I see a large winter storm is spreading out West, affecting most of the places I have family and property. My kids have already gotten a ton of snow, and below-zero temperatures are in store for them for the next several days. The rest of my family is staring down a mix of freezing rain, sleet, and maybe then snow on top of all that. And what do I have today? I wore flip-flops and no coat to the tree lighting ceremony, where they announced the winners of our holiday sign contest. No wonder I'm having a hard time recognizing that the holiday season is actually upon us. I can't say we have no chance of a White Christmas, this far out, but days like this aren't putting me in the mood, that is for certain. I'm no closer to digging out the decorations, when it is just me living in this house. I'll probably suddenly find the inspiration to do it, right around Christmas eve, when it makes no sense to drag out those boxes from the garage.
I tried feeling festive at the tree lighting, but it just wasn't happening for me. There were children singing carols, pretty lights to look at, and Santa who arrived on a big red fire engine. But it was so warm, I took a pass on the hot chocolate and had apple cider over ice. There was food provided, but since I consider eating fish to be the worst sort of punishment, I passed on the shrimp kebabs. I walked through the card display, finally getting a good, solid look at my competition. I was totally outdone this year. If we were ranked all the way through, I would have been lucky to rank fifth or sixth. There were some fantastic entries. My favorite one won first, and one I hadn't seen before tonight came in second. I had hoped maybe to place third again this year, but I knew it was a long shot. Maybe next year I can plan ahead better. I had plenty of warning time this year, but I was so wrapped up in the goings-on in Colorado, I was totally surprised when it was suddenly November, and time to work.
The little red-headed dog told me just now that bedtime comes early tonight, so I suppose I need to agree to his demands and publish. One more night of not feeling Christmassy to mark off the list. Maybe tomorrow I will buy a new battery for my color changing ornament (I already ran it down in two nights), and see whether I suddenly feel like singing carols. Or not.
No comments:
Post a Comment