Wednesday, December 27, 2006
A Very Mixed-Up Xmas
This year's Christmas was... well, it was different. Since we hauled ass to Roatan on Christmas Eve last year, this was my first real Christmas home from college. This was also really the first Christmas everyone waited until past 8 AM to open the presents. For most of my childhood, my parents would drop off the stockings to Brother Cognito and I early in the morning-- at the kind of hours kids wake up when they're buzzed about presents-- while they delivered the presents "from Santa", then we'd barge downstairs at 7 AM for breakfast, followed soon after by presents. This year, we woke up sometime around 7. I tore through the candy in my stocking while playing City of Heroes (yes, I resubscribed) and waiting for Brother Cognito to wake up.
This year was also the year my family and I learned the importance about Christmas lists-- me, the importance of handing them in early, and my parents, the importance of sticking to them. See, due to the confusion of finals, I didn't end up handing my parents my list until December 3rd, when they'd already started shopping for me.
So, what did I get? Clothes. Lots of clothes. Some I could use (a pair of black jeans), others not really (a Dickies work shirt with the world's most unpleasant checker pattern). The only things I got that I'd asked for on the list were "Fresh Fruit for Rotting Vegetables" by the Dead Kennedys and an iPod Nano. The worst part is, the Nano-- probably the most expensive gift I received-- was just a spur-of-the-moment, "Well, if I can't get a Wii..." request that became somewhat impractical due to the fact that I only have one real CD (the aforementioned Dead Kennedys), I have little disposable income at this moment and am currently subscribed to two MMOs with monthly fees, and I've joined Pandora.
Fortunately, my parents and I both realized our error. So, my parents allowed me a "credit pile", where I could place the gifts I didn't like so that I'd get the cash off the returns for some post-Christmas Christmas shopping. The first spoils of that shopping were claimed yesterday, when I picked up Final Fantasy XII and Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess... which kind of explains why I'm posting this on the 27th.
It wasn't a bad Christmas, though. We watched Clerks (a gift from a cousin in Jersey, and an experience for my parents) and feasted on turducken. And now, I'm doing what every kid who got socks always wanted to do.
This year was also the year my family and I learned the importance about Christmas lists-- me, the importance of handing them in early, and my parents, the importance of sticking to them. See, due to the confusion of finals, I didn't end up handing my parents my list until December 3rd, when they'd already started shopping for me.
So, what did I get? Clothes. Lots of clothes. Some I could use (a pair of black jeans), others not really (a Dickies work shirt with the world's most unpleasant checker pattern). The only things I got that I'd asked for on the list were "Fresh Fruit for Rotting Vegetables" by the Dead Kennedys and an iPod Nano. The worst part is, the Nano-- probably the most expensive gift I received-- was just a spur-of-the-moment, "Well, if I can't get a Wii..." request that became somewhat impractical due to the fact that I only have one real CD (the aforementioned Dead Kennedys), I have little disposable income at this moment and am currently subscribed to two MMOs with monthly fees, and I've joined Pandora.
Fortunately, my parents and I both realized our error. So, my parents allowed me a "credit pile", where I could place the gifts I didn't like so that I'd get the cash off the returns for some post-Christmas Christmas shopping. The first spoils of that shopping were claimed yesterday, when I picked up Final Fantasy XII and Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess... which kind of explains why I'm posting this on the 27th.
It wasn't a bad Christmas, though. We watched Clerks (a gift from a cousin in Jersey, and an experience for my parents) and feasted on turducken. And now, I'm doing what every kid who got socks always wanted to do.
