Post Christmas Post

Are you heading out for the after Christmas sales at the crack of dawn today? Or what the television ads are calling “If you didn’t get what you want after Christmas sale”. Not me. This is the 2^nd year I am not partaking in the craziness. In years past I have gone out for the sales on gift wrap, decorations and other clearance items. And I will admit, I would pick up a little something for myself. It just hasn’t been in my budget of late. Besides, Anastasia did an excellent job on the gift front this year. Did I say EXCELLENT? I meant AWESOME! SPECTACULAR even!

If you have some extra cash, get out there and SPEND SPEND SPEND and help out our economy! Goodness knows it could use the help.

I went to bed about 12:30am after finally finishing my gift wrapping and elfish duties, a new record for me. I have been known to be wrapping and/or assembling until 4:30am Christmas morning. I would have been done 3 hours earlier if it had not been for the fact that I was insistent on loading my son’s new Ipod (which by the way is way cool, because you can shake it to shuffle your music). Anastasia kept telling me to just wrap it unloaded and go to bed already. Turns out I did the right thing. My son was absolutely thrilled. His taste is old school rock from the 70’s, the stuff that I actually grew up on so it was a joy to pull all that music together (not like my daughter and her penchant for Miley Cyrus and Hillary Duff). (Cough, excuse me I think I have something caught in my throat.) The dedicated elf that I was, I worked right through dinner and at 11pm I decided it would be a fine idea to have a Braunschweiger sandwich. (Note to self: Not such a good idea. Although it was tasty and hit the spot, the late hour caused a nasty bout of indigestion.)

We did hit one major snag in our gifting when Anastasia went out to the shed at 11pm Christmas Eve to find the padlock completely iced over and frozen shut. I had stowed my daughter's golf set there because I really couldn’t think of another spot that wouldn’t be found out. (Note to self: Hiding an item in a place that could prove impossible to retrieve due to inclement weather, probably not a good idea.) Thankfully Anastasia was able to open the lock this morning after a ½ can of de-icer, a bic lighter and bending a key. Thankfully I had spare keys.

Anastasia got her coveted hybrid driver. Due to the size of the box (and perhaps the fact that A Christmas Story was playing on the television) the kids and I taunted her with “You’ll shoot your eye out” over an over until she opened it. Now my daughter and Anastasia are plotting to go to one of the area golf domes to try out their clubs on the indoor range.

I hope everyone had a safe and Merry Christmas.

Lola's Diner
©2008

Sharing Even More Love

It must be the holidays because there is a lot of sharing going on in blogland. Special thanks to Harriet at I Am Harriet for this award.

I am passing this award along to JD at I Do Things So You Don't Have To simply because she does things so I don't have to, and she has a super blog.

Lola's Diner
©2008

Sharing More Love

Thanks to DCRose at All About Cakes for this Award.

I am passing this Award on to:

Jennifer at Connect With Your Teens
Mobab’s at Beetle’s Humor – Memories of the 50’s and 60’s
Michelle at My Crazy Life With A Toddler
Maitri at Compassionate Kindness Bloggers
Carlota at Dashing Smiles
Shiela at Colorful World of Shiela
Lori at Momma Momma Because We Hold it All Together
Joey at Bloggin’ Mama

Wishing everyone a warm and safe Holiday.

Lola's Diner

©2008

It's Christmas Eve. I am so not ready!

It's the wee hours of Christmas Eve and I am FREAKIN OUT. I am not ready. I have exactly 2% of the gifts wrapped.

I do this EVERY year. When am I going to stop this? I'm such an adrenalin junkie.

Ok, one bizzare thought, I'm watching The David Letterman Show and Mickey Rourke is on. When did Mickey Rourke become The Joker?
I don't mean to be disrespectful, but seriously,what happened to his face? It looks nothing like the face I recall from Nine 1/2 Weeks. Time has not been kind to him.Ok, I digress.

