AFTER THE STORM

Nothing is left but a large pile of paper and boxes on the living room floor. A lot of work goes into shopping and picking out the best gifts for it to end like this. All in all it was a good Christmas morning. My kid was up at 6:30. That is a new record for her. She went through several hundred dollars of gifts in about 4 minutes. Nothing new. Then she went with her dad to his mothers. I have a great relationship with my in-laws. Not the ex. I spent 12 years trying to be nice (10 before the divorce). Now I try to ignore him. I found out last year the easiest thing to do is not let him in my house. That way he doesn't get a chance to be rude and obnoxious. Got to go back to work tommorrow. My kid is finally over the flu and I am feeling somewhat better. My leg still bothers me some. I found out that a muscle relaxer gives me a hangover. So I ain't taking them anymore. We still haven't had Christmas with my family yet. Maybe this weekend. I told Brittany it would be like having Christmas twice. If we had known we were going to postpone we could have saved some money on the after Christmas sales. Hope everyone had a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.

CHRISTMAS FLU

Well the bug has landed. The flu bug that is. My kid came down sick Wednesday. In a matter of hours she went from being her regular little smart ass self to being a major smart ass. She got pretty sick pretty quick. Her throat swelled up and boy was she ill! Don't forget the fever.
Then we had a 2 hour fight over taking a pill. She has taken pills since she was about 3 with no problem but she was afraid it would make her throat hurt. Needless to say I told her she could either take the pill or I would shove it up her ................ well she took the pill. Now one of my sisters has it pretty bad. Vicki went by her house and she passed out and was choking. Good thing Vic was there. I would hate to think of what might have happened. We may have to postpone Christmas a few days until everyone is better. We have done it before. No big deal. Not to the grown ups anyway. I would rather wait a few days than start our own epidemic. We have a pretty big family. In between in-laws, outlaws, grand kids and the assorted others we drag up there is usually at least 28-30 there. Don't know if we chance it. Maybe it will move on to the next unsuspecting victim. Be careful out there.

CHRISTMAS CHAOS

We just returned from Christmas shopping. 6 hours of it! My kid is already sacked out on the couch with the dog and cat. Full House is on Nick at Nite (can't reach the remote). I put a pretty good dent in my Christmas list tonite. Ran into some pretty good deals, too. The traffic in Florence was horrendous. We ate at O'Charley's. Not bad but not what I really wanted. I am sick of Wal Mart. The mall was a bust,too. Did you know that at 11:00 at nite K-Mart is practically empty? They were having a pretty good sale. I think I will go to Decatur tomorrow to try to finish up. Can you believe I wore my kid out shopping? She has decided she doesn't want to go tomorrow because I won't go home until I get done. I out shopped an 11 year old girl!! Guess I ain't as old as she thinks. People are rude and pushy out there. But you just have to jump in the trenches and battle it out. My sisters and I have this little thing we do each year we call "Sister Gifts". We started it a few years back. We all try to be a little creative with our gifts. You would be surprised with some of the things we come up with. But one thing we all try to include is a Christmas ornament for each other. Now we have a collection of ornaments that we have given to each other. I have part of my sister gifts but I need to find the little unusual things. I think I will do that tomorrow while I am in town. I have some ideas but I can't reveal them in case my sisters read this. NO PEEKING Y'ALL.