The Great Christmas Tree Disaster

[dawn_felagund]

Yesterday, when I came home from work, I noticed something was wrong as soon as opening the apartment door: the vacuum cleaner was out.

I didn't get it out, and no one in this household vacuums except me, if they can help it.


Bobby was in his usual place on the couch, napping. (The poor man wakes up at five every day to make an hour-long commute into DC.) He woke up when I came in, and as a way of greeting, I said, "Why's the vacuum cleaner out?"

Apparently, when Bobby got home, he found the tree toppled over onto the coffee table. Also, he had his hockey stuff spread out on the floor to air, so it was quite a mess of pine needles, broken ornaments, smelly hockey gear, and tree water.

We'd had this weird patch of water on the floor for a couple of days, but it was far enough away from the tree that we didn't make the connection. But apparently, the stand was cracked and the water was running to this spot on the floor. Well, yesterday, it decided to give entirely, and our poor tree to a nosedive into the cactus garden.

When I got home, the poor thing was reclining against the door out to our balcony, and its lights were in terrible disarray.

So we needed a new tree stand. Who knew, though, that a tree stand is impossible to find on 21 December? It's only four days before Christmas. Apparently we're the only dumb "procrastinators" who need a tree stand at such an unreasonable time of the year. We went to Home Depot first: nothing. So we went to a tree lot. Apparently they only sell trees and no tree-related paraphrenalia. So we went to another Home Depot and got lucky. But by then, one Felak was very cranky.

(It didn't help that my sleep pattern was weird the night before, so I was exhausted come morning. My imaginary friends muses just don't understand that three in the morning is time to sleep, not play.)

At least this tree stand is easier to use than the old one, which was inherited when we moved last year and has eight pegs that have to be screwed in perfectly to get the tree to stand straight. This one only has three, so instead of taking an hour to get the tree straight, it took five minutes. We put back the ornaments that had fallen and not broken (one advantage of carpet) and Bobby straightened the lights, and now the tree looks good as new again. The carpet is slowly drying; it helped that--by virtue of my (less than) half-day at work--I could pull back the drapes to let the sun do its work.

Last night, Bobby picked up the Bose iPod docking station that we've both been oggling/drooling over for the past couple of months. This was our gift to ourselves with our Christmas money, but things worked out that we could get it early and apply the Christmas money instead to having my rattly brakes fixed. Bobby was in the proverbial high cotton last night playing with it, and we put his iPod on shuffle and stayed up for an extra hour, drinking hot chocolate and reminiscing over the songs it chose. It occurs to me at times that we really have created a soundtrack for our life together, which is going on ten years in May. Each song, it seemed, made one (or both) of us leap and say, "Do you remember the trip where we listened to this all the time?" or something along those lines, which in turn made us think of the funny stories associated with said trip, and so we had a nice time for that hour, and I did absolutely nothing while awake for the first time in weeks.



Today, I had CJIS recertification training. As much as I complain about my job sometimes, being a State employee really isn't a bad gig. CJIS--which stands for Criminal Justice Information Service because I know you all doubtlessly find parole and probation as fascinating as I do--requires users to be recertified every two years. Well, since my two-year anniversary at the WAU was this past Saturday, my time had come.

(I will always remember my anniversary at work because it was the day that RotK was released into theaters, but I couldn't go to a midnight showing as I had my first day of work that very day. So Bobby and I saw it on Friday instead, like normal, non-geeky people.)

The initial CJIS certification two years ago was an awful day-long affair on the computer in a classroom with thirty other people, many of whom couldn't type or find the ENTER key...I thought recertification would be much the same, but it was classroom only, no computer. Our instructor wasn't even the somewhat-nasty Jamaican lady named Rose (who is renowned at the WAU for telling the statistician before me to close her legs in front of an entire class) but a nice, softer-spoken guy. Training started at nine, which meant I got to sleep in a half-hour, and the instructor plunged through the PowerPoint slides and--after a mere forty-five minutes had passed--said, "Well, if you don't have any questions, then my Christmas gift to you is to let you take your test and go."

So I spent more time in the car driving to and from training than I did actually in training. Not that I'm complaining. At 10:15, I was well on my way home.