Back to the topic at hand. I don't have any wrapping done. I can't do any now because Anastasia has gone to bed because she has to get up for work in the morning. My wrapping station is our bedroom because it's the only place safe from prying eyes. Or so I thought. Yesterday I sent my son up to look for something under our bed because of my bad back I can't do it myself. He came downstairs all smirky. He hadn't found what I sent him up for and he proceeded to tell me how the suitcase that was firmly placed on top of a rubbermaid bin had fallen over and it's contents spilled on the floor. Wow, I wonder how that happened? Then he got more smirky and said "I know I'm getting brown slippers for Christmas." To which Anastasia and I replied, "And how do you know that?" To which he replied, "the suitcase fell over and a pair of Men's size 14 slippers fell out". (Do you know how hard it is to find slippers in that size?) Well, he had me, because who on earth would I be giving those slippers to? Maybe u-boats for Stuart Little? Grrrrr, I wasn't even following my rule of hiding in plain sight. Then because my son knows he's got my goat he adds that I better not be getting him a shaver. My son will be 14 years old 3 days after Christmas. 14 years old! And he already has facial hair. He is also 5' 11 1/2" tall. (You can't forget the 1/2", he won't let you.) He is refusing to shave and looks like he's going for Seth Rogan's not so little bro look.

Anyway, I digress again. How am I possibly going to stay focused tomorrow?

I have to run to Best Buy to purchase anti-virus software and a new microphone for my son's karaoke machine. I bought a 4 pack of Christmas Karaoke cd's because he was saying how we don't have any Christmas Karaoke, however he failed to mention that he broke the microphone. So since we planned on using it Christmas Eve night, I have to get out at the crack of dawn (because I'm a nut and want to beat all the last minute shoppers, cough, crazies.)

Do I sound like I'm on speed? I swear I'm not. Really. I mean it.

Oh hell, I'm going to bed now. I hope you're managing your holiday better than I am.

Lola's Diner
©2008

Sharing the Love

I just received an award from Mommying on the Fly. Thanks to Lisa C. at Mommying on the Fly whose blog I always enjoy.

The award states "This blog invests and believes the PROXIMITY - nearness in space, time and relationships! These blogs are exceedingly charming. These kind bloggers aim to find and be friends. They are not interested in prizes or self-aggrandizement. Our hope is that when the ribbons of these prizes are cut, even more friendships are propagated. Please give more attention to these writers! Deliver this award to eight bloggers who must choose eight more and include this cleverly-written text into the body of their award."

I’m passing this award on to the 8 recipients listed below. Please feel free to pass it on and share the love.

Here my recipients!

1. Maitri @ Maitri’s Heart
2. Patricia @ Subjective Soup
3. Deb @ Mama Flo’s Place
4. Anne @ Small Town Mommy
5. Stacey @ Havoc and Mahem
6. Harriet @ I Am Harriet
7. Crazynlovemom @ Crazy 4 My Kidz
8. Kim @ A World of Progress

Lola's Diner
©2008

My 2nd Conversation 10 Month – 10 Lives Challenge

Some of you may recall my post from Sunday, November 16, 2008,
10 Months - 10 Lives Challenge

And My First Conversation - 10 Months - 10 Lives Challenge

It's time for my Second Conversation of the 10 Month - 10 Lives Challenge. I have tabled my original installment because I am shocked and outraged that something like this can still happen in 2008. What am I talking about? I’m talking about the brutal gang rape of a 23 year old lesbian on December 13th in the San Francisco Bay Area. California Authorities Investigate Lesbian's Brutal Gang Rape.

This is beyond barbaric. How can anyone treat another human being in this manner for any reason? In this case the Richmond Police have indicated that the attackers knew the woman’s sexual orientation and made comments.

What is nearly as disturbing is that the media has barely mentioned this. I saw this story on Yahoo’s front page, but I have yet to hear about it on the television news.

Part of the 10 Month – 10 Lives Challenge is for us in the Gay Community to point out:

How we are more alike then different.
How we want to enjoy the same rights you enjoy.
How we want our relationships to afford us the same rights that yours do.
How many of us want families and go to great lengths to have them.
How we want to live our lives just as you do.

