4th Annual Christmas Gift Review

Once again, it was an enjoyable Christmas Eve & Day here at The Diner. Management went to the 8PM Christmas Eve service at our church--and it was great because that is one of the two times per year that we're able to sit together as a family. It was also especially fun to me because the worship team was comprised of 5 of my former students...not to mention the culmination of a celebration of Advent (which our church hasn't really empahsized before and I'm glad we've started).

And, as is becoming a very nice tradition: Teenagers sleep later. They're not quite as anxious to have Christmas start at 7AM and be over by 8AM as they used to be, and now they kind of moan and groan about getting up at 8:30AM. In fact, in a sure sign that we're in a different phase of life now, my higher-order life-liver sister Jilly called to see if we'd liked the gifts they sent. She's celebrating with her family in Yakima, Washington. She called at 9:15AM our time...letting us know that the higher-order-barnstorming offspring Margaux had awakened them especially early, given the time difference.

Anyway, on to the review:

Biggest Financial Expenditure Difference In A Stocking: In my stocking this year, there was a pack of ouchless ponytail holders...likely costing under a buck. In the same stocking there was the mother of all iPods: 160 gig of video playing, music holding goodness. That's 40,000 songs or 30 movies or 90 television shows and I have no idea how many photos or any combination of any and all of the above. Retail cost of that deal and the ouchless ponytail holders is quite a difference.

Best Proof That Santa Knows Candy Tastes Of Our Family: I got Snickers bars (although #1 for me is peanut M&M's, I'm having problems with a tooth right now and hard candy is kind of out), Tracy got something made by Reese's, Shelby got Ghiradelli, and Kelsey got SweetTarts. It doesn't matter, though. They wind up being sampled by everyone, anyway. Except the Snickers, which are hard to share.

Unquestioning Proof That McKinney's Spoil Their Dogs: Lloyd, Great Dog, couldn't stand the smells emanating from his stocking on Christmas Eve. He started barking and growling at it, so we gave in and let him open his on Christmas Eve. Overlooking the fact that we get this beast his own stocking as proof, in it was nearly $30 worth of toys and treats and bones. He also got a gift from the higher-order barnstorming Sentz family on Christmas Day with more toys and treats. We view this as normal behavior.

Consistency Award: The gift the girls got to open on Christmas Eve was, for nearly a decade now, once again, pajamas.

Gift Guaranteed To Require The Most Trial And Error: My father-in-law, Murray the Retiree, gave our family a...wait for it...DVD recorder. Think about it. How many times have you wanted to save some show you just watched or something you've TiVO'd and had to delete it? Well, this bad boy will actually burn a DVD of something you've recorded or are watching. Plus, you can do basic editing to eliminate commercials or things that would push PG to R or whatever. Of course, I'm technically challenged and I think I have it hooked up correctly but have the wrong type of recordable DVD's (who knew those "plusses" and "minuses" on the package meant something?). We'll figure that out today and call for backup if necessary. What I don't understand is how Murray got it figured out. He's no better with technology than I am.

Best Suggestion We Didn't Follow Through With: Kid1 suggested that we take a photo in front of the mantle with the mess everywhere in front of us and send out "Post-Christmas Cards." Her logic: "Everybody sends out cards before Christmas. Why don't we send out that picture on cards that say, 'Wasn't Christmas 2007 GREAT?!'"

Hobbies Ahoy Award: Kid1 spends her spare time cooking and baking...and got a crock pot and pie trays and all sorts of gadgetry to enhance that. Kid2 has a lot of costume/shoe work with ballet and a sewing machine was in order. The smokin' hot shutterbug trophy wife got gift certificates to WineStyles. The beauty of this is that I have no hobbies (other than reading or watching sports) but I benefit in various ways from all of them.

Gift That Helps The European Economy: Many of you remember that Kid1 won two free airline tickets anywhere in the world at a hockey game last Januaury...so, she had to pick a spot in the world she wanted to go to and the time she had allotted to go was when school was out. They leave today for Paris, France. I qualify that because, when you live in North Texas and say "Paris," people ask if you have family in the town about a couple of hours outside Dallas. So, Santa threw in a hotel room in the St.-Germain-Des-Pres quarter to ensure the tickets get used before they expire. Apparently, Santa weighed the reality that a photographer and artist doing Paris, France together was worth the exchange rate of dollars to Euros.

Best Throwback To High School: My wife got me a DVD of the movie Caddyshack. I had one, but lent it to someone and never got it back. Me and my friends watched that movie, or parts of it, about 40 times or so in a year's time. We still quote it, and have found that our generation views this as a point of commonality and bonds over it.

Best Book That Fooled Me: There was a photo book my daughter got that said something about "The Nutcracker" and had a picture from the famous Christmas ballet on the cover. I glanced at the cover and moved on. Last night, during the clean-up portion of the program, I told her to put her book up. She asked me if I saw her picture in it. "No. I didn't know you were in a book." It was at that point that it was a professionally bound book of HER COMPANY'S version of The Nutcracker done this year in Fort Worth. At that point, I had another 20 minutes of reprieve from the clean-up.

Gift That Made Me Happy/Sad: The Sentz's gave me one of those electronic frames that holds about 10 minutes worth of digital photographs that scroll every 10 seconds or so. They took the time to pre-load it with photos of their side of the family as well as some photos of my mom and dad. As I sat there, I would get really happy about photos of Margaux or the Sentz's and then get kind of misty at pics of my parents and then back to laughing at photos of me and Jilly as a kid. I'm glad they only loaded it to about 5% of capacity or I'd have been a wreck.

Best Stocking Stuffer For A Hipster-Doofus: As someone who studies pop culture and enjoys it...how can you go wrong with Rolling Stone magazine's 2007 year-in-review issue? Santa really "gets" me.

Well, as usual, it was a wonderful Christmas season here at The Diner.

And, because of that...

...I'm almost ready to get the decorations back in the attic.

Not quite.

But getting there.