Back to normal

The holiday season and honey-do list are both in full-swing, already.

Last night PW and I opened presents LP made at school.  A Popsicle reindeer and a clay bear.   This morning, we got up a little early, dug the SUV out of teh snow and took LP to school for Breakfast With Santa, then the two of us went for a workout/sauna and all day shopping, errands and a decent lunch up in Calumet, at the Michigan House.

Christmas wouldn't be Christmas without a lot of freaking shopping, right?   Bought today:  A Christmas tree (typical pokey green one), refrigerator/freezer (side by side with a water/ice thing that hopefully is programmable so that you can set it up to squirt unsuspecting people in the eye), a stove (forgot to tell you about the stove, Mr. Bud!!) and some copper presents for whom I do not know.  Just now, as in JUST NOW, I dropped a couple hundred bucks to pay off a new snowboard for my oldest.  He hit a tree at one of the local ski hills (Mt. Bohemia-expert back-country runs only) and snapped his snowboard in half.  We also poked around a few antique shops, two book stores, JC Penny, a jewelry shop and the ATT phone store.  I was feeling kind of scrooge-like today, but hopefully that will pass, soon.  Tomorrow, LP and I head out to shop for PW and to watch a friend of ours do his awesome Elvis impersonation on stage at the mall.  Hopefully, Mr. Bud will join us.  Hopefully.  Mr. Bud.  Join.  12:30.  The.  Mall.  Elvis.  The show is a hoot, I saw it a few years ago at the county fair and he brought down the house.  Oh yeah, and THE BOOKSTORE IS CLOSING.  FUCK ME.  How do I buy an armload of books every five weeks for crew-x??  Don't tell me about those online book places. I need to FEEL the book, run my hot little hands over it, read the back and the inside jacket, check the copyright page, read the chapter names, peek in at a page, or 10, smell that scent when you fan it in front of your nose, kick the tires, check the oil and all that shit.  We have two used bookstores and one, little, independent store, but they just don't do it for the sheer volume I need to find and I'm a bit depressed:(

And yes, the house is crying out for attention.  I'm out of wood in the house and need to start hauling it in to dry.  But first, I needed to buy a decent size rack, then build a long, low box to put it in, to catch the dirt and chips.  Before that I need to patch the great big HOLE in the wall where the rack will go, but first I needed to bring in wood and build a fire so the mud would dry quick.  Sort of a paradox, there, but I have the last coat of mud drying, a fire going and a metal rack painted shiny black.  Still need to build the damn box and paint the wall.  I also have shit pot of snow to shovel and a ton of ice -ala- snow that's been accumulated and packed down to chop up and haul away.  The porches, woodshed and the shed roof over the kitchen need to be raked clean of about 2-3 feet of snow that just won't slide off the new metal roofing.  I'm got my eye on this handy dandy home-made roof rake my neighbor just created.  It rolls up the roof on little balloon tires, then a gentle tug drops a spring-loaded plastic blade down into the snow, locking it so you can then pull the snow straight down to you.  It's mounted on 30 feet of light-weight tubing.  He mentioned needing a radial arm saw so I'm gonna trade for the day:)  Next up I also need to haul three, 45 gallon garbage cans full of kindling into the basement, plumb the water for the fridge and get ready to trim the bathroom that should have been finished a year ago.  I might even try to find the time to make a couple of driftwood ornaments for the tree, but for the rest of the night I'm going to settle down and read a good book, or snuggle up with LP and watch a movie.  Later folks, time to feed the fire.