Weep. Weep for Me.

I think I got a little cocky. It's December 21st and since it's a mere few days before Christmas I think I got a little cocky. Let down my guard. Started feeling invincible and it caught up with me.

Late this afternoon I was changing B's shirt. We were listening to the music channels on our digital TV service, specifically to the Christmas music channel - all Christmas music for all of December. All I wanted to do was change B's shirt, a process I can do in sixty or seventy seconds, and then I was going to change the TV to watch the evening news. There I was, up to my elbows in husband, completely vulnerable and helpless to defend myself when it happened.

I heard the opening notes of Last Christmas.

What could I do? Throw down my husband? Leave him half strangled in a tee-shirt while I dove for the remote control? It wouldn't have done any good anyway. As spry as I may be, I had no chance to ward off the whiney, breathy voice of George Michael pissing and moaning about his old love who dumped him and who wouldn't, George?

I was so close. So, so close. Up until then I had been freely walking through the Christmas market, untouched by Wham! In and out of the mall and department store and grocery stores, completely Wham! free. I was nearly to the Christmas season finish line when I was assaulted. Assaulted in my own home. Wham! waited until I was helping a handicapped man - caring for my quadriplegic husband - to sneak in and catch me.

Shame on you, Wham! Shame on you.

Each Year The Same

We've reached the part of the preparations for Christmas that I dread. Not the decorating or the shopping or the wrapping of gifts. Instead I dread the package delivery service and grocery shopping.

Considering that I live overseas from friends and family and that we do most of our Christmas shopping online, the package delivery folks come by here a lot. We're now at the point in the season where packages come virtually every day. And as nothing is perfect, I can't always count on the package delivery folks coming at the same time each day. If one day a package arrives at 10:30 and I'm expecting another to come the next day, I can't bank on the second one being delivered at 10:30. The person who normally delivers packages to my building is a lady and she's seen me in every state of dress, my hair in curlers, with wet hair, with dust rags and mops in hand - she's even seen me without my eyebrows penciled in. The only other people allowed to see me without my eyebrows penciled in are related to me by blood or marriage. Of course waiting for packages to come cramps up my morning schedule and it's only a matter of time before I get it wrong and she comes to bring me goodies while I'm in the shower deep conditioning my hair.

Tomorrow I'll have to do the last big trip to the grocery store before Christmas. I have my list made but it doesn't stop me from fearing that I'll forget something and either have to venture to the grocery store on Christmas Eve morning to get butter or avail myself of a gas station mini-mart. Or even worse, the mini-mart in the train station where a half pound of butter will run you in the neighborhood of $4. And all grocery shopping - anything that requires me to use my car, really - must be complete by noon. 1:00 at the very latest. Else I risk not having any place to park when I get back home because all of the parking in on my street fills up fast once the Christmas market opens. I'll be running the gauntlet of getting to the grocery store and back before it's too late for me to get a parking space but not going so early that I miss package delivery.

After Christmas my frustrations will change. That's when it moves to getting rid of the cardboard boxes that once housed all the things that were shipped to me and dodging fourteen year old boys with New Years firecrackers.

Three Hours and Three Hundred Swear Words Later

...I can present to you this!



I believe it turned out pretty well considering I was drinking apple martinis and eating cashews while putting it together.

Friday Shuffle - Drive By Shuffle Edition

Holiday preparation slump seems to have subsided and I'm fully in the throes of the Christmas spirit. Most of my shopping is finished - all the overseas gifts have been bought and shipped and all that's left is the easy shopping...something for B and a little something for my MIL and Gerd. Stuff I can grab any day early in the morning when the shops aren't so mad.

Otherwise this weekend it's a fairly full schedule. There's some organizing I need to do in order to get furniture and houseplants rearranged to fit in our Christmas tree and then the actual putting up and decorating of the tree. I'm already planning in my mind how I want to do the garland. I have pearl beads that I use for garland each year. B insists that I use the pearl garland. It's one of his favorite parts of the tree decor. For the past three Christmases I've been using with it gold ribbon - the sort edged with wire, it being put on the tree in a rather casual, oh-look-some-gold-ribbon-just-happened-to-blow-around-the-tree sort of way but this year I believe I'll skip the ribbon and do double strands of the pearl beads. Just a little insight to the things I think about during the course of my day.