I still had odds and ends to finish for candy, so that is what I did. I made another tray of chocolate nonparetzels (a cross between chocolate pretzels and nonpareils) and another tray of chocolate-caramel-almond clusters. I did another batch of caramels and made my father-in-law some peanut clusters and my dad some dark chocolate raisin clusters, which he loves for some reason. And so now, all I have to do is package everything tonight and holiday candy is finished! Well, sort of...I'll be making samples for photography for the website and all, but certainly not the massive quantities. Until Nelyo's gets underway (hopefully!) that is.

All told, this holiday season, I will have used: seven pounds of milk chocolate, three pounds of dark chocolate, two pounds of white chocolate, one pound of mint chocolate, and uncounted pounds of creme fillings, peanut butter, nuts, caramel, pretzels, raisins, colored coatings, flavorings, peppermint crunch, and nonpareil beads. *whew* That's a lot of candy.


Edit: The day of this post, of course, Bobby had to prove me wrong. By vacuuming. Gah.

Comments

[fanged-geranium.livejournal.com]

My cat pulled a Christmas tree over one year by catching a bauble with its claws (luckily it was the year after we retired the old glass ornaments)!

[dawn_felagund]

Wow, that's quite a cat! I shudder to think of the number of pretty ornaments that met their untimely demise at my parents' house due to frisky cats and overzealous dog tails.

(One reason I am glad to have nothing more pesky than a few Elves and a husband to take care of! :^P)

[rhapsody11.livejournal.com]

You know, I was actually in a shop that had 50% discount over those thingies... but we're a bit too far away from you. But what a sight... needles in your hockey skates... so I bet besides lunch you will do some tree stand hunting as well...

(It didn't help that my sleep pattern was weird the night before, so I was exhausted come morning. My imaginary friends muses just don't understand that three in the morning is time to sleep, not play.)

Add an active baby on top of that, plus minor contractions and you have my nights currently. I have a pouting Celegorm, a babbling Maglor in my ear, Mablung (the 1st age one) wants to say something as well, Maedhros is quite happy as well... I am not complaining really, just a bit exhausted.

[dawn_felagund]

We actually found one at the last place we stopped, for just $7--which seemed really good to me--but we spent almost an hour driving around looking for one.

I've always had sleep troubles due to hyperactive imaginary friends, from the time I was a small child. That's how so many stories and novels come to be written before I even put a pen to paper! And my Elves seem to think that since they can go without sleep for long periods then I can too. ;)

[rhapsody11.livejournal.com]

And my Elves seem to think that since they can go without sleep for long periods then I can too. ;)

Eugh.. yes. Two chatty elves (you know, my two fav Feanorians) couldn't leave me alone some weeks ago (two nights in a row), and I actually got up in the middle of the night to crank out two chapters featuring both, heavily nc-17. You know that my Bilbo muse is so incredibly polite? He just patiently awaits until those two fiery elves are done before he can give Boromir his two cents worth (another short I am working on)... Hobbits are very polite in case you were wondering. Even my Samwise xmas fic or my Merry/Glorfindel fic... they just simply wait for me. So maybe you should try it once ;) Hobbits I mean. LOL

[atanwende.livejournal.com]

Your christmas tree disaster sounds wondrously familiar to me. Some years ago on christmas eve my grandfather crawled beneath our tree in search for our cat and tripped the whole thing. Someone then placed a stool with metal feet on the wet carpet. We still have the rust stains. The funny thing is that it happened while I was downstairs. When I returned my father told me something along the lines of "Grandpa just tripped the tree" and all I said was "Hey, stop kidding me!" It was pretty hilarious. :-)

[dawn_felagund]

Okay, I'm really laughing at that story...my grandfather died last October, but the thought of him crawling anywhere much less under a tree.... :)

(More like saying, "Dawn, have you done your taxes yet?" and me saying, "But Pop-Pop, it's June and they're not due 'til March....")

It seems that Christmas just isn't for sissies anymore. ;)

[atanwende.livejournal.com]

It seems that Christmas just isn't for sissies anymore. ;)

Indeed. It begins with shopping battles and doesn't yet end with dozens of relatives visiting... ;-)

Happy Holidays! :-)

[tarion-anarore.livejournal.com]

Ai, the tree!! We surprisingly have never had this problem in twenty years, five dogs and two cats. *knocks on wood*

muses just don't understand that three in the morning is time to sleep, not play

This sounds very familiar...