We’ve come so far.

Yet we are not safe.

Yes, we are saddened that Proposition 8 did not pass. We have much work to do.

We as a society should be horrified and embarrassed that a fellow human being can be brutally assaulted in a manner such as this.
Hate crimes related to sexual orientation have increased 16% in the United States.
Whether you are gay or straight, a crime like this is horrific.

Not only do we need to fight for our Civil Rights with regard to Gay Marriage, but we must continue to fight for Hate Crimes bill passage. Because President Bush said he would veto the bill to which the Matthew Shepard Act was attached, it was dropped from the bill in the Senate.

Why is the Matthew Shepard Act needed? Because the 1969 Federal Hate Crime Law only “extends only to crimes motivated by actual or perceived race, color, religion, or national origin.” The Matthew Shepard Act basically expands the 1969 Federal Hate Crime Law to "include crimes motivated by a victim's actual or perceived gender, sexual orientation, gender identity, or disability."

This is yet another reminder that we have so far to go.

Please take a moment to sign The Erase Hate Petition now.

My heart goes out to this woman and her family.


Lola's Diner
©2008

Saving Christmas – There’s still time

Christmas 1968, my Father had been in and out of the hospital with back problems. He had just had major back surgery. Back then it was a very big deal, he was in the hospital at least a month. My Mother didn’t drive, but she dutifully took 3 buses each way to visit him daily while we were at school. On her half a mile walk home from the bus stop she would stop at the grocery store and purchase just what she could carry and what she could afford.

My Mother didn’t work outside the home, so we had to live on my Father’s small disability check. We were forewarned not to expect much for Christmas. I’m not sure if it was my Mother’s not so subtle way of letting us know that year was different, or maybe she was so tired from her bus travel, but my Mother didn’t put up the 7 foot artificial tree. That year we had a 4 foot silver aluminum tree that my mother put on the drum table in the picture window. It was truly a hideous tree and it forever marked a very different Christmas for us.

One night a few days before Christmas our front doorbell rang. My Father was still in the hospital and my Mother wondered who on earth could be ringing our bell after dinnertime on a cold snowy night. My Mother didn’t want to open the door, but I kept imploring that she HAD to open it because as I peeked through the picture window I saw it was Santa Claus! She finally did open the door, but wouldn’t let Santa in the house. He left 2 very large boxes on our front porch. Each box was 3 foot square, about 10 inches tall. One box was full of all kinds of food. There was cereal, flour, sugar, roasts, chickens, pasta and all sorts of canned goods. The other box had candy canes, chocolates, some clothing, hats, scarfs and mittens, and some coloring books. My Mother, proud as she was, kept calling back to Santa to take back the boxes, but he waved her off and disappeared into the night.

That Christmas was very lean. It was the year my sister and I got our first Monopoly game and Mini-Mod dolls instead of Barbies. At the time we were both a bit disheartened by the lack of Christmas loot, but as the years have passed I have to say that it was the one of the most memorable Christmases of my life. I was 7 years old and Santa came to my house and made my Mother cry. I don’t think I’d ever seen her cry before that. All that food helped us get by until my Father was able to go back to work. It was truly a Blessing.

We later found out that Santa was the brother-in-law of my parent’s neighbors, Tim and Terry. They said they had gone door to door and collected money from the neighbors and purchased all of those items. Terry knew my mother wasn’t going to ask for help and she knew she wouldn’t accept charity from her neighbors. A heartfelt note from Terry in one of the boxes told my Mother it was alright, it didn’t mean she owed anyone anything. It didn’t mean she was weak. It meant she was cared about. It meant she was loved.

Do you know someone who is struggling, whether because of illness, disability or unemployment, or perhaps a single mother struggling on her own?

There’s still time.

It’s not too late to save someone’s Christmas.

It wouldn’t take much. Maybe a bag or two of groceries, or a grocery store gift card and a couple of toys.

A Santa suit isn’t required.

Just a bit of cash and a big dose of holiday spirit.

Happy Holidays!


Lola's Diner
©2008