Subject: Weekend Update: Christmas 2000
Date: Tue, 26 Dec 2000 11:40:11 -0500

My family enjoyed somewhat of a Currier & Ives Saturday because the
whole family did everything together throughout the day; an event that
becomes more rare with passing time.  After a late breakfast, we had
to move two cords of wood from the driveway to the deck off the barn.
Emily loaded up Miranda and Andrew to shuttle wood to the deck.  She
also helped me fill my wheelbarrow which I ran between the two
points. Joy and Jessica stacked the wood that we dumped at their feet.
We did the job in just over an hour despite cold toes and a few
pinched fingers.  Several logs remained stuck in the driveway, frozen
by an earlier snow and rain.  We'll get them at first thaw.

That afternoon, we participated in a Double Elimination Competition
Tetris Tournament.  Andrew won the first tournament, but Jessica came
back to win the second tournament.  I was eliminated rather handily in
both tournaments.  (I'm better at Dr. Mario than Tetris.)

Flush from a fortune in festive newspaper tipping, Andrew offered to
buy pizza for dinner.  We accepted.  Later that evening, we popped in
a tape and watched "Miracle on 34th Street" - the Ted Turner colorized
version.

After the Sunday service the next morning, our fellowship was cut
short by a fire alarm that shooed everyone from the building.  Many
people were blaming the Pastor, saying that he just wanted to get home
to Christmas Eve dinner, but in fact it something a lot more
humorous. Joe Farris was standing near the alarm with his 1-year old
girl, Isabella, who had gotten hold of the pull switch behind Joe's
back. Joe pulled away but Isabella didn't let go and "that's all she
wrote."  Mom and Dad were arriving for dinner anyway, coming to us
from the Malden church where Dad has been supplying for some weeks
now.  They came to enjoy our Christmas Eve service and spend the
night.

Christmas at our house is not like it was when I was a child.  In our
young years, my brothers and I would wake mom and dad up so early that
they changed our gift-giving tradition to opening presents the night
before, so they could get some sleep.  Joy's family brought in some
checks and balances to opening the gifts.  One prerquisite to opening
presents is that the mother remain steadfast in the face of pleas to
open presents early.  It was Jessica's task this year to plead the
case for the rest of us this year (with encouragement from her
father).  When Christmas Day had arrived, Jessica advocated that we
wait another day to continue the anticipation of giving and receiving.

Joy's sister Faith is very bad at waiting until Christmas Day to open
her gifts.  Joy has even gone out of her way to supply her sisters
with progressive gifts that they get to open between Thanksgiving and
Christmas with strict instructions as to when each gift can be opened.
But Faith is incorrigible, calling days earlier to confess a feigned
repentance for violating the Crawford tradition.

Another tradition that I think must be in Joy's recollection but she
has successfully transferred to our kids is the strange obsession with
having Pop Tarts for Christmas breakfast.  It wouldn't be Christmas
without them!  (I'd like to see Joy's sisters Faith and Hope eat
those!)  Well, I had mine with something a bit more substantial and
the way was cleared for the gift giving to take place.

It takes us about an hour to open our presents, between passing them
out and watching everyone else, one at a time, open their
presents. When I was a kid, we could have a pile of presents unwrapped
in mere minutes.  I am not sure how my parents dealt with it all and I
wondered if we bored them a little.  I am kidding because it is
actually another old-fashioned moment of familial fun enjoyed by all.

Later in the afternoon, my brother John arrived with his family for
Christmas turkey dinner.  He parked over the frozen logs in my
driveway; I meant to tell him about it beforehand.  My second brother
Steve and most of his family came later in the afternoon.  (Steve
didn't have turkey because his jaw is wired shut from a hockey
incident he had four weeks ago.  Instead he made some slurry for
himself.  He has another three weeks and misses such luxuries as
licking one's own lips.)  Russell, my younger brother, as noted in
earlier journal entries, spends Christmas with his in-laws, but he did
call to wish us all a very Merry Christmas.  The nephews and neices
and my own kids spent much of their time playing video games while the
adults caught up on family matters.  We did have one uninvited guest
drop in to our dining room: a bat, who probably awoke from its crevace
somewhere in our house and lost his way into our living space. (Santa
is supposed to come down the chimney, not Dracula or Batman!)  We
redirected the poor thing out to our porch.  Perhaps it found its way
into a[n outdoor] wall crevace again.

After my extended family left, we curled up once again on the couches
and chairs to watch "Chicken Run", one of the gifts I got, to finish
off Christmas together.

I hope your Christmas was blessed, even if you opened your presents
early.

Mark
--
+---_-----------+ Mark Metcalfe, metcalfe@cadence.com
| c a d e n c e | Cadence Design Systems, Inc.    Phone: (978) 446-6451
+---------------+ PCB Systems Division, Technical Communications Manager