Must dash. I've made a pitcher of apple martinis, pulled out a bag of pretzel sticks and now I'm going to cuddle up with my husband and watch a Christmas movie. White Christmas I believe. Let's shuffle.

1. Baby Let's Play House - Elvis Presley
2. Joy Ride - The Killers
3. In The Morning - Razorlight
4. It's A Shame About Ray - The Lemonheads
5. The Right Place - The Derailers
6. Heaven Sent - Hinder
7. You're A God - Vertical Horizon
8. Heavy - Collective Soul
9. Promise Of Summer - Jackopierce
10. Thing Called Love - Bonnie Raitt
    

Breaking From the Norm

I made an Advent wreath today. I had one that I'd bought about a year after I'd moved to Germany but it got all ratty and I hated to find the right candles for it. Little stump candles that couldn't be but so tall and so wide and I got all freaked out when they burned down too low. I have a healthy fear of house fires. Instead I wanted an Advent wreath that used tea lights. You see, aside from the fire hazard thing, using regular stump candles, or tapers if that's what your particular advent wreath takes, means that the candles will be uneven from week to week. You light the first candle and you have the choice of either using it for just a little while and then blowing it out and therefore having successively uneven candle lengths from week to week or replacing the candle with a new one each week when the next candle is lit. As I'm a bit of a freak for symmetry, the uneven candles drive me nuts. Tea lights? Always even. Light it and burn it until it's empty. Throw in a fresh one the following Sunday. Heck, burn it every day - no uneven candles!

Uneven Advent candles are what passes for a worry in my world.



Yesterday I found this little arrangement. Just the metal tray with the candle holders. The tray is deep enough that I could fill it with any number of little doo-dads - greenery or beads or pine cones or whatever strikes my fancy. I could change its look every year if I choose. And it takes tea lights. Excellent find!



Today I went to the One Euro shop (where, natch!, everything costs just a euro!), got some plastic miniature balls (prediction: someone will Google "plastic miniature balls" and become sorely disappointed when the conversation is about Advent decor) and some little felt cut-outs, found in my spare bedroom closet some fake spruce garland that I could cut a couple pieces from and in a couple minutes I had a new Advent wreath.

B got all balky about it because it's not all "wreathy". He called it "cake pan-y". I considered acting all put out and insulted but instead have adopted the attitude that it is innovative and instead of being traditional I'm being visionary. And symmetrical.

Christmas - Come and Gone

I suppose I should give the annual holiday roundup of what transpired over Christmas but it was actually fairly uneventful. As we had it planned, my MIL and Gerd would be coming over on Christmas Eve for coffee and cake and gift opening, B and I would be alone all day on 1st Christmas Day as my MIL and Gerd would be going over to crazy Aunt Gabi and milquetoast Uncle Gerald's house, and then 2nd Christmas Day would see the return of my MIL and Gerd for another rousing hour or two of coffee and cake.

I am so caked out right now it's not even funny.

Normally we're saddled delighted with the presence of Aunt Gabi and Uncle Gerald but this year our cast of torturers guest list changed and instead of the G & G Show we were treated to Gerd's former son-in-law. By some twist of fate or family disfunction Gerd doesn't get along with his daughter but is still friendly with his former SIL and so SIL came to visit Gerd over Christmas. Perhaps SIL has no family of his own. Or perhaps SIL doesn't get along with his family. After his visit I would bet money on the latter.

They arrived on Christmas Eve around 3:15 and stayed until around 6pm. During that time SIL never shut up. Never. He talked the entire time. I have no real idea of what he said because it was all so boring and pointless I simply didn't bother listening and it wasn't like any of us could interject anything into the conversation anyway. This guy came in, we did our introductions and the race was on. He took a seat opposite B and ran his mouth like a bell clap. There were brief moment were he would pause to shovel in some cake or take a gulp of coffee but else he never let up. Poor B. He truly is a captive audience and had to spend the whole time with this guy zeroed in on him.

Finally even Gerd couldn't bear it any longer and they left and for that I was most grateful because by then my ears were starting to bleed.

First Christmas Day was nice. We watched a lot of movies and towards late evening I called my sister's house to get a report on how their Christmas was going. Evidently, according to the report my sister gave me, my mother was talking too much and my sister wished she would shut up.

You're singing that song to the wrong person, lady! I'll see your incessant rambling and I'll raise you non-stop jabbering by a complete stranger!

