December 19, 2001
Dear Everyone:
Time flies when you don’t keep a gun to its head. Take “Jeannie”, for instance. When she woke up this morning, she was one year older than she was yesterday. (Happy Birthday, “Jeannie”!)
As for me, I still don’t have my Christmas tree set up and decorated yet. And Christmas is officially less than a week away. On the plus side, I’m at least halfway through the Christmas cards. That’s because I can work on the cards in the evening. Can’t do the tree in an evening.
In order to set up the tree, furniture must be moved. In order to move the furniture, the area rug needs to be rolled up and temporarily moved out of the way. And once the rug is moved, now would be a perfect opportunity to vacuum the carpeting. And hey, what about those stairs?
You can see how something like this could easily escalate into a full-fledged cleaning frenzy. And once that happens, it’s Katie-Bar-The-Door. By the time the dust settles, you’re too tired to decorate the tree and wind up hanging the ornaments on the vacuum cleaner. These things must be approached with extreme caution.
And besides, it used to be a family tradition that the tree didn’t go up until Christmas Eve. Until the year that “Marshall” climbed the Christmas tree, breaking most of the ornaments. The neighbors claimed to be able to hear Dad swearing three houses away. That was the year that the tree went up Christmas Eve and landed in the back yard by Christmas Night.
As for why I didn’t put the tree up last weekend, I had every intention of doing so. But first, on Saturday, I had to help “Jeannie” go to the tree farm and stalk and execute a tree. She needed a tall tree that was very bushy on one side and virtually flat on the other, so it took some time to find a suitable candidate. And to stop to look for window-sized icicle-lights on the way back, and to deliver the tree to her patio, complete with a bucket in which to put it while it soaked up water before going into the stand.
We couldn’t find the right size icicle-lights, so I offered to look when I got back to San Ramon. Sure enough, I found the lights she wanted, so I offered to bring them up to her place on Sunday. But I slept kind of late on Sunday, and, by the time I’d gone up to her place and put the lights up (“Jeannie’s” house is very impressive now, light-wise), and got back to my place, it was time for laundry and grocery shopping and that’s how weekends get away from us.
So I’ll get the tree done this next weekend. It should be fairly easy. This is a pre-lighted “Victorian Fir”. I spotted one the weekend before I went to “Hobby”, earlier this month, but neglected to grab it right then. By the time I got back, the four-foot tree I wanted was sold out and there was only one six-foot one left, so I bought that. Last Saturday, when I went to find “Jeannie’s” icicle-lights, darned if they weren’t selling the four-foot ones again.
I always preferred to get a live tree in the past. Sure, it may be a lot of trouble, but the tree makes the place smell like Christmas. This year, with all the business trips I’ve been taking, I decided that the wreath on the front door had enough “Christmas-smell” to go around.
Once I got the artificial tree, I started realizing how many advantages they have. If you want it fluffy on one side, and flat on the other, just adjust the branches accordingly. There are no needles to fall, so you don’t really need a tree skirt. No lying on the floor, trying to hold up a watering can to fill the stand twice each day. No worrying that the water has dried up. No dealing with the garbage company’s “special one-time-only pickup day” to get rid of the “carcass”.
And, especially, no dealing with string after string of lights. If the tree farm had offered pre-lighted live trees, I might have considered it. Although cutting down a tree while avoiding the power cord could be problematical. Those long-handled saws are tricky enough by themselves without adding the threat of electrocution. I suspect the cost of the farmers’ insurance premiums would make such trees quite expensive. Kind of like trampolines: It’s not the time and materials that make them so costly, it’s the manufacturers’ insurance rates.
So, like I said, I’ll get to the tree this Saturday. And pick Mother up at the airport on Sunday. And pick up Christmas-Dinner-In-A-Box on Monday. And, like “Richard” said, one memorable Christmas Eve, “Thrifty will be open tomorrow, won’t it?”
At least the shopping, shipping and card-sending is almost complete. This will probably be the last Letter for this year. “Marshall” and “Jeannie” are making some kind of Day-After-Christmas-Activity plans. So everyone have a Merry Christmas and a Safe and Happy New Year.
Love, as always,
Pete
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