Seasonal Frivolity

I was hoping to do a book-review post or two this weekend -- or, failing that, at least a Movie Log post, which I obsess less about -- but it's not looking rosy.

You see, last weekend, the whole family -- myself, The Wife, both Things, and my mother -- decamped out into the woods for much of one day to select and cut down Christmas trees, in the rough-hewn frontier style of our ancestors. It didn't take too much time -- especially out of a five-day holiday weekend -- but it was the first piece of the huge time-sink that is Christmas.

And so yesterday it was time to actually put my mother's tree up -- getting it in the stand in the morning, and then putting lights on it in the evening -- which took more time. And then it fell over after we left -- I'm going to claim that it had nothing to do with me, even though I'm the one that put it in the stand, since that stand is attractive and highly decorative, but does not hold trees up quite as well as one might expect for a piece of iron of that weight -- which meant that my mother and The Wife had to go buy a new stand, and then I and Thing One had to return to the ancestral homestead to put the now slightly-battered tree into the shiny new stand. (Which had eight little bars that had to be individually screwed in -- by hand, by me, of course -- which was not nearly as pleasant as it sounds.)

It's been a busy weekend -- that's what I'm saying. And I'm tired. So I don't think I'll be typing any deep thoughts about books quite yet. The holidays are coming up; if I don't catch up before then, I'll definitely catch up at the end of the year. Promise.