Second Christmas Day? Replay of Christmas Eve minus rambling jackass and no present opening. And we had different cake. We did, however, have about a half hour where I had to restrain myself from going up to the neighbors living above me and beating them until they were senseless piles of goo because 2pm on second Christmas Day is when they decided it would be an appropriate time to drill. Jeez-o-flip, I wanted to brain them for that. Golly, I want to know who they got a rental contract from because in mine it says that there will be no drilling on a freaking holiday. It's not just the noise that was irking me - it was the complete lack of respect for everyone living around them. It was a holiday. I don't believe it's beyond reason to expect someone to refrain from drilling in the freaking concrete slab walls for one day. I perhaps should have gone upstairs and asked them to stop but unfortunately I couldn't trust myself enough to simply ask without accompanying it with a few swift kicks in the shin so I just gritted my teeth and rode it out. I thought that having a screaming and possibly kicking match with the neighbors would be worse to do on a holiday than even annoying drilling.

Now that it's the downhill slide to the end of the year I've been immersing myself in knitting and reading. Santa brought me lots of new books and so I'm very happy.

Friday Shuffle - Last Shuffle 'fore the Fat Man Arrives

Raise you're hand if you're all ready for the Christmas holiday to arrive! Yeah, my hand's not raised either. I still have one more present to buy.

• I hate like sin to buy gifts for crazy Tante Gabi and milquetoast Uncle Gerald. We're not close with them except for the times when we have their company thrust upon us and I happen to find it pointless to the point of meaningless to buy gifts for them. And I've noticed that the closer it becomes to the holidays, the less of a crap I give about what I present them. That's sad. Gift giving shouldn't be done out of a sense of obligation. I don't give them junk but I care so little about it that if they didn't like it or didn't use it or even regifted it, I wouldn't care because I feel like I only went through the motions of presenting a gift.
  
  
• Speaking of the word "gift", a couple Christmases ago my sister and her husband sent some marmalade for me to give to some friends of ours that my sister and BIL are just crazy about. It was some sort of orange/hot pepper marmalade concoction and on the label of the jar it said "A gift of Florida". Later after they had a chance to try the marmalade I asked how they liked it and the husband said "We liked it a lot. It's very spicy! I can see why they jokingly call it poison!". That's when it dawned on me that they misunderstood the meaning of the word "gift" on the label. Gift in German means poison.
  
  
• The misunderstanding of words that are common in both English and German but have vastly different meanings happens on occasion. I'd lived in Germany for about a year when it occurred to me to ask Burkhard if he thinks "Pizza Hut" means to him "Pizza Hat" and yes, it did. Hut in German means hat. And he thought the black roof on the logo was some sort of flat, black hat akin to what a gondolier wears. I laughed for ten minutes straight when he told me that.
  
  
• I always think the words "after shave" must freak out Germans or at least make them laugh. Go find a English to German translator and look up the word "after".
  
  
• We've been having some crazy weather here this week. It looks like it's cloudy every day but in reality it's not regular clouds but high fog that's so thick it blots out the sun. Today the fog was lower and since the temperature is below freezing the fog freezes and covers everything in a sort of frosty fuzz. Pretty, except it so freakin' damp that the cold soaks into your bones. My joints are so stiffened up from the damp I'm walking around like a 600 year old woman.
  
  
• The fog has also kept me from taking, for your enjoyment, pictures of the Christmas Market. But let's face it - it pretty much looks like last year's pictures.
  
  
• I'll show you my Christmas tree, though.

Today's musical selections come from my Christmas tune folder. Bixente, put on your Santa hat and shuffle.

1. Wonderful Dream (Holidays Are Coming) - Melanie Thornton
2. Merry Xmas Everybody - Slade
3. The Angels Cried - Alan Jackson & Alison Krauss
4. Weihnachten Bin Ich Zu Haus - Roy Black
   
5. O Holy Night - Il Divo
6. Christmas Wrapping - The Waitresses
7. Christmas Eve - Blackmore's Night
8. It Came Upon a Midnight Clear - Aaron Neville
9. Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas - Judy Garland
10. Audi Victoria - Die Prinzen

That's it for me until after Christmas. If you celebrate the holiday, I hope you have a blessed and safe Christmas filled with love and peace. If you don't, enjoy your time away from work and pray that on Christmas Day we can have a peaceful day around the world.

