A naked Christmas tree was calling me. I had the alarm set for 9:30, but just before nine one of those tree branches was figuratively poking me. "I'm out here. Decorate me." Then the phone rang—stupid robocall.

So I answered Hope [the tree] rather than Morpheus, despite his being a very persuasive guy. But first I had to answer the call of nature and the call of the canis familiaris. (It's entirely too early for all these calls...)

Anyway, after breakfast James dug in his model stash for something to take to the model club gift exchange, and I wrapped both that and the duplicate Hallmark ornament he'd bought for the occasion for him, and sent him off for his monthly luncheon with the guys and the annual "Dirty Santa" game. The temperature was already in the mid-60s and headed up to the 70s, so I put on the lightest thing I had, a sleeveless duster, and commenced to decoration: get all the boxes of ornaments out of the big box, put the older ornaments up on the back of the tree, including my lovely little horns and bells that came from McCrory at Macon Mall and the frosted red balls that look like the ones on the druggist's tree in The House Without a Christmas Tree, some others at the back or the bottom to fill in the glitter, even though the back won't be seen, then on the front and the visible side the large glass ornaments, the large Hallmark ornaments, and finally the smaller ones fit in the gaps of the larger ones.

This is the perfect time to watch most of the Christmas specials that James isn't as fond of, so it was a wonderful orgy: Christmas Is, The City That Forgot About Christmas, the two For Better or For Worse Christmas cartoons ("The Bestest Present" and "The Christmas Angel"), It's a Wonderful Tiny Toons Christmas (the inside jokes are still hysterical; I love "William Shatner" narrating "Little Drummer Boy"), Raggedy Ann and Andy: The Great Santa Claus Caper (which has the same closing credit music as A Very Merry Cricket, The Simpsons Christmas Special, and finally the original A Christmas Memory with Geraldine Page, which reduced me to a blubbering mess. I finished tinseling before I was halfway through The Best Christmas Pageant Ever, and I hadn't really been paying attention to it, besides rolling my eyes at Alice Wendlekin.

Then I had to vacuum quickly before I could run downstairs to get the manger set and place the figures piece by piece into the stable. Every chipped figure is as familiar to me as my name; some of the pieces are as old as I am. Mary still has the 15¢ grease pencil mark on the unpainted chalkware surface under her kneeling body.

Then I vacuumed again and by the time I was done with that James was home. I took a quick shower because I was drenched in perspiration. When I was putting the tinsel on, I had to put a glove on my left hand, which was holding the tinsel because my hand was so soppy from sweat that it was making the tinsel stick to my hand. Then I got dressed, because I had assumed we were going to see ARTC tonight, but James' back was particularly hurting him and mine was feeling none-too-well at this point.

So we just reloaded the power chair and went to West Cobb Diner for dinner. I was ravenous; in my obsession with the Christmas tree I'd had only my gingerbread boy and a glass of milk since breakfast. I ate that turkey and dressing up tooth and toenail, and the cucumber and tomato salad, too. Afterwards we went to Barnes & Noble, where I got the final book in the Apothecary trilogy, the January "Country Sampler" (::sob:: already!) and the new "Small Room Decorating." (You need decorating porn once in a while.) I was looking for a December "Period Living," but they still have November, and where is the Christmas "Landscape"? I must go into Buckhead!

Came home to read and listen to Christmas music on Dish's Traditional Holidays channel.

Labels: books, Christmas, decorating, magazines, music, television

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. . . . . noted and logged by Linda at 11:05:00 PM

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