Christmas Eve Eve.

shopping list where's my shopping list crap did I buy enough rolls? Do I need to buy more liquor? Crap crap crap crap

Why hello, and welcome. Welcome to my holiday-addled brains.

wrap more wrap FASTER no WRAP SLOWER but BETTER where are the gift tags did I even buy gift tags this year? Crap crap CRAP

This isn't even an accurate representation of the activity up there, brain-wise. This is way too coherent to be accurate. In reality, my brain right now is a soggy mess of tinsel and nog. There are no words, just images of the Perfect Christmas that Will Be. My cortex is trying to sort it all out while my primitive brain finds whatever stale cookies I have and directs the arm-parts to put them in the mouth-hole.

do I have enough side dishes? I think I have enough but what if I don't? WILL EVERYONE GET UP AND LEAVE?

We're hosting Christmas for the second year in a row, and I'm actually really excited (albeit a teeny bit preoccupied and maybe a smidgen frantic). I love planning these things, although in the actual execution I sometimes wonder what the hell I was thinking. My entire family is coming, plus friends, plus Scott's parents. I'm not sure where I'm going to seat everyone, so I'm instituting a rule: Jews sit on the porch. Hell, they're Russian Jews! They like the cold!

Hide the rolls from the cat SHE WILL EAT THEM hide the cookies from the cat SHE WILL EAT THEM TOO let the cat play with the wrapped presents THERE IS NO FIGHTING IT

Ha, ha, I'm not putting the Jews on the porch. I am feeding them ham, though, which may be just as bad. While I do it I will shout, "You're here to worship MY messiah now, suckers! Eat your CHRISTMAS HAM!"

My audience is going to think I'm completely losing it now could I please shut up about the Jews in my family? Okay shutting up now

Anyway. I am off to contemplate and re-contemplate tomorrow and how the timing of all this cooking and cleaning should go, and so I will not be posting again until after Christmas. At that time, I will report on the holiday goings-on in the Finslippy household, and whether Santa got Henry all the presents he asked for (hint: yes) and if I managed to poison anyone (unlikely, consider the ham is already cooked, and everything else is vegetables, but you never know) and how much liquor was consumed.

Happy Everything, readers!

Comments

[Carrie]

Your to-do list has succeeded in helping me feel calmer about mine; still, preparing for Christmas without liquor (due to pregnancy) is cruel and unusual. To say the least.

And you have reminded me of my favorite Xmas carol: The South Park one, I think it's called "Merry Fucking Christmas!" As in, "In case you haven't noticed, it's Jesus' birthday, so get off your fucking Muslim ass and fucking celebrate!"

If only they had done a verse for atheists like me.

Merry Christmas!

[amy]

LOL! That is just hilarious! Thank goodness I'm not Jewish or I might be offended. ;)

[Carrie]

Your to-do list has made me feel calmer about mine, so thanks for sharing! Although preparing for Xmas without liquor (due to pregnancy) is cruel and not a little unusual.

You have reminded me of my favorite Christmas carol: "Merry Fucking Christmas" from South Park. Go to Lala.com and play it now (but not in front of Henry!)

Merry Fucking Christmas, Alice!

[Margo]

My Thoughts Exactly!
And I'm not even hosting Christmas. I am making lasagna for the three of us. That's our tradition. But I was stupid enough to decide to make cookies for gifts. Lots and lots of cookies. So now I have about 150 cookies to frost tomorrow. Ha. Shit.

Hope you have a wonderful Christmas! Can't wait to hear how it went. :)

[Elizabeth]

The running dialogue in your brain is pretty much the same as the one in mine. I still have wrapped nothing, baked no cookies, haven't mailed a single one of the photo cards I picked up from Walgreen's over a week ago.

What I really need at Christmas is a personal team of elves to do all that crap for me while I eat the Hershey Kisses that I bought to make Peanut Blossom cookies and watch back-to-back Christmas movies!

Have a wonderful Holiday, Alice!

[Miss Grace]

Well then. Merry Christmas.

[Ginny]

Happy Everything to you, too, Alice! Hope it all goes well!

[Viv]

Merry Christmas Alice!

[elswhere]

Wait, I thought you guys were Catholic?

