christmas ended up being a bit of a fairytale. i wasn't looking forward to being stuck in a house with my family, everyone pissed off at everyone else but trying to be cheerful. then mum and kit and i went to the mountains for a few days and when we got back dad had bought a christmas tree, rescued the christmas ornaments from the great storage shed flood, dug up all the old christmas cds, fixed the stereo, and cooked us a gourmet christmas eve dinner. it was all the best christmases of my life rolled into one. the traditional music, the tree, all the old ornaments. after dinner i debugged the christmas lights and we listened to christmas music while decorating the tree and then dad read us all a christmas story from a laura ingalls wilder book. mum retreated to her room to finish wrapping presents and kit and i wrapped our presents by the tree, the 'santa' visited in the form of everyone wandering out with their presents and slipping them under the tree. and my father spent the night. for the first time in my life i was the last person up on christmas and, by default, the first one awake on christmas. i slept in this morning, got up, wandered out to the tree. kit distributed the few presents, we opened them, and it was just so perfect. i got nothing more than i wanted. nobody felt it necessary to buy me extraneous junk. the highlight of presents was getting three simon and garfunkel records and a new belt for the turntable. i didn't play a single cd all day. dad cooked us christmas dinner and i set the table and we all sat down to eat at two o'clock in this wonderful christmas haze of happiness that fuzzed out all the bad shit in this family. dad's been living in the house while we were in the mountains and this is our second night back and he's still here. everyhting feels so strangely normal. it's wierd. life around here is never this normal. but mom said something at dinner about dad moving backinto a hotel and that's when he tols her about the apartment. i should have known the peace couldn't last all day. the storm blew over pretty quickly, though. about an hour later my sister informed me that they were kissing in the kitchen. i'm making part II of carey's christmas present and reading people's blogs and tamar's made me cry for some inexplicable reason. i miss everyone. i hear emily's having a party tomorrow but i haven't managed to get in touch with her about it. if anyone happens to have a direct link with her if they could get her to contact me that would be good...if she wants me there, that is. otherwise, ignore this. parent's have given a tentative ok for new year's eve and flatly ruled out the day before we go back. they won't even give me a reason for the latter. i need to get a lot more creative really quickly because i only have gifts for two people and i'm broke. so far i've been doing fine making presents with what i have, but i am woefully low on imagination after having sudden moments of enlightenment about presents for two people. gifts are coming, though, even if it takes me until the last day of school to make them all.i have 'sounds of silence' stuck in my head, only i don't know it very well so it's really just the first line plus bits of the tune. on bookends there's a wonderful son called 'punky's dilemma' that goes Wish I was a Kellogg's Cornflake floatin' in my bowl takin' movies, relaxin' awhile, livin' in style, talkin' to a raisin who 'casionn'ly plays L.A., casually glancing at his toupee. Wish i was an English muffin 'bout to make the most out of a toaster. I'd ease myself down, comin' up brown. I prefer boysenberry more than any ordinary jam. I'm a "Citizens for Boysenberry Jam" fan. that made me really happy, as did almost all of today. i sent kathryn an email and part of her reply was aha! I knew that someone with the name rainbow girl must be be either one of my friends or someone sending me creative porn (no offense meant, I get it all the time, it makes me strangely happy because at least someone is putting their sleezy talents to good use.) amused me greatly. thank you so much. and for a while sent emails to carey and got close-toinstant replies :). grrr i need to see carey so i can give her present(s). oh, even if you think i know it, could you sign my guestbook and tell me your birthday? many apologies for the long semi-stream-of-consciousness-no-paragraph-breaks post. hope you enjoyed reading it.