Merry Christmas!

I've been trying to think of a clever post for Christmas, but I got nothin'. So I'll give you a short litany of how my Christmas weekend has been, and then I'll post an excerpt that's related to Christmas insofar as it's about Christ.

Yesterday afternoon, my brother flew in from NYC. Yeah!!! We get to spend a week with him, and he actually gets to spend a week not working. We went to the Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe for the 4:00 showing. I commented today that it was sort of a slow movie, so I can imagine that some little kids didn't love it; this was evidenced by the little kids behind us in the theater. Well done, however; and I'll defer to more literature-savvy folks for more comment on the movie.

Last night we had our traditional clam chowder and opened gifts. I got some of what I asked for, including sweaters and a cast iron tea pot with a number of loose-leaf teas to go with it, and a frame for my recent diploma (is that egocentric?). (It was an admittedly outrageous list, so I'm amazed that I got so much of it!)

We had a great worship service this morning -- a sermon that hopefully caused a number of the C&E ("Christmas & Easter") attendees to think about who Jesus really is. I love that a guest with whom I visited spontaneously commented, "This is such a great church!" It is! Lunch: prime rib. Yum. I decorated the table with a clear punch bowl with gerber daisies floating in red water. I liked it :)

Oh yeah, and I woke up this morning to my sweet puppy having deposited little "squirts" all across my living room floor (he got loose in my garage yesterday and ate half a box of milk bones). He woke me up to go out once, and he tried to wake me again, so it's my own fault that I spent the beginning of my Christmas morning scrubbing my carpet. TMI? Tough -- you're reading my blog, the deepest, darkest secrets of this random mind :) (actually, I'd be pretty shallow if these were all my secrets!)

Speaking of reading deep, dark secrets, I did a little "next blog" surfing a few minutes ago and came across a kind of sad Christmas entry. I bet you could find a bunch of those if you looked around for a little while. I wish I could quote this whole entry about a girl (college-aged?) from a broken home (I feel badly linking to her since I don't know her, so I won't). She began,

"Having two Christmas' was the only thing that kids of divorced parents could brag about. 'yeah... I get two Christmas'.. twice the presents. having divorced parents is awesome!' The presents did get a bit outrageous a couple years, which I believe is to be the result of both parents trying to outdo the other."

She concludes,

"As the years go by, the plethora of presents which once covered the emptyness of our family around the holidays have lost their value. Sadly, my family has lost the Chirstmas spirit. When my parents call me at school and ask me what I would like for Christmas I tell them "nothing." What I really want to say is a fun day with my family. So they'll wander around the mall, unsure of what to get me, and result in writing a check. Fine by me, I'm a poor college kid with a love of new things. But I would do anything for the happiness of the holiday, and the true spirit of Christmas which has diminshed over the years."

Say a prayer for her ... and for the many people who don't find that the most unpleasant part of their Christmas is scrubbing dog diarrhea off of their carpet on Christmas morning!