Category: Life

O Christmas Tree, Oops Christmas Tree

Long day of cleaning, laundry, and cooking, and I decided to put up my tree this year, so this will be a short one. I’m putting up my own tree just to celebrate the fact that I survived the heart attack. The decorations were amassed over the years and my travels, inherited from my parents, or given to me by friends, and I want to look back on all of it in gratefulness for the joy I’ve known in this life, while also looking forward to many more years of life, lawd willin’ and the creek don’t rise.

Here is Washington, D.C.’s tree for the year, going out to a whole bunch of people–Don, Mark, Scott, Haisam, Amanda, and Cyndi.

Washington, D.C.'s state Christmas tree, 2023.
Washington, D.C.’s state Christmas tree, 2023. Click to embiggen.

As long as I’m posting D.C.’s tree, I’ll add the National Christmas tree as well, since all of these trees are in D.C.

The National Christmas Tree, lit up at night.
The National Christmas Tree, 2023. What a hot mess.

Yes, it’s looking a little rough. It fell over and had to be hoisted back up with a crane. I don’t think they did too much to fix the lights or the streamers. When I first took a good look at it, I thought someone had TP’d it.

Then there is the other extreme, the tree in front of the Town Hall in Old Town Alexandria, Virginia. A smaller tree down by the water in Old Town looked the same. I guess they don’t believe in putting anything on top.

Christmas tree at night.
Christmas tree in front of Alexandria Town Hall in Virginia.

To be honest, I prefer the National Tree. I prefer a wild, hot mess to stringent precision. Pretty sure that’s how my own tree will turn out tonight, too. Usually I weave the lights through the branches one at a time, but I don’t have the patience for it so it’s a rather loose weave. By the time I’m done with the lights I might be done for the evening and have to put off decorating the tree until tomorrow night, but that’s okay. No one is going to see it but me, and it’s worth it.

Sunday Stealing: Pink

Doing some Sunday Stealing today.

1. Do you tend to have a guilty conscious?

Sometimes I wonder if I didn’t give Inigo enough of a chance to heal from his leg injury before I took him to say goodbye. But he was in pain, his quality of life took a deep turn for the worse because he couldn’t walk or climb, and I sensed he wouldn’t come back from it. As one friend said, freeing him from pain was a final act of love that I could offer him.

2. Do you still have your wisdom teeth?

No, and that’s actually a Christmas story, as I had them taken out over a winter recess while I was in college. That was also the year my father cut a gash in his hand sawing the trunk of the Christmas tree. We made quite a pair sitting on the couch. My mother said she was running an infirmary.

3. Peanut Butter – creamy or crunchy?

I like both but usually get creamy.

4. Get up off your butt. Take 5 steps. Which leg did you start out on?

Right.

5. What color is your favorite kitchen utensil?

Wood.

6. Did you watch the Michael Jackson memorial/funeral?

No.

7. Do you know anyone who graduated from high school this year? Were you invited to their graduation party? Did you go?

Nope.

8. White with black stripes or black with white stripes?

Zebras are black with white stripes.

9. If we were to call your 6th grade teacher, what would they say about you?

“She’s very bright and a joy to have in the classroom. She enjoys science and English.”

10. Can you draw a perfect circle?

Nope, but I can listen to them. LOVE this song. A friend once cracked a joke that this song might be the first time Maynard James Keenan wrote something in a major key. The sound is ridiculously happy considering the subject matter, which is the stupid ways humans spend their time and money when we could all die tomorrow. I love the hat-tip to Hitchiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. (TW: There is one scene of suicide, and the whole thing is about nuclear annihilation. If you’re easily triggered, watch the second one, which is just dolphins swimming.) Bravissimo hip hip hooray!

11. What was your favorite scratch & sniff sticker scent?

As a child, root beer. As an adult, gardenia. I found these Filter Fresh sheets that you can attach to your air filters and the “Scratch for Scent” sticker on the gardenia one smells just like the perfume my mother wore in the ’70s.

12. How many light switches and electrical outlets are in the room that you are in right now?

One light switch, three electrical outlets, and one defunct cable/landline phone outlet.

13. Do you know sign language?

Just how to spell my name and how to tell someone to eat shit and die. No joke. Back in college two of the girls at the end of the hall were legally deaf and they taught me that.

14. Do you step on cracks in the sidewalk?

Not intentionally.

15. And the sheets on your bed look like….?

White with white stripes.

My Favorite Christmas Commercials

Today was a hard day after a hard week, and once again, I’m wiped out. Therefore I will reach into my bag of emergency entries, er, classic holiday cheer, and attest that these are my favorite Christmas commercials of all time.

This one came out the year I was born. I love it because of its simple animation and of course, the birds. The story gets me every time. Birds bring us their music. How lovely to offer them some of ours in return, instead of taking their homes. Birds LOVE music, too, so this story isn’t too far off the mark. If I go out on the balcony and my little friends are not around, I need only to whistle a tune and the Sparrows emerge from the holly bushes, fly up into the tree, and look down at me with their heads cocked in curiosity as they wait for their snacks.

Then there is this classic, the Hershey’s Kisses commercial. I feel like it’s not the holiday season until I see it. The original came out in the late 1980s. I loved it then, and I love it now.

And finally, this commercial for Coke from 1970. It was right on time, coming out of the 1960s with their call for peace, love, happiness, and civil rights. But given how far this country still has to go, in some ways, it seems ahead of its time. It’s also the only song I can play on the piano.