Bah Humbug.

Nothing will kill your Christmas spirit faster than Christmas shopping. I was actually pretty good and started my shopping about a month ago...okay, okay, I only bought my mother's present that night. She, my brother, and my maternal grandmother were pretty easy--it was my father and paternal grandparents who were a challenge.

What was so bad about Christmas shopping? Well, the weather, for one thing. The temperature wasn't bad (close to 50 degrees, which is actually pretty darned nice) so much as the wind and the torrential downpour. From what I saw on the news, most of the eastern seaboard got their world pretty well rocked by some sort of precipitation today. Add in the fact that I took vacation today specifically to finish my shopping (that and get my hair cut), thinking the stores would be deserted during daytime hours (you know, when most of the world is working), but was dead wrong. Everywhere I went was packed--crying kids, pushy adults, the whole ball of wax. I must have been bumped into about fifteen times today without so much as an "excuse me". And that's not counting brushing past someone in a narrow aisle. I'm talking NFL-caliber shoulder blocks. And when I went to the local beer and wine superstore*, I was hit by at least three shopping carts. Lastly, a big "fuck you" to the waste of flesh who parked his Silverado diagonally across two parking spots. I saw this guy getting into his truck as I was leaving the wine store, and he looked just like the kind of horse's ass who'd do a thing like that--dirty sweatpants, big ol' beer gut (not a little one like mine), trucker baseball cap, vacant drooling inbred stare.

*I'm not kidding when I say "superstore". This place is nearly as big as a Wal-Mart, bigger than some K-marts that I've been in, and it's all dedicated to beers and wines. I think they have hard alcohol somewhere, but truth be told, other than the various styles of whiskey, I'm not a big liquor drinker.

Blog updates will likely be spotty for the next week and a half or so. I'm going to my parents' house in Reading, PA tomorrow for Christmas with them and my paternal grandparents, then it's off to Honesdale, PA on Sunday for a second Christmas with my mom's side of the family. After that, it's back home to Claymont to ring in the new year with a few good friends and a lot of good food and drink. I'll post as often as I can (with pictures if possible), but if I don't get to post between now and then (I'm taking my laptop but won't be able to get online from Honesdale), I'd like to send my best wishes out to all my readers for a very merry Christmas and happy and prosperous New Year.