Oh, this trip was just a joy all the way around. Was there a reason I had to come along for the counting? I mean, I’m as big as a house, couldn’t I just stay with my sister while Joe goes and does the whole Civic Duty thing? Of course not. I had to travel all over creation, in my state! Can you believe it? And did he make reservations in advance? “Oh, I’m so sure they’ll have room for us at the inn. It’ll be no problem!” T’chuh, I’ll give you “no problem”. Me having my baby in this barn, that’s a problem, let me tell you. But look at the little guy. Now that we got the birth goo off him, he’s just an angel. And not even crying. But he’ll have enough time to cry later, I guess. Right now he’s just as happy as can be sleeping in the manger. As long as that donkey stays back. I mean really! Oxen and sheepen and cowsen and chicken, there’s got to be a whole zoo in this one barn. I wouldn’t be surprised to find an emu in here. Well, I wouldn’t be surprised if Australia was discovered and everything. Right now, as things stand, I think I would be surprised to find an emu. But only a little. Not that there’s room for an emu with all these shepherds hovering. What? You’ve never seen a woman with a baby in a barn before? Well aren’t you Mr. Urban. Yeah, I’m talking to you! Now what is that noise? Who let a kid in here with a drum? If all that “par rum pum pum pumming” wakes the kid I’m not going to be happy. Joe! Sort out that kid will you? If you don’t the both of you will not be happy since there are two drumsticks. Capice? Yeah, that’s what I thought. No thank you, there’s nothing you can do for me right now, no thank you! Oh, what is that smell? Great… the ox just did something all too oxish. What did I do to deserve this? Gah, it’s just crazy! And will someone turn off that lamp? Oh, it’s a star, is it? Just wandering around the sky was it? Til it stopped right above this here barn? Yeah, right. Pull the other one, it’s got bells. No! It’s just an expression! Don’t you go and start pulling things! You shepherds, I swear!
Happy merriness to you and yours this year.
-Rue.
Here’s some frankencense. Ought to cover the smell. And the myrrh’ll cover the frankencense smell. Use the gold incense burner.
Need any help with the thank you notes?
Well, now you’ve gone and done it, rue! Don’t ya no better than to dis somebody’s mama? And baby jesus’ mama to boot! :dubious: Y’all are getting probly a whole truck load of coal in your stocking this year for sure. Everyone knows that St. Nick reports directly to the baby jesus, and I’m betting the name rue is numero uno on the coal list. 
Man, is it cold here in Mickeyville this mawnin’! With the wind chill, feels like thirty degrees. I’m just glad I’m off work this week cause they fer shure have the AC on in my building and it’s more than likely cold enough in there to hang meat.
I got me different projects to do around the house setting up for Xmas dinner on Saturday cause everybody’s coming here. Yesterday I washed all my couch cushion covers. The seats are okay cause they’re foam rubber but the back cushions are filled with stuffy guts. I had five lawn bags filled with stuffy guts sitting in my livingroom while the cushion covers were in the washer. Puttin’ the stuffy guts back into the cushions was a real treat, I tells ya. Anyway, they came out pretty good, if a tad lumpy. Today I’m gonna vacuum under all the furnitures and then shampoo the carpet.
Better get on it.
Tupug
Oh goody! We get to get all sacrireligious this week! VunderBob will be so poed he missed this! Ya know, ol’ Joe was a pretty good ol’ Joe about that whole thing. I mean, it ain’t his kid but he still took responsibility to raise it and all. Course he did get saint hood out of it, so I’m guessing it ain’t all bad. Then again, he was kinda gullible. I mean, Mary coming up with this “God got me pregnant” bit and him just buying it. Ok, I know all about the dream where this angel showed up and told Joe it was God’s baby and all. I’ve had some weird dreams after a little too much imbibing myself.
Is that lightning I hear? :eek:
Darn cold this morning. I have all my extra towels stuffed up against the windows to stop the 41 degrees coming in, keeping the house at a nice 72. Thank goodness for furry putchies (from Victoria’s Secret, a Christmas gift from a few years ago).
Wonder if Mary got furry slippers or a nice housecoat for Christmas? As for swaddling clothes, that would prolly be easier than onesies for the little Baby J.
Heck, he taught the kid a trade too, which is a good thing. Carpentry may not rake in the big bucks, but there’s sure enough not a lot of money in the Messiah business.
Yeah, the weather guy said a bad word this morning. He said “zero.” That’s not a word I want to hear first thing in the morning. It’s pretty danged windy out there too.
Happy Solstice Eve all!
Rue, it’s very nice of you to honor the Baby Jesus’s mom like that. I don’t think she gets to say her piece often enough. Being the mom of someone famous must be tough.
I got all my family’s gift shopping done yesterday. Sunday morning is the best time for shopping. Parking is plentiful and crowds are light. Tonight I get to wrap presents then I’ll be all done.
And Horray for 4 day weeks! Although I am one of them Heathen Pagan-types, I still love the season. Food and parties and family and friends. The return of the sun, the lengthening of the days, the slow march to Spring. I hope everyone has a lovely, safe and happy Holiday.
It was “zero” here this morning too. Except there was a “four” in front of it. Would have been better without the wind. And what’s left of the fence not beating against the patio windows.
I think I’ll bake some cookies, just to heat up the house.
screech (who was raised in a drafty barn-shaped house) -owl
‘A cold coming we had of it,
Just the worst time of the year
For a journey, and such a long journey:
The ways deep and the weather sharp,
The very dead of winter.’
