Sr Director just came through with her Xmas gifts - usually some piece of cookware we have a lot of excess inventory in. This year it's a set of 21 Lock&Lock storage containers, this is a brand new line for us so pretty exciting!

The zoo was, in fact, a zoo last night. My family driving from Oxford spend an hour in traffic coming up Vine street from the highway.

Ugh. That area is a mess on a normal day, let alone a warm-ish day the last weekend before Christmas when everyone wants to go the the Festival of Lights.

Ooh, that sounds like a good gift.

I have vacuumed everything (floors and seating), and cleaned the back corners of the bathroom floor. I think it's just surfaces left? Which means I should properly take everything off the kitchen counter and really clean that. We'll see.

So sitting down turns out to have been a mistake.

I started today pretty much ready to burn everything down with fire, and calmed myself down with a lot of coffee and some breakfast. It's possible I'm getting sick, or maybe it was breathing in the mold downstairs when I used the treadmill last night.

It's 2pm and I still haven't had lunch, so I'm eating some yogurt, a handful of nuts, and a clementine and calling it good enough.

I will not be dealing with the email that sent me into a towering inferno of rage this morning until later in the week. Unless it "slips" to next week when I'm only in office for one day.

So sitting down turns out to have been a mistake.

Getting up is hard.

Matilda seems to have recovered (mostly) from her little snively cold in time to go ice skating with her friends this afternoon.

I have a present for everybody but I need to do a few more small gifties to round things out.

The fridge is already packed and my plan for xmas morning is to focus on Things That Small Delicious. So I think a combo of fresh coffee, frying bacon and cinnamon rolls should work. I'll do a little frittata with that for the protein.

But I'm also planning on doing a big spread of FORBIDDEN bagels for JZ tomorrow morning. It is time for the Great Carb Indulgence.

I got Emmett a cashmere hoodie for xmas. I think that counts as a twofer since his girlfriend will get the benefit of cuddling up next to him and petting the cashmere.

I did some last minute chores, and now I'm making gingerbread for a friend. I just need to pack and wake up at an early hour for tomorrow's flight. So, basically, I'm binge watching Watcher.

Rollover what you can but take your PTO, people!! Don't let your employer steal that part of your compensation package from you!

I'm working from home for the next two weeks, and unfortunately I actually have a shit-ton to do because I'm going away for two weeks in January which means I have to front-load a TON of stuff I'd normally put off until after the holidays.

Well, they also want me to not take a vacation day if I just call into a meeting! But it is a goal for the new year. But also 10 weeks!!! I am now friends with a programmer who is about ten years older than I am and we are the holdouts where we don't want to get an advanced degree to make us qualified for what we are already doing. He basically takes all of December off.