As the family unwrapped gifts on Christmas morning, Dad opened one which led to this exchange:
Dad: It’s a USB Pet Rock!
Mom: What does it do?
Blair: The same things as a regular pet rock.
Dad: Except it works with the computer!
My family is fun.
Deer Trouble
A lot of people run into problems with deer grazing on their decorative plantings. Likewise, a lot of people have light-up deer they put out during the holidays.
My parents are unique – the light-up deer they put out during the holidays wind up dining on the decorative plantings.
Beating the Deadline
Wahoo! For the fourth year in a row, my Christmas cards are going out before Christmas of the year for which Christmas is being celebrated.
OK, so technically, the cards won’t be arriving in anyone’s mailbox until after Christmas, but they’re still going out before Christmas.
Wylie's Monster Snorkel
Wylie demonstrates his technique for hiding from scary monsters while still getting to the cool air. This camouflage technique has the added advantage of allowing you to pretend not to notice that someone is trying to change the bed sheets.
Dreaming of a White Pre-Christmas
As of Saturday at 6:30pm, there are 19 inches of snow in my yard.
The snow on the roof of the car is taller than me! (It’s been a long time since I couldn’t see over the roof of a car.)
But it does look nice! (Please note that the yellow cast to the snow in the foreground is due to a street light and has nothing to do with Wylie.)
The weather forecast calls for a chance of additional snow on (or possibly before) Christmas Day.
Boom De Ah Dah
It’s been a day of discovery. Or rather, it’s been a day of Discovery.
I while back I saw the cartoon, “xkcd Loves the Discovery Channel” which at the time struck me as a little unusual, but enjoyable nonetheless.
Today I discovered the, “I Love XKCD” music video.
Reading the comments, I discovered that this was all inspired by a Discovery Channel music video, “The World Is Just Awesome.”
Boom De Ah Dah. Boom De Ah Dah.
Motorcade
Traffic going to and from work has been pretty bad this week. I expect it’ll be much better the next two weeks as everyone does the usual year-end “use it or lose it” vacation, but that’s next week. Today, I was sitting in four lanes of pretty much bumper-to-bumper traffic. That’s when I heard the sirens.
Sitting in traffic like that, sirens are rarely a good thing. I figured this must mean it was a fairly recent accident, and I was going to be sitting there for a while until they got things sorted out enough to direct traffic around it.
I glanced over at the passenger-side rear-view mirror and saw a group of police motorcycles and squad cars driving down the shoulder of the road. They don’t typically put motorcycles out on the highway during rush hour, and you hardly ever see them at all this time of year.
I then realized, this wasn’t an accident response, this was a motorcade! Motorcades are a dime-a-dozen in this area, but they’re far more common downtown or going between downtown and one of the airports. You never see them in my part of “Sprawlsville.” And who would put a motorcade on a major highway during rush hour?
So I watched the first officer zip by on his motorcycle, followed by another and another. The guy riding on the last motorcycle in the group stood out from the rest. It was a police motorcycle like the others, but this guy was huge and unlike the officers on the other motorcycles, he had a beard flapping in the wind and was dressed in a bright red outfit with white trim….
I had a huge grin on my face once I realized what was going on. The motorcade was for Santa!!
As I watched the motorcade continue down the highway, a bit of Christmas magic happened and traffic got a whole lot better.
It was a terrific start to the day.
Aiiiieeeeeeeeeee!!!!
I frequently use movie posters to create unique wrapping paper for Christmas and birthdays. Imagine finding this “Bee Movie” package under the tree!
If You're Gonna What?!?!
Beyoncé’s “single ladies” has been getting a lot of airplay around here lately. I suspect that’s at least in part because once the broadcast mega-corps discover that people like a certain song, they feel obliged to play it into the ground. But I don’t begrudge Beyoncé her success, I’m certain she deserves it.
The only problem is, I keep mishearing that song. Perhaps it’s the acoustics of the room my radio is in; perhaps it’s my hearing; or perhaps it’s simply my preference for songs with a tempo I can dance to. Whatever the reason, I can’t quite make out some of the lyrics.
According to a quick Google search, the lyric is supposed to be, “If you liked it then you shoulda put a ring on it.” The ex-boyfriend the song is directed at missed his chance, he should have proposed.
The way the words come across when I hear that lyric is somewhat different. The lyric I keep hearing are, “If you’re gonna pull my finger, put a ring on it.”
Considering what happened the last time I fell for that prank, it’s hard to fault the guy for his decision.
Google Paper – Out of Beta!
A few years back, Google introduced “GMail Paper” as an April Fool’s prank. The idea was that by clicking a “Paper Archive” button, you could have any or all of your GMail messages printed out and delivered to you (for free!).
It’s not quite GMail Paper, but this year, for Christmas, Google is letting you send a for-real paper Christmas Card to anyone in the US. It’s limited to one per person, but that’s still a fun idea.