Can't find your post about your fall, erika, but I hope you're feeling better (and that you got checked for concussion etc). Falls are nasty.

So The Girl has flown back to Israel to be with her family (her dad doesn't have much time left) and I'm very selfishly feeling lonely about being alone for the next few weeks and not having her around for the holidays. Ah well. Catching up with Castle. Need some new shows too. I hear Community is good.

Thanks all! Ah, yes, my lingering French souvenir! Luckily, it was a wonderful trip all around.

Tep, my doctor told me to take Zyrtec and Pepcid, so I'm on it, but thanks! I hope, hope, hope, that this doesn't last a really long time. I'm glad it's winter and I can cover most of it with clothes.

Seska! Much ~ma for The Girl and her whole family.

Okay, I just need to make a small grumble: Tim went over to his dad's the morning with the explicit plan to help him decorate for Christmas. I told him I would join them after lunch to help. They're both annoyingly meticulous and picky and sloooooooooooow as hell, and I prepared myself for that (I am gradually getting used to it, even as my preference is to aim a tinsel cannon at the tree and be done with it).

So I call Tim just now to tell him I'm leaving, and ask if they needed anything. He says, "Make sure you dress warmly, so you can use the leaf-blower."

Alas, it's not a tinsel cannon; Tim's dad decided that even though it's 25 degrees out (for real; I'm not being hyperbolic because I'm a lazy bitch), he wants to get all the rest of the (FROZEN) leaves off the ground.

I didn't sign up for leaf-blowing in 25-degree weather, and I am a little bit pissed. But I am going anyway.

And I am going to invoke the quid pro quo rule (which I try not to do, because relationships are not meant to be bank-balance transactions where there is always equal and commensurate give-and-take), because he is going to godamn OWE ME for this.

Seriously, yo. It is TWENTY-FIVE goddamn degrees out there. I thought I would be hanging ornaments on a tree inside, where there is central heat.

t edit Perhaps this is steroid rage kicking in. I own that. But it's FUCKING COLD.

No, I would also be pissed if I had signed up for tree decorating (I'm picturing a fire and hot Nicolas) and I got frozen leaf blowing instead. (Can you even blow frozen leaves?)

Eta: the iPhone totally changed chocolate to Nicholas but I'm leaving it. 'Tis the season and all

I *know* I won't get hot Nicholas, dang it. I *never* get hot Nicholas.

I think I'm going to go over and just say "Tell me what I can do inside." I understand that Tim's dad may be obsessed with his yard, but I am not. I didn't sign on for yard work in below-30 weather; I signed on for obsessive-compulsive decorating indoors (with or without hot Nicholas).

I should show up in a short-sleeved shirt to drive my point home.

What is Christmas without hot Nicholas? Best dang autocorrect ever.

And FTR I'd be pissed too Steph.

I'm snickering, Steph, but I feel your pain. Tim's dad sounds a bit like my sister. Who still wants me to rake up pine needles from my yard and put them under my shrubs, even though it is like 30 degrees outside.

Yeah, that's not right. You should demand indoor activity, and hot Nicholas.

Come to think of it, we all should.

Hah, I was all wondering if I should know what hot Nicholas was before I saw the postscript. I did have mince pie, fruitcake, and glög last night while watching Love Actually with my sister (in town for the weekend) and roommate. Fun! I surprisingly recommend the ikea nonalcoholic glög, with or without added wine