[Sarah]

The concept of Jews on the porch just tickles me.

[mom101]

Just call it Christmas Bacon.

We all eat bacon. Seriously.

[derfina]

I think Henry needs to do us all a Christmas dance! Ya'll have a wonderful holiday!

[Erica]

HAHAHAHA

"directs the arm-parts to put them in the mouth-hole"

Alice, this is why I adore you.

[Lori L.]

Merry Christmas, Alice!

[THE OTHER SIDE OF THE WORLD]

YOU ARE WICKED ALICE,BUT THAT'S WHY I LIKE YOU...(YOU KNOW YOU'LL BURN IN HELL WITH ALL YOUR FRIENDS...IT'LL BE NICE TO MEET)
...DOWN HERE WE DON'T CARE TOO MUCH WHAT YOUR COLOUR, CREED, RELIGION OR WHATEVER IS...IT'S SIMPLY TIME TO SHARE EVERYONE'S FOOD & BOOZE & THE MORE THE MERRIER IF YOU GET MY DRIFT...WE WILL EAT TURKEY, HAM, SEAFOOD & ANYTHING ELSE THAT'S PUT IN FRONT OF US
...& YES WE DO SAY "MERRY CHRISTMAS" TO EVERYBODY...SO TO YOU & YOURS CONSIDER IT DONE...ROLL ON 2009!!

[THE OTHER SIDE OF THE WORLD]

HMM...SLOW BRAIN V FAST FINGERS
CLARIFICATION NEEDED PERHAPS??
I WAS NOT REFERRING TO THE "H' WORLD WHEN I SAID DOWN HERE
NO, NO, I MEANT DOWN UNDER...YA KNOW...THE BIT UNDER NEATH YOU...I'M SURE YOU'LL ALL WORK IT OUT

[Joan]

Glad to know there are other goyim married to Jews out there who think such thoughts about our in-laws at Christmastime, yet who aren't anti-Semitic.

Or are we?

[suburbancorrespondent]

You know so little about Jews and Christmas - you're supposed to order Chinese takeout for them and then send them to the movies. Duh.

In fact, after I dish out Christmas dinner to my goyische loved ones, I may just do that with myself...

[Leah]

"Do I need to buy more liquor?" + "My entire family is coming, plus friends, plus Scott's parents." = heck, yeah

also, your cat (the one who is trying to kill you) is really strange with the cookie-and-roll eating. maybe you could teach her to drink the liquor and chill by the fire instead?

[Meg]

Hilarious!
I hope the Russian Jews don't read your blog. Maybe you should tell them to bring their own latkes or something.

Merry Christmas!

[Effective Nancy]

Hi! A semi-Russian Jew here... First Christmas at my in-laws' brought me a seat next to a total stranger who happened to be the only other Jew at the festivities. ASSIGNED seating, because surely our religion in common was more uniting than the 30+ years' age difference, urban-vs.-rural background thing. The man, though sweet, was older than my own father. We had nothing to say to each other besides "Isn't this nice?"

And we both gagged down the ham. (Would have MUCH preferred a plate full of bacon (or even fully cooked ham, frankly).) And Chinese and a movie turned out to be the best solution for me AND my former-altar-boy husband in a subsequent year.

[Dawn]

My Palm Pilot that held my life, gave up the ghost today, so now my Christmas list reads like, "La la la, Christmas I can't HEAR YOU!!!"

Merry Christmas to all in the Finslippy household, regardless of ham philosophy.

[Dawn]

I think Typepad ate my comment... odd.

At the risk of repeating, it was:

My Palm Pilot, that held my entire life, gave up the ghost today, so my Christmas list now reads like, "La la la, Christmas I can't HEAR YOU!"

And while I'm here again, may I make a special request? Could you put a link to Henry's Sunday afternoon crazy dance video in the sidebar when it moves into the archives? Watching that video is saving me $$$ in therapy.

Merry Christmas and bananoo, bananoo to yooooou!

[Alyce]

Merry Christmas, Alice, Scott, and Henry! I hope Santa brings you what you asked for (spoiler: I know he did because I saw him at Target and he said you'd been *really* good this year).

[FatChick]

Hilarious! Happy holidays, from a bona-fide ham-eating Jew (and I like porches, too!).

