Bah Frickin' Humbug

Sis 2 here -

Yay rah -it is almost Christmas time! (please read that dripping with sarcasm).

Yes, Christmas is a wonderful season - joyous and special. A time to spend with family and friends. Beautiful lights, carols, gifts, and food.

Yada Yada Yada. Just not feeling it. Now mind you, I like the food, the lights and decorations -- when someone else is doing them! Giving thoughtful gifts to others is fun and we all love receiving something meaningful but who wants to do all that wrapping (hello gift bags!) Time with family -- well, sometimes that is a blessing and sometimes that is why they make wine! And don't even get me started on all the overachieving moms at this time of the year - hand knitting scarves for everyone in the family, moving that stalker Elf on the Shelf around the house each night, baking 9,000 varieties of Christmas cookies, wrapping each persons gift in individual paper, writing the next Great American Novel for a Christmas letter, etc.

Now I haven't always felt this way. As I have gotten older and the kids have less and less appreciation for the prep for Christmas, my desire to decorate, bake Christmas cookies, send cards, etc. has waned until I feel closer to the Grinch before his heart grew. And this year may be the frosting on those proverbial Christmas cookies!

As you may recall from a previous blog post, Spousal Unit was gone for a business trip that went from being 2 days long to 4 days long. Prior to his leaving I had requested (multiple times) that he get the Christmas tree out of the attic for me - this request was not fulfilled. So finally on Tuesday I decided to say "fuck it" and just do it myself. Yes, the box the tree is in is bigger than me (and I am not a small girl) and yes, it probably weighs almost as much as me but I can do it right? So I climb the stairs to the attic access in our garage and begin to wrestle the box to the access opening. Hmmm - the box is slightly larger than the opening which means while I am man-handling this heavy, awkward box I also have to squeeze it to make it fit. Okay let's do this.

Attempt #1 results in me getting it stuck in the opening! Just fucking great!!! So I push and push and finally it goes back into the attic. I step back to regroup, curse a few times (because surely that will make the box shrink) and go back in.

Attempt #2 begins better - the box lines up with the opening and begins to come down the stairs and then BAM it is stuck again and this time it is stuck even tighter. So here I am at the top of these rickety stairs - pushing, pulling, squeezing and cursing to get this box to move. Nope - won't come out of the attic and won't go back in. Fuck! So I push and pull some more when suddenly this box that probably weighs close to 150 lbs. comes loose and begins to barrel out of the opening straight at me! I have nowhere to go but down so I grab the rail of the stairs and jump from the 3rd step to the concrete floor of our basement as the box flies past me and crashes to the floor. I end up wrenching my back and shoulder, scraping and bruising the knuckles on both hands, the tree stand busts out the side of the box and one of the METAL stocking hangers is cracked in two pieces. I drag the box into the house and as I begin to assemble the tree daughter and her friend sit and watch. The tree is up (and has been since Tuesday) but has not yet been decorated (it does have lights but that is because I was smart and bought a pre-lit tree) - guess that is going to be left to me as well.

Is Christmas over yet?? Oh shit - that just means I will have to take the tree down and wrestle it back into the attic.

Keeping Christmas Sassy and Sarcastic.