Come and Gone

The day before Christmas Eve my MIL arrived out of breath to report that the elevator wasn't working - it was stuck on the first floor with the door partially open. I live on the second floor, which in my building means I'm actually up on the fourth floor since there are shops and offices in the lower part of the building. Certainly a time to be thankful that we don't live on the seventh floor.

Since one can't be sure that the elevator failure has been reported B called the emergency number and was told that it had indeed be reported and they'd get someone out there to fix the elevator right after the Christmas holidays - in other words, Wednesday. B thanked them, hung up and reported to me what he'd been told.

You know B's been a quadriplegic for over twenty-three years now. You'd think he'd remember that tiny detail. You think he'd really remember it when he's reporting a broken elevator. I couldn't believe he just swallowed waiting until Wednesday for a repair of the one thing he definitely needs should he need to get outside. The one time it's okay for him to play the cripple card and he doesn't mention it.

My rather vocal protest encouraged him to call the emergency repair number back and they said they'd have to check to see if it would be okay for them to come out the same day since it involved a handicapped person being in the building (meaning they would have to see if the rental company would pay extra) and a short while later the repair dispatch called back to say they'd send out someone as soon as they could. Two hours later we had a working elevator.

And that's why I didn't have to drag boxes and bags and crates of Christmas stuff from my MIL's apartment to my apartment via a whole lot of stairs. And that's why the rest of the building didn't either. Yay for my rather vocal protests.

The rest of the holidays were as I expected. The apartment looked lovely, the food was delicious, B's aunt was obnoxious and his uncle was boring. We got some nice gifts, the packages from my family didn't arrive in time for Christmas and everyone and their dog has called us.

All in all it's been a good Christmas. And I can now play with my new laptop computer with no feelings of guilt.

But I wish the Christmas market was still around. At least the fish.

Friday Shuffle - Fourth Advent Edition

Christmas preparations are now strictly centered at home. The shopping is finished and now I'm left with baking cookies, finishing the wrapping (okay, starting the wrapping but we don't have much to wrap anyway) and getting my apartment clean for Christmas Eve company. I'll probably take a break to wander downtown to see the holiday shopping crowds, happy to know that I don't need to be there and if it gets overwhelming I'll just walk up the street back home.

Bixente the iPod's ready for the holidays as well and ready to give you his last holiday music shuffle - and this time he's doing it country style.

1. It Came Upon A Midnight Clear - Vince Gill
2. The Angels Cried - Alan Jackson & Alison Krauss (sob!)
3. Christmas Cookies - George Strait
4. Come On Christmas - Dwight Yoakam (complete with a bottle with which you can drown your sorrows)
5. Away In A Manger - Johnny Cash
6. Christmas in Dixie - Alabama (heart crushing, homesickness filled, boo-hoo sobs!)
7. Santa Looked A Lot Like Daddy - Buck Owens
8. Joy To The World - Tammy Wynette
9. I Only Want You For Christmas - Alan Jackson
10. Country Christmas - Loretta Lynn

How I'd love to be home this Christmas - my oldest brother will be there along with my sister and other brother. We haven't all been together since my father passed fifteen years ago. We'd love to be with B's cousins in Australia as well. We got a Christmas package from them today filled with fun trinkets and lots of love as well. We're very blessed to have lovely families.

May all who celebrate the season have a safe, joy-filled and serene Christmas. Hope Santa's good to y'all. I'll be back after the Jolly Old Elf has made his visit.

Peace.

Thursday Haiku Blogging - Christmas Edition

As if Thursday haiku blogging isn't enough for you, I add in the spicy mix of the holidays.

Or maybe it was just some leftover Chex Mix.

Star atop my tree
Crooked, straighten you again
Now dove flops over.

Lift's busted again
Drag shopping bags up the stairs
Next time buy less stuff.

Cookies left to bake
Iced sugar. Snickerdoodles.
Eat with ice cold milk.

Homesickness starts up
My family's so far away
Call them lots and lots.

Dance to Christmas tunes
Rudolph and Little St. Nick
And Santa Baby.

Now all wrapping's done
Boxes stowed under the tree
Wait for Weihnachtsmann

Last Advent shuffle
Friday, last holiday tunes
Is your favorite there?

You'll find out tomorrow.