Yay for not having to spend a whole day training! And for Nelyo's candy! I was trying to find and eight point star cookie press when I was making my lemon cream cheese cookies yesterday, but no success...

[dawn_felagund]

We surprisingly have never had this problem in twenty years, five dogs and two cats.

But with retrievers, don't you get the Flying Tail of Doom? Our dogs--three retriever mixes--caused the premature deaths of more ornaments than I think the two cats have.

I was trying to find and eight point star cookie press when I was making my lemon cream cheese cookies yesterday, but no success...

Yes, eight-pointed stars are hard to find. Five-point seem all the rage...and I can't be entirely angry about that because the five-point star is a major symbol in my original fantasy novel. (The eight-point, of course, is the symbol of the Elves!)

Lemon cream cheese cookies sound delicious. I'm experimenting with a lemon cream ice cream for the holiday flavor this year. Hopefully it turns out as delicious as all that sounds!

[tarion-anarore.livejournal.com]

But with retrievers, don't you get the Flying Tail of Doom?

We do indeed have the Flying Tail of Doom!! Luckily, most of our ornaments in tail zone usually just fall off and are cushioned by the carpet. And for a long time the bottom of the tree was decorated with unbreakable things like pipecleaner candy canes (yay kindergarden!!). We've rather given up, so the bottom remains sparsely decorated, and those bulbs we do hang have the wire hooks twisted and wrapped around the whole treebranch!!

I'm experimenting with a lemon cream ice cream for the holiday flavor this year.

Sounds yummy!!! If it works, I know what I'll be getting at Nelyo's. ;)

[ithilwen.livejournal.com]

What a mess!

Ans yes, it is amusing that by the time Christmas actually arrives, there's no Christmas merchandise left in the stores. I guess no one actually buys things in season any more.

[dawn_felagund]

As part of my cranky-didn't-have-enough-sleep rant, I pointed out to my husband that if Frank's was still around, we would have been okay. I don't know if you had a Frank's in your area, but they used to have entire aisles of holiday stuff. But they went out of business last Christmas. Boo. Screw Home Depot, I want Frank's!

A day later, luckily, the apartment looks like nothing happened. The carpet is a little damp, but the industrious husband has mopped most of it up by now. ;)

[ithilwen.livejournal.com]

We never had a Frank's here, but there used to be one in my parents' town, and they shopped there all the time. I was home visiting them for the holidays when the chain went out of business last year, and we stopped by the store - it was sad seeing them emptying the place out. I want Frank's back too!

[dawn_felagund]

Frank's and Hechinger's were the places to shop for gardening and decorating needs in Maryland back in the day. Frank's was a big deal because of all their holiday stuff (and the fact that they had miniature cacti and Venus flytraps which were Teh Cool when I was a kid.) I think my mom, with her gardening and decorating projects, kept the one in our area in business for a lot of years!

It was sad to see them going out of business last year because I always preferred them to Home Depot and Lowe's for that sort of stuff. (As for Walmart.... *head starts spinning*) The only advantage were the incredible sales which let hubby and I--having just moved--get ornaments and decorations, but I'd sooner have them back. (As we bought more ornaments than we can possibly use anyway.)

[juno-magic.livejournal.com]

I'm glad to hear that you are still that cheerful after all that mess!

*huggles*

[dawn_felagund]

You should have seen me that night! I was the portrait of "cranky"; but I recovered as soon as I got home and the problem could be fixed. It's just frustrating--in this day of "big box" stores--to go to these ginormous places that never have what you want (after pushing the stores out of business that did have such items) and never have staff willing to help you. Rarr!

[niothwen.livejournal.com]

muses just don't understand that three in the morning is time to sleep, not play.

.....so you play for a few hours because now you're wide awake, then 10 minutes before the alarm goes off they wander away and you get incredibly sleepy......

[dawn_felagund]

Yes! That's the way it always goes! My Elves wandered off that morning sometime after six...and I have to get up for work at seven.

I shouldn't complain. My original novel and most of my other writing was born of insomniac nights (or mornings) and I think the price is more than worth it! :)