Weekend Assignment #247: Home for the Holidays?

Hanukkah starts Sunday night, and Christmas is Thursday. Any minute now, people will start heading elsewhere for the holidays. Karen Carpenter is singing in my head, egging me on to ask about holiday migration patterns:

Will you or a relative wake up in a hotel room on Christmas morning?

From my Picasa album Christmas

Weekend Assignment #247:"There's no place like Home for the Holidays" - or so the song claims. Are you heading "home" to family and friends? Are other family members heading "home" to visit you? Are you heading someplace that definitely isn't home, or perhaps just staying home, with no visitors on your doorstep? In short, what are your holiday-related travel arrangements this year, and is that they way you prefer to spend it?

Extra Credit:Tell us a holiday travel story from yesteryear.

John and I almost never travel at Christmas, and it's been at least four years, probably more, since we had holiday company. Even if money were not an issue this year, we would probably still be staying put this coming week. I'd love to bring my dad and stepmother and brother out here for a visit, but the house is in no condition for that, and neither are anyone's finances.

Pepper is dubious about her future Christmas stocking.

Overall, though, Christmas for the two of us plus the dogs is just about right. In May John and I will have been married for 30 years. We enjoy each other's company, and we aren't big on parties and large gatherings. Oh, I like a smallish, alcohol-free party full of people I know really well, but that's not likely to happen again anytime soon, whether I travel or not. John, on the other hand, probably hasn't attended any party whatsoever in a couple of decades. John's parents are dead, and his sister is we're-not-sure-where. My brother is in Cleveland, my Dad and Ruth are in Wilmington NC, and my surviving aunts and cousins in New Jersey haven't seen me since the 1970s. Clearly, our situation just isn't conducive to holiday family reunions. A low-key holiday at Casa Blocher with John and the dogs isn't terribly exciting, but it's comfortable, and relatively low stress - or would be if it weren't for the whole unemployment thing.

It's A Small World Holiday, 2005

We did get out of Tucson one year, and I think only one, since moving to Tucson in 1986. In 2005 we made it to Disneyland, to see Christmas decorations around the park, reindeer at Big Thunder Ranch, and the seasonal versions of two attractions, It's A Small World Holiday and the Haunted Holiday. I loved the former, but the latter not so much, and a hotel room on Christmas morning is a bit cheerless. Nor was I able to get to church for Christmas mass. Anaheim's St. Michael's Church didn't have anything like a midnight mass, nor much of a schedule on Christmas Day. Disneyland was expected to fill up early, and if I'd gone to church I would not only miss a whole morning at Disneyland but in all probability be unable to get into the part at all for most of the day. Ah, well. I felt a little guilty, but overall it was well worth the trip! I wouldn't want to leave town every Christmas, though. Not even for Disneyland.

Your turn! Tell us about your holiday travel this year or lack thereof, whether you're traveling or someone else is coming in to visit you instead. Write about this in your blog along with a link back here, and leave a link to your entry in the comments below. I'll be back in a week with a roundup of your responses. Here are the ones from last week:

For Weekend Assignment #24: Surprise! I asked about any pleasant surprises for you this year. Four of you answered, but one was for the other meme I piggybacked onto the entry:

Julie said...

So, what was pleasant? Selling a story to a major mystery anthology certainly was. I was also pleased to be invited to The Leap Back 2009.

Suzanne R said in comments...

Your doggies are precious. It's amazing what love can do. This is for Feline and Furball Friday. My link is:
http://suzyq421sphotoblog.blogspot.com/2008/12/feline-and-furball-friday-socksie-and.html

Florinda said...

The best surprise this year is almost certainly our aforementioned new home. We were reasonably content in our old apartment. Although we occasionally talked about finding a new place, we knew there weren't too many rental options in our area that had both the space and pet-friendly policies we needed, so we figured we'd be signing another lease there in October. The opportunity to lease a larger three-bedroom townhome in a nicer area of town for a guaranteed term of 18 months and a reasonable monthly payment came up unexpectedly and was just too good to pass up - so we're very glad we didn't!

Mike said...

I have a few, nothing really special. One has to do with our older car. The car is about eight years old now, and fast approaching the 100,000 mile mark. Well, now that Jenn has a job four miles from home, that magic number may take a little longer to reach.

