Merry Christmas!

Two days! I was AWOL from Holidailies for two days in a row. The guilt is amazing, which is why I'm here updating before I've even had breakfast on Christmas morning (but I have showered, so at least I smell pretty).

On Thursday, our electricity went out a little after 10:00 pm, and since my normal updating time is after that, I totally missed Day 17. We were lucky we had power all day until that time. D's mom, uncle and grandmother had all lost power that day for varying lengths of time (his mom's was out for 17 hours). The freezing rain had coated every tree and wire in town and plenty of them just dropped. Lots of areas around town were without working street lights. That aggravated D to no end because people are idiots and didn't treat those intersections like four way stops, which is what they become by law. Instead they were just breezing all around, causing accidents and backed up traffic.

Friday was busy as we had to prepare to attend Christmas eve dinner at his grandmother's house before immediately heading out of town to my mom's in time for candlelight service at her church. But since there were snow emergencies still around town and some people couldn't even travel because of restrictions, they postponed until Monday evening. So D and packed up everything and headed out for my mom's earlier than planned. On the way, I just needed to stop at Best Buy to get a gift card for my brother. Alas, by the time we arrived at said store, it was closing (at 5:00 pm). I felt like a failure for not getting something so simple in time. I berrated myself the entire twenty five minutes it took us to get back out of the parking lot and onto the main road. When we got out, I decided we'd give the mall a try so D dropped me at the entrance and I scurried about for a Suncoast or Sam Goody. Happily, there was an FYE, so I picked up two DVDs for my brother to unwrap. He's getting something from Amazon shipped directly to his house and I've just bought him that Best Buy gift card online that'll also be sent directly to him. I'm not feeling like the colossal failure I was yesterday, but I still feel like I didn't do my best. He's a hard guy to shop for, but I pride myself on good presents. Oh, well - at least we can all watch the DVDs tonight.

It's a frigidly cold white Christmast here in northwest Ohio. But I have heat and food and wine and best of all, I'm with people I love. I wish the same for you.