Except for taking care of the Christmas cards two weeks ago, I had nothing — nothing — done whatsoever regarding preparing for the holiday season.

And the only reason I managed to kick out the cards in one day (it was a Sunday) was me procrastinating on grading more research papers.

Then I realized that Christmas day was oh-my-lord nigh this past weekend. It was my dean’s annual Christmas party at his house that did it — Christmas decorations, small talk about the relief of the semester being over and the stress of last minute Christmas shopping, the oooh-ing and aaaah-ing at Daniel and folks gushing about this being his first Christmas…

Egads! I don’t have any *gifts*.

Enter stage right Me, illuminated by the unearthly glow of the Amazon.com website, this past Monday. One-day-expedited shipping charges took out a goodly pound of flesh, but I got all of the stuff (except for two) yesterday. Yesterday was a massive round of gift shopping not-gotten-at-Amazon and then, well into the darkened hours of a December afternoon, a massive round of gift wrapping.

I just finished up the gift-shopping today, (with a quick stop to the post office to priority mail some off) and I can say with much gratitude, “Yea, verily, I am DONE.”

::collapses::

Just in time, too — for Zathras is in town and will be visiting soon. Yay!

Oh wait… the TREE.

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In the spirit of the season: My Reindeer Flies Sideways