That's it for now! I don't expect a big turnout this week, but I'll be thrilled if you can work in a Weekend Assignment in the midst of your holiday merrymaking. Write about the assignment topic in your blog or journal, and include a link back here. Then leave a link to your entry in the comments below. Please don't forget your links! I'll be back in a week to highlight the results.

A reminder: I'm still running low on ideas here, so I still need your input. What would you like to see as a Weekend Assignment topic? Email me your suggestions (mavarin at aol.com). If I use your topic you'll get full credit and my undying thanks.

Karen

Weekend Assignment #246: Surprise!

It's been a mindboggling year in many ways, and not all of it has been good news. Let's focus on the personal and the positive, shall we?

Weekend Assignment #246: A strange and sometimes difficult year is drawing to a close. Tell us about something that happened this year that was a pleasant surprise for you personally.

Extra Credit: Are you looking forward to the new year?

Let's go ahead and combine my answer to this question with Steven's Feline and Furball Friday, because I'm going to talk about my dogs for a bit.

My faithful companions.

As you probably know, it's been a difficult year for me, what with my being laid off, a longish stretch of unemployment, the death of my dog Tuffy from cancer and a cancer scare of my own. All these stresses and losses have been partially offset, however, by the two dogs who came into our lives this year: Cayenne and Pepper. I could have foreseen that if Tuffy didn't make it through the year, we would have a new dog by now. But I didn't anticipate two dogs, or what a big part of my life they would become.

They're with me night and day, these dogs, either in the room with me or hanging out on the couch in the den while I type in my office a few feet away. I'm a little embarrassed sometimes that they don't spend more time with John, but I gave each of them a lot of attention early on while John was at work, and now they're used to having me around. They're in for a bit of a shock when I get a job!

Pepper, in relaxation mode.

Pepper arrived first, and required more effort to tame her. She was my birthday present back in March, a rescue dog selected off a web site, who had been on death row at the pound along with her puppies. She was far from thrilled to meet us or Tuffy when we first met her at a PetSmart on the southwest side of town, but we took her home anyway. She was stubborn and willful, not so much ignorant about human commands as she is indifferent to them. Like Tuffy, she wasn't the most affectionate dog in the world, but nevertheless wanted to keep tabs on our whereabouts.

But that was a while ago, and Pepper's come a long way since then. She's still not big on licking and other major signs of affection, but now she joins me in the front seat of the car and smiles at me as we head to the dog park. She obeys me about 65% of the time, up from about 10%. And she seems to actively enjoy being scratched and petted by us now, whereas early on she'd be more likely to walk away. Yes, she's turned into a good dog!

Cayenne, resting up before her next burst of activity.

Cayenne has a similar history to Pepper's, but a very different temperament. Fostered out to a Humane Society volunteer until her puppies were weaned, she was specifically recommended to us when we stopped by their facility on August 2nd, the day after Tuffy was euthanized. The red dog with the bandanna seemed to get along fine with us and with Pepper, so we took her home. She's not the least bit standoffish; in fact she's a little too dependent on me. She's reasonably obedient, moderately affectionate, a showoff and a clown. And I love her to bits!

Cayenne, Pepper and a doggie acquaintance

From the Picasa album Trouble Dogs

Without a job to go to, my day is structured by the late afternoon visits to the dog park. It's not just the dogs who benefit from socialization there; I do too. I'm on speaking terms with a few people there now, and that helps a lot when my only other in-person contacts are with John and with Safeway employees when I shop. This too is a pleasant surprise. Who could have guessed that a dog park (which Tuffy didn't like at all) would be an enjoyable part of my daily routine?

Your turn! Tell us about some pleasant surprise in your life this year, big or small. Write about this in your blog along with a link back here, and leave a link to your entry in the comments below. I'll be back in a week with a roundup of your responses. Here are the ones from last week:

For Weekend Assignment #245: Holiday Traditions I asked about changes in holiday traditions. Four of you answered:

Julie said...

I used to make cookies every Christmas, and perhaps that's something I'll do again this year. I have a Pfefferneuse recipe from my grandma on my dad's side. I never could get it right until she showed me how to make it. She came from the old school of cooking. "Add the ingredients until the dough feels like this." Once she taught me how the dough was supposed to feel, I was able to make the cookies.

Martha said in comments...

I sure hope I have time to play along on this week's assignment - I have lots of good stuff to share!

I can't believe you have the aluminum tree with the light color changing thingie! My Grandmother had that same set up, I thought it was the best thing ever when I was a kid - you brought back some very fond memories for me.

