seen in a long time.
Then, there's the 27th, a national holiday in at least one person's mind. It's my friend Ryan's birthday, and since it's right after Christmas, he's home to celebrate with all us losers still stuck in North Carolina. See, he lives in New York now and is all fancy-pants with his apartment and Metro Card. But it's OK, because every time I see him, we pick up like we just saw each other yesterday. And we always have a lot of fun.
So, we got together with all our local friends and went to The Old Printing Press Sandwich Factory. No, that's not actually its name, but it's what we decided it should be called because it's funny and conjures up images of a movable-type sandwich making machine and bread stored in card catalog drawers with dividers separating it by date. We came up with all that in about 30 seconds and no, we're not entirely mentally sound. But we had a great time talking, laughing, reciting Jim Gaffigan routines, watching clips of a British comedy called "Look Around You" on Ryan's iPhone, and all that nerdishness. Then, we went back to Jeremy and Robert's for Wii Sports and Rock Band 2. Much to the surprise of everyone, I tore it up singing Boston's "Foreplay (It's Been A Long Time)" and then flailed around like a spasmodic chimp trying to play the drums on Dinosaur Jr.'s "I Feel the Pain." Stupid kick pedal. After I got home really late, I did some research and am pleased to find that Rock Band 2 on the Wii has all the same downloadable content as the 360 and PS3 versions, so I'm buying it. My parents will learn to enjoy video games, by crikey.
And then, today I went down to Charlotte with Ryan and his brother Casey to see a mutual friend of ours who works in the coolest library I have ever seen. It's downtown, right on the new light rail line and is designed to cater solely to kids and teenagers. It's got all the usual things: books, magazines, computers, places to study and read, all that. But it's also got two theaters and a television studio. Not directly linked to a cable channel, mind, but it's got a green screen, costumes, an animation setup with a white-board & specially-rigged camera, and a sound booth! It has at least three eMac workstations and an aluminum Mac tower running Final Cut Pro. To say the least, it is fancy. And Seth (said friend) just stumbled into working there while trying to get a job as a regular librarian. It's fantastic, except when people come in smelling overwhelmingly of urine, but I guess that's true everywhere.
After Seth got off work, we walked down to the Rock-Bottom Brewery and had dinner. The conversation led to a lot of updates to the ol' quotes site and a resolution on my part to get out and hang out with my friends more often. And I will, too.