13 December 1999

Twelve days until Christmas. I need to hurry up and get certain packages in the mail. We may be "doing" Christmas a little early, because my brother is going to spend Christmas with his fiancee in Montana, and the only days that he and my grandparents will be here at the same time are the 23rd and the morning of the 24th. So my dad told me last night that we might celebrate - at least in part - the morning of the 24th, before John has to go to the airport.

I hope it's just a partial celebration - only opening presents that John is either giving or receiving. Christmas is Christmas, after all, no matter what name you put on it, and it wouldn't feel right not to have a Christmas celebration on Christmas. But that's up to my parents and grandparents, really.

The 3GI party went very well. I wasn't the only ex-employee to come, and it was nice to see everyone again. I got a lot of compliments on my dress, which was nice, and I danced until I got a blister under my big toe. Whee! I did take my camera, but it was so dark that most of the pictures look like crap. Oh, well.

Before 3GI's party, Matt and I were just sitting in the living room reading. Suddenly, the tree did this slow, stately topple to the floor, dripping ornaments and candy canes, barely preceded by a racing blur of a cat... We assumed that the cat had attacked some ornament and triggered the collapse. We got the tree back up and put back the ornaments and candy canes - luckily, no ornaments had broken, and only a few of the candy canes. It was lopsided, but since it was time to go change for the party, we figured it would last until Saturday.

Saturday morning, the tree's angle was even more precarious. I had Matt hold it upright while I tightened the screws in the base. Correctly upright, we went on about our business.

This morning, the tree was beginning to look a little unstable again. I am coming to the conclusion that the base I bought isn't quite big enough for our tree. After Matt left for work, I crawled under the tree and righted it with one hand while tightening screws with the other. It's still a touch lopsided, but more or less upright.

I think I may see if I can't repair the tree's original base...

I keep thinking that this is going to be a busy week; that I have a lot to do. But when I try to list those things, it doesn't sound very busy.

• I want to make a batch or two of peanut butter fudge using a recipe KT gave me.
• I need to mail packages to various people near Chicago and New York.
• I need to prod Matt into getting something for the one person left on our list.
• We need to do Christmas cards.
• One day later this week will be devoted to taking my brother out to lunch and making another batch of moon cookies, but I don't know which day yet.
• We need to decide on the guest list for our New Year's party and get the invitations out.
• I need to pick up a few gift certificates for people who are hard to shop for.

Not exactly back-breaking work, there. Oh, yeah, and today I plan to go to Roses to pick up a new pair of cheap loafers (mine are developing holes in the sole) and some cheap tins to put cookies and fudge in. Hold me back!