Christmas in the Sandy Eggo

I got to San Diego on Tuesday evening to make the yule tide gay. My mom, grandmother (Bessy Bad Ass) and I went to Ruth's Chris for dinner- something that has sort of become a tradition when I come into town. Ever the festive one, my grandma wore the most fabulous red plaid pants that you could imagine - Something that would make our Scottish ancestors ripe with pride. She also donned a pair of boots that were about an inch and half too long for her and an inch higher than she was accustomed to. She readily admitted to this and as I helped her to the table she literally swerved like a 4 year old in her mother's high heels. This is not because she has become wacky in her old age, that wouldn't be funny to blog about - it is out of pure vanity. Grandma needed shoes - they did not have her size. She made it work. God forbid anyone say anything about the 84 year old's mis-matched shoes.

Dinner was delicious as it usually is and by the time we got home I wanted nothing more than to put on pants with an elastic waist, to park my lazy ass on the couch in the living room and to not leave that spot for at least two days.

When I make a goal, I like to stick with it.

We spent Christmas Eve hanging by the fireplace, watching reality television shows about outrageous murders and other unsettling crimes. I've been sitting here for about ten minutes trying to think of a legitimate explanation for why two white chicks from suburbia would do something like that under the twinkle of the Christmas tree lights and the reality is there is no good explanation. There is just something really interesting about people that go totally nuts. The "fucking Wackadoos" as Tony Soprano would say. We watched so many of these shows in a row it got to be sort of a joke. We even started to criticize the methodology of some of the crimes.

"Why would you ever use a credit card or a cell phone in any part of your murder plot??" I would say.

"Yeah" my mom would answer, "Or a computer."

"It's like so obvious that it could be traced." I mused.

Yes, Ho Ho Ho indeed.

By 8:00pm on Christmas Eve I could tell that my mom was just itching to reenact the Christmas Eve we had 3 years ago when, in a pure Christmas high, we opened all of our gifts before we went to bed. An episode that we regretted the next day. This year I insisted that we exercise some control.

So on Christmas morning we opened our gifts and we both totally scored this year. Some of my highlights include some cute Christmas decor, a great Banana Republic coat and the latest JK Rowling book- The Tales of Beetle the Bard, to name a few. I got my mom a whole new set of Clinique makeup, a digital camera and the Twilight books (Which I personally am almost finished with and though Jon Rose is my main man - Edward Cullen could be my vampire any day of the week. Straight up.)

We then spent the rest of the 25th watching Snapped; A show on the Oxygen network about women that commit murders because one day, "They just snapped". I also peppered in several naps because my excitement for Christmas woke me earlier than I had planned on getting up. It was truly magical. We had the Schuman tradition of homemade taquitos for dinner.

This morning I went to visit my Roo who gave me a great photo album with pictures of my brother, dad, Roo and I throughout the years. There were even some unsettling photos from the troubling middle school days that I probably will not be showing anyone EVER. That says a lot too because generally speaking I have no shame.

After Roo and I had breakfast and a nice chat I left to meet my mom at Balboa Park. We've talked about going to the Museum of Natural History during my last 5 visits and this time we finally went. It was awesome - although frankly seeing 65 million year old crustaceans makes me resent the fact that I have yet to find a single arrowhead. I LOVE Balboa Park - it's been so long since I was there - I forgot how amazing it is.



We got home and I took my 90th nap of the week. We watched a few movies (Charlie Wilson's War and Shawshank Redemption), ate In-n-Out and called it a night. And now, my Twilight book beckons me.

Tomorrow I head back to the fog San Francisco to see my darling boy and to reunite the Cavaliers. I'm excited to give Jon his gifts and to take down our ridiculously over sized Christmas tree (which is something I NEVER thought I would say.)