Welcome!

Welcome to austinagrodolce … My family and I garden with more intention and enthusiasm than allocated budget or overall design plan. It shows. Wildlife populations don't seem to notice our lack of cohesive design, they just like the native plants here. It seems by growing local we've thrown out a welcome mat. Occasionally, we're surprised at who (and what) shows up.



Sunday, November 30, 2008

Cold Turkey

Sharing here that I have gone over 24 hours now without a piece of pie or any Thanksgiving leftovers in whatever form.

I won't pretend I have pie willpower. Those pies are long gone. Ancient History. No evidence of their existence past a teensy extra bulge in the elastic waists of my clothing.

My hands are starting to shake a little - that could be from the caffeine.

Alternately, it might be the prospect of our two chores for today.  Hauling down the tree from upstairs to set it up and getting the Christmas lights up on the outside of our house.Why rush from Thanksgiving right towards Christmas, you ask?

A) Is this really your business?, and 2) Because it is a fair amount of work and I want to enjoy it for at least a month, that's why.

Equally important to recall is that this year, for the first time in a very long time, we have a young cat with an untested tree reaction to factor in to our Christmas decor equation.

Decorated Christmas Tree plus New Extremely Frisky (read: potentially destructive) Cat equals....what? Many many possible answers might balance that equation.
DCT + ENFC = ???

Here's another way to think about it.

If a cat, we'll call her "Kitty B", traveling at the speed of blurring vision, propels herself towards a fully decorated Christmas Tree while a creaky human, we'll call her "Alarmed A" observes and lurches up from the couch to intervene at slightly less than the speed of drying paint, who will lose their footing and actually knock over the tree?  Or....

Kitty B + Angry A x Velocity of Slips/Slides ÷ DRT (distance remaining to tree) = ?what¢¶the™º*§?!!!
Be sure to show your work or you won't get credit even if you answer correctly!

We may discover that yes, sure, ooooops! That decorated tree does indeed look for all the world like a giant Kitty Toy.Or it may be spectacularly uninteresting to Bijou. My money is on that first option, but I will be tickled to be proven an alarmist.

My original point, and I am pretty sure I had one in there somewhere, was that I'd like to see how the cat reacts and then yet have enough time to retool and reload the tree as needed before LawSchoolGirl arrives later this month. She is of the "turn all the lights off and sit in the glow of the tree and admire" ilk, direct descent from her Momma there, and I am looking very much forward to our chance to sit and do that together, ad return to law school.

In that aspect, the preserving and representing the holiday traditions of the family? I am the Tenacious D. So. Shaking hands from excitement, terror, caffeine or turkey withdrawal notwithstanding, we have our work cut out for us today.As a reward I have that "here is your Thanksgiving Feast Again Three Days Later" dinner in my pocket for tonight. Yes, resting patiently in its plethora of plastic preservation permutations, the Heat It and Eat meal extraordinaire awaits!

I'll admit this. Thanksgiving:The DoOvers is one of my favorite meals of the year. It ranks just after that piece of pie for breakfast the morning after Turkey Day. You get all the deliciousness without the fatigue of it coming on the heels of the effort it took to put it all together.

All the deliciousness except for the pie that is. And Yay for that. The Siren Song of pie in the house is nearly impossible to resist. So we mostly don't.On to stringing lights and dragging down (too many!) boxes that are mostly holding in the Christmas Tree and her abundant decorations.

That is the last blast from me today - except to note that Christmas Trees have a lot in common with road maps. Once you get them fully unfolded, and in the tree's example, properly fluffed out? They never ever quiiiiiite fit back in where they started from, in my experience. Which may or may not fully explain all the crumple marks on my road maps and the years worth of tape around the tree box.Luego - es tiempo por las luces!

3 comments:

Flapjacks said...

my cat would destroy a tree. not because he would find in any way amusing, but rather because he knows it would make me angry. johnny smash!

Anonymous said...

You're spot on with, "Because it is a fair amount of work and I want to enjoy it for at least a month, that's why."

If putting up decorations took an hour, I'd probably wait. But I'd rather not spend one day putting them up and six strung-out days trying to take them down to enjoy them for just a week. :)

TexasDeb said...

F: So the point of your cat's efforts is to make you angry? Where's that cat whisperer when you need one?

Charlie I am glad to hear I'm not the only one who de-decorates gradually. I can't face an empty looking room all at once, at least not in WINTER for Pete's sake!