[DM]

God, I love ham. And you. Merry Christmas, Alice and family.

[patois]

I think if they're coming for the Christmas meal, the Russian Jews might be on to your posturing about force-feeding them ham.

Merry Christmas.

[Brooke]

Hee! You doll, you.

You wrote,

In reality, my brain right now is a soggy mess of tinsel and nog.

The hidden blessing is this: At least there's nog. We had a snowstorm here and everyone in Seattle has been unable to get to the liquor store for like 8 days now. It's like famine plague and pestilence all rolled into one. You thought we liked our coffee? We like our port wine and vodka cranberries better.

Merry Christmas, adorable person.

[C]

Some things never change: year after year, you remain brilliantly funny. Thanks for the Christmas Eve smile!

[rachelb]

I love the peeks into your thought process. I feel like that a lot.

But it's your twitter about Henry screaming at you that made me laugh out loud. Why do these children have to be so awful right before Christmas? I was ready to cancel the whole thing today.

And I'm in Seattle and made it to the liquor store today, along with about 200 other desperate people! Thank you Bailey's!

[rachelb]

I love the peeks into your thought process. I feel like that a lot.

But it's your twitter about Henry screaming at you that made me laugh out loud. Why do these children have to be so awful right before Christmas? I was ready to cancel the whole thing today.

And I'm in Seattle and made it to the liquor store today, along with about 200 other desperate people! Thank you Bailey's!

[Mauigirl]

I hope today goes really well and that everyone has a wonderful time!

This was hilarious - and so true of all of our thoughts before an event like this!

[Brian]

You said ham. heh heh.

[Meg]

Ha indeed. That's what's in all of our brains. And the Jews in my family seem to have made it through more sanely then anyone else. Maybe because they kept taking time outs on the porch.

[Cat]

Finslippy's Holiday: Now With More Jew

My holiday dreams have all come true

[Rachel]

You never fail to just crack my shit right up. Hope it was a great one!

[BOSSY]

Happy merry to you and yours.

[MiniHipster]

HAHA!
I hope it all went well for you Alice.

MiniHipster.com

[amigurumigirl]

Happy Late Christmas! I bet you had a great time with no snafus to speak of whatsoever. Woot! Cheers!

[kat]

i hope your christmas was a happy one :-)

[Baby Blankets]

It's good to know that someone else has a brain that goes as crazy as mine! Hope everything ran smoothly and everyone enjoyed the ham! Happy 2009.

[victoria]

This is a little tardy, and it is not meant to discourage anyone from pursuing any healthcare options that might work for them -- but I am a Sarno fan, too. His book cured me of crippling low back pain in my twenties (that TWO YEARS of tedious physical therapy exercises had left untouched). Now I feel loathing and contempt for all physical therapists. My p.t. back then told me that my back pain kept getting wrose because I wasn't "diligent" about doing my exercises -- when you could have bounced quarters off my abs! I followed his advice to the letter!! I did the damn exercises EVERY DAY and NEVER sat down or bent wrong or did anything I was told not to do and endured all sorts of unpleasant confrontations with people in movie theatres and restaurants because I did everything standing up and I did the stairmaster 20 minutes every damn day, etc. etc., and the pain just got worse and worse until there were days, not infrequently, when I couldn't even walk (at age 25! with no disease or injury!) and the damn lying p.t. never admitted that the exercises WEREN'T WORKING. He blamed me for not being "diligent," and just kept prescribing me more and more useless, waste-of-time, BORING exercises WHEN I COULD HAVE BEEN USING THAT TIME TO DO SOMETHING THAT ACTUALLY WOULD HAVE BENEFITTED ME OR GIVEN ME PLEASURE. Now I wouldn't go near a p.t. if you paid me. (This was not the only experience I had that exposed p.t. as a fraud, but it was the most horrifying.) Physical therapy is about as useful as saying the rosary -- it gives you soemthing to do, and makes you feel slightly less helpless while you're actually doing it, and gives you a brief pious feeling that "I'm a good girl and I'm playing by the rules so I know that things will get better for me," but it's just a superstitious waste of time and energy. There are a lot of more effective ways to manage pain (including Sarno) than p.t.