Change of plans

Funny how things can change each week, huh?

Each week has it's own set of feelings and focus and activities, I find. Just an observation.

There's nothing bad happening, for those family members who might read this and think the worst. In fact, only good things are happening: I found out on Monday that my Austrian family will be visiting us from December 16 to 30.

I am thrilled. I haven't seen my nephew, who is 13, in a year and a half. And now we get to share christmas with them! Normally christmas is pretty rote in our house - we buy a tree from the same place each year, on the same weekend, and I decorate it listening to the same christmas CD as every other year. We have a dinner xmas eve, go to my parents' xmas morning, have dinner at my parents' xmas night, and head to my grandmother's place usually boxing day or so, for a night. My brother has a ripping new years' eve party, and we hang around the house and eat a lot.

So this year, where I'd planned to be quite low-key, in fact I'm going to go balls-to-the-wall for Christmas. I've booked off work as of the 19th, and will work my butt off until then to make sure the house is in good standing, we have room for everyone, everyone is appropriately fêted and fed, and there's a good supply of everything readily available. The work starts this Friday, when I head to IKEA to find storage solutions for the crap I haven't dealt with yet, and for all of our coats, hats, mittens, boots, etc. etc.

For those relatives reading this: they will likely not attend Oma's xmas so don't worry about having extra six-footers in the room. Not like we need any more of those.

We're going to hunt for a real christmas tree (sssh don't tell the neighbors) and decorate it together. I will invest in some decent xmas music, and retire the Madonna/BoneyM/Bing Crosby CD I've been making my honey nuts with since 1998. OK maybe I'll keep the Boney M. Just for him, he hates it so.

I will bake cookies, and maybe we will make candies - together. How very Martha. We will ALL enjoy the family fun-due on xmas eve, so fun-due for 9, and we will ALL head to my mom's for turkey christmas night. We will ALL unwrap our gifts xmas eve and we will place a few under my mom's tree too. I will hang out the advent calendar my nephew made me two years ago and fill it with chocolates for him (at least two weeks' worth). We will go skiing (if there's snow) and for hikes, and I plan on making my nephew walk the dog during the day, to give myself a break. We will drive up and look at our land, and see our shared lake in the flat December light. I hope they like it.

But between now and then, I have (let's see....) eight events to organize. Why does work stack them all up like this? Beats me. Sadists. I go all summer with very little to do and then BOOM. It's not even like they're all planned-for during the summer; they pop up like mushrooms throughout the fall. It's sick. By the time xmas comes, I can only hope not to be sick as a dog and completely flattened as I have been in the past couple of years. I have work to do people! Austrians to host! Food to eat! I am trying a new persona on for the next month or so - one who doesn't give a fig and rolls with the punches. I'll let you know how it works out.

Celebrating Good Times

There are very few days of the year/decade when I say "Damn, I wish I was American." Yesterday was one of them. Barack Obama is a good man, and will be a great President - measured, diplomatic, intellectual, warm, a constitutional lawyer with a terrific international background and a whip-smart wife. What a sea change.

The only positive thing I can say about the other ticket is that I'm jealous of Sarah Palin's hair and her post-five-children body.

We celebrated last night by heading to my girlfriend's place, eating pizza, playing Wii, and hanging with her kids. We watched the early returns, for as long as it took to feel comfortable that there wouldn't be any Republican shenanigans or bounce-backs, before heading home to catch McCain's concession speech.

I don't think Americans could understand how this could be exciting for a white lady from Canada, but I am beside myself. I feel like the world just let out a collective sigh of relief. I can stop scratching my head, as I've been doing for the past 8 years, trying to figure out how a quite friendly and reasonable-looking group of people could have made such a collossal mistake. I am hoping that the world's political climate will be changed, that America can heal itself, and go back to being the friendly giant to our south. I hope too that the buzz of inspiration felt by our neighbors will spill over the border and light a fire beneath the arses of some of our stale leaders or leaders-in-waiting; it's telling that we had the worst-ever turnout in our election a couple of weeks back, in the shadows of the phenomenon down south. Our own less-than-uninspiring leader was elected by just over 22% of registered voters (about 15% of the overall population if that matters) in a system that has revealed itself to be quite flawed. We do a lot of things right here in Canada, but apparently elections aren't one of them.

So there's my political statement for this blog. I don't feel comfortable 'going there' usually but I feel like celebrating.

I look forward to seeing what SNL does in the next few months as well, as they're now going to have to up the ante in terms of African-American cast members.