I love your stocking tradition! I think I'll add that to our family traditions this year! :-)

Florinda said...

Maintaining holiday traditions with these blended and reconfigured families and their negotiated schedules can get complicated - we need to be flexible. There's not a specific day when we always put up the tree, because we want to do that with my stepkids and it depends on which weekends we have them with us - and since The Boy's birthday is in mid-December, we try not to mix it up with Christmas stuff. We usher in our holiday season with a family viewing of A Christmas Story, but whether that happens after Thanksgiving dinner (if we spend Turkey Day with the kids) or on the weekend when we put up the tree (if we don't) changes from one year to the next.

Mike said...

The first one I came up with is the, "Crap, we need to get a tree" tradition. No, we don't have one yet. I work a lot of weekends, so it makes it difficult to plan a day when we can all go. We get a real tree, but we don't go and chop our own down or anything. Usually we go to Home Depot, or a church that is close to where I work.

That's it for now! Busy as I'm sure you are, I hope you'll take the time to participate this week. Write about up the assignment in your blog or journal, and include a link back here. Then leave a link to your entry in the comments below. Please don't forget your links! I'll be back in a week to highlight the results.

A reminder: I'm still running low on ideas here, so I still need your input. What would you like to see as a Weekend Assignment topic? Email me your suggestions (mavarin at aol.com). If I use your topic you'll get full credit and my undying thanks.

Karen

What? What? What?

On three different occasions now, the Tenth Doctor has reacted to some shocking discovery by exclaiming, "What?!" and again, "What?" and once more, "What?!!" The first time, a bride had suddenly appeared in the TARDIS and demanded to know where she was. The second time, Queen Elizabeth I (whom the Doctor had not yet met) called for the removal of the Doctor's head. The third time, the Titanic smashed through the wall of the TARDIS. Yes, I think all of those would qualify as surprises for him!

I felt like that this morning, a couple of times, albeit with less cause. First that was a piece of email, purportedly from "service@irs.gov," telling me to "Claim Your Tax Refund Now!" Yeah, like that's going to happen. The IRS doesn't need to reach me by email. They've got my address, and I got my refund months ago, thank you very much, deposited in our account. Still, don't you get teeny tiny doubts when some new phishing scheme surfaces, in case somehow it's really from the claimed organization? I do.

But that was nothing compared to the shock I received on the drive to work this morning. As I passed my local Taco Bell at 22nd and Wilmot, I saw this:

They were knocking down the Taco Bell! What? What? What?! This wasn't some failed business. This was a place that was always so busy at midday that I gave up trying to eat lunch there. Couldn't hack the line! But I bought dinner there just a week or two ago.


I turned right into the parking lot, but my camera eluded me when I reached in my purse for it. What? Figuring that I'd left my camera on my desk, I doubled back home for it. It wasn't there. What? Turned out it was in my purse after all, and I'd just wasted five minutes for no reason. What? But I drove back into the parking lot and grabbed this shot before going on to work.

By lunchtime, they had made a lot of progress on knocking down the rest of the building. I couldn't help thinking of their lunchtime patrons, heading over there for a grilled stuffed burrito and finding a pile of rubble instead. What?

This is not the first time I've been surprised by unexpected demolition at that particular shopping center. A couple years ago they knocked down an early 1960s diner, Cory's, leaving only the restaurant's sign. And a few years before that, they knocked down most of the north wing of the L-shaped shopping center. But those structures were relics, almost as old as I am. The Taco Bell wasn't anywhere near that old. Weird. Then again, neither was the Popeye's at Broadway and Campbell, which shut down the day after I broke my ankle in their parking lot about four or five years ago. What?

***

I'm on the last chapter of An Adept in Mâvarin, at least in theory. I'm on Chapter 13 anyway, the last chapter in my Adept folder. So far, though, the narrative doesn't feel remotely like the end of a first book in a trilogy. The plot of the second book has already started, all the characters are in trouble and it's getting worse (for Rani and Fabi at least), and there's no sense of closure. I'm not at all sure I've picked the right stopping point to shore up as the end of the volume, but I won't be sure until I get there, and maybe not even then. Maybe I should stop at the end of Chapter 12, or even Chapter 11. I'm going to have to be very clever, and probably teach myself a new writing competency or two, to pull this off. Gulp! What?

Karen