Bloody photos

Have I mentioned that I hate holiday crowds? So I went out today in pursuit of photo Christmas cards - you know, those kind where you take a picture and stick a holiday border around it with a short "Happy Holidays from Mom, Dad and the kids" on the front. So I headed to the Walgreens just up the street with my CD with the pics on it - seemed the quickest place to get in and out with what I wanted. I also needed a fake snow drape to cover my desk in the living room, since I've decided that the girls are finally old enough to not destroy my Dept. 56 Dickens Village. Alas, forces were conspiring against me. Walgreens #1 had no snow drape and their picture maker was broken. So I headed east, trying to decide whether to try Walgreens #2 or Wal-Mart across the street. Walgreens? Wal-Mart? The run-in/run-out factor won out again and I dipped into Walgreens #2, where I was able to order my cards (pick up at 5:30pm please - we're really busy today) but still no snow drape. I ended up at Wal-Mart after all.

There's no easy way to navigate "Cheap Crap Labyrinth" aka Wal-Mart. The parking lot was a zoo and everyone inside was lost in their own world of trying to find the right Playstation game or sweater or bedspread or 12 Dancing Princesses Castle. And of course the holiday stuff is all the way in the back of the store. I looked at karaoke CDs again, because I keep trying to find something appropriate for Shan's gift without being... well... let's just say I'm not going to have my 7-yr old lip-synching to The Pussycat Dolls and "Hot like Me." I didn't find anything, though, so I'll check Circuit City later. Walked through toys again, but nothing called me today. I left an hour later with two snow drapes, two kid-size Santa hats, and some wrapping tissue. Dropped another buck in the SA bucket... the guy working looked like he'd been standing there awhile.

Tom and I went to Costco later and managed to find a Chivas box set for his aunt and uncle, so thankfully they're finally taken care of. I took the box downstairs to the space where we're staging all the presents and stopped for a minute, looking at the piles of stuff. I remember specific gifts I got as a kid, like my first record player or the year I got a 2XL (one of the finest examples of early game robots -- fabulous fun!!). But I don't remember there being tons of stuff under the tree, piles of boxes, lots of "things." I've been trying to remember how much commercialism there was when I was small and I know it was certainly there, but it seems like it was a lot less. Maybe that's just time taking it's toll on my brain. Then I thought about how much I love giving gifts to people and decided that as long as we were giving nice things that were wanted and would see use, that I didn't care how big the stack was under the tree. Pile it on - watching people open gifts with a smile on their faces when they see what's inside is one of the best feelings in the world. It's not about how much is there... it's about what is there and being happy that someone thought of you.


It's funny... Sometimes at the holidays I feel like the person who sent in this postcard.


But the buying isn't for me. My postcard would say "I'm only happy when I buy things for other people." Somehow that seems like not such a bad thing to be this time of year.