That’s The Journey of the Magi, not Christmas, but oh, well. I’m thinking of getting Mr. Lissar a complete T. S. Eliot (you all recognized the quote, right? Of course you did.) plays and poetry, for Christmas.
Oh, good! Tomorrow is going to be only -5. Right now it’s -21 with a windchill of -33. That’s Celcius, but when it gets close to -40 it’s the same temperature in both systems, I think. Apparently some Southerners don’t believe in windchill. I cordially invite them up here today.
I like cold, I do- and I hate really hot weather- but this is ridiculous. It’s only mid-December!
Merry ChristmasHannukahKwanzaaSoltice!
Have I told you how much I missed you Screech? No, of course not, because you just got back to the MMP* Clique. So this is the first chance to say it. I missed you Screech.
Have I told you (the general “you” not just ms. screech-owl) how much I hate the heat pump this house has? It’s supposed to pull the heat out of the outside air and redeposit it inside the house. Only there ain’t no heat outside right now. (The atmo has gone liquid, folks!) So the heat pump is pumping a big load of nuthin’. And the Bonus Heat dealie cuts back out when it gets within two degrees of comfortable. This is not a help.
So I’ll take all the coal I can get. I’ll burn it and keep warm. Really warm since we don’t have a fireplace. But at least I’ll be warm. For all eternity!
*MMP is “the Monday Morning Post”. Today is Monday, it’s Morning where I am, and the OP is “the Post”. It takes off from there wherever it will. Someone’s going to ask. They always do. You yourself can join the MMP Clique by posting in the MMP two weeks in a row or three weeks out of five. Then we’ll all miss you when you’re not around. But be warned: Swampy will tell you just everything about what he’s up too. And he doesn’t always wear pants while he’s doing it.
“So we get invited to this fancy wedding over at Cana, and the kid, he’s all “Do we haveta?” Teenagers! Anyway we get there, and they run out of wine, so I ask him to run and get some. Man! Does he give me attitude or what! He flat-out refused to go to town, but finally he did manage to scare some up. Pretty good stuff, too…”
“Hey! Drummer Boy! I’ve got a newborn trying to sleep. Enough with the Frostys and the Rudolphs. Sheesh…if the kid wakes up again, are you going to breastfeed or change the dirty swadling clothes. I don’t think so…”
Voice of God, speaking to Mary:
“Hey I never said I’d marry you.”
It snowed here last night, right after it rained. I’m at home - I didn’t want to drive the winding, hilly, icy roads in the dark, then I decided I wasn’t going in at all. I just finished some pancakes.
When I looked at our outside thermometer around 7 this morning, it said 9. Yep, 9 degrees F. And there’s just barely enough snow on the ground to cover the grass, but our driveway is covered and probably slippery. According to the weather guys, it won’t get above freezing till some time tomorrow.
So I get to see the MMP on MM, which is nice again. Since I can’t get here on MM at work.
So happy frosty morning, all. And Rue, watch out for them lightning bolts from the sky. I’m just sayin’…
[Joseph]
“Good one Mary… Son of God, eh?.. Well, he better damn well be the ONLY Son of God!”
[/Joseph]
And you three! Wise, huh? Wise would have been to give us yur nice room in the inn! They are wiser than you, Joe, they made reservations! Where are the wise WOMEN? They’d at least have brought some hot food and diapers!
Hey, at least they didn’t have to worry about the local Bethlehem bazaars blaring Christmas carols non-stop starting November 1st, driving all the employees and shoppers completely insane by Novemeber 15th. (And “Grandma Got Run Over By a Camel” just doesn’t have the same ring to it. 
)
Yeah. Too many hangups…
I always read the MMP as standing for Mighty Morphing Post - seems appropriate, given that by the end of the thread, we are way far from where we started.
Susan
Y’all I just might have to fall in love with ACBG. The critter is willing to put up with a lot just to hang around me. Sometimes he hangs on me too, but that’s a story for another time. This weekend he went with me to Columbus, Ga to see some of my friends he doesn’t know and listen to waaaaay boring stories about places, people and events he doesn’t know but he did anyway. Course I fed him lunch at the yummy Chinese food place so that helped. Speaking of my little visit up there, I got me a brand new outdoor cooker! ACBG got him a brand new outdoor cooker too! See, we went to the CharBroil Outlet and got each other brand new outdoor cookers for Christmas cause that’s what we both wanted. Then we came home and went to a dinner party Saturday night. For dessert, we got to frost and decorate our very own Christmas cookies. That was fun. The combination of Christmas cookies, frosting and all kinds of little decoration type stuff for the cookies turns a bunch of adults into eight year olds. When I got home and took off my jeans, I noticed that I somehow got frosting all over the backside of my jeans. I just don’t know how, but I did.
It was 21 degrees here this morning with a windchill of 17. BRRRRRRRR!!!
ACBG and I both have Thursday and Friday off work but he’s gotta leave Thursday to go to Alabamy. 
I was kinda hoping we could hang out (and on) Thursday and he’d leave Friday but don’t blame him for wanting to get on the road a little ahead of traffic, I guess. He’s not coming back til Monday. I’m going up to see family early on Christmas morning and come back late Sunday afternoon cause I gotta be at work next Monday. I would go on Friday but I want to go to Christmas Eve services at my church cause I like it.
Was I going anywhere with all this? I can’t remember.
-swampbear (rambly)