We're putting up our Christmas tree tonight, because we CAN. :)

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

jeremy evil tells me the American rule of thumb is to never put up the Christmas tree until after American Thanksgiving. (I can’t vouch for the veracity of that, being a pure Canuck and all.)

Well, up here, it’s chilly out, it snowed last night, and we’ve both been in celebration mode for the past week - my sobriety anniversary was Tuesday, I took my one-year cake at my AA home group last night, and our one-year anniversary of having met is this coming Monday.

A couple of weeks ago, I checked the Canadian Tire web site to see what artificial trees are going for these days, and what would be the best deal. The one I picked out, as it turns out, is on sale this week ($30 off!) so I told Jer we should go buy it today while it’s still on sale and in stock. It’s a 6-footer, and, as I look over to Jer setting it up as I type this, very nice for the price ($49.99 CDN on sale).

While we were at the Tire, we bought lights, ornaments (with a definite muted color scheme - we are so gay!), bows, bauble hooks, a tree skirt… and after we checked out, we turned to each other and said, “Let’s just put it up tonight.”

When I was little, I always wanted to put the tree up as soon as it got cold out, but my parents would say, “No, no, it’s too early. We’ll wait until two weeks before Christmas.”

Well, I’m 31 years old now. I can do what I want. Jeremy is totally into festive decoration (he did the front door for Hallowe’en at the beginning of October!).

So, I’ve got a Mannheim Steamroller Christmas CD playing on the 'puter, Jer has now finished setting up the tree and is putting the lights on, and after we get back from running some more errands, we’re going to decorate it.

We’re putting our tree up - our first Christmas tree as a couple living together - this second weekend of November, and we’re going to make that our tradition. Because we want it that way, and we can. :slight_smile:

2

Go for it! Ours will go up the second the table is cleared on Thanksgiving Day.

I was just thinking about putting on my X-mas heavy rock CD with songs by Jeff Beck, Richie Sambora…

Happy Holidays!

3

Things to do:

  1. Do not go to Scott Evil’s house until he’s tired of Christmas music.

  2. Ask someone if it’s a Canadian tradition to buy your trees at a tire store.

  3. Give Scott Evil a fire extinguisher as a Thanksgiving gift. There’s a reason for not putting trees up in the house 6 weeks early.

  4. Remind secretary we threw away all the office Christmas decorations in July. We must pretend we don’t know where they are at.

  5. Do not go to any public places (malls, box stores, etc.) between now and December 28th. I like Christmas music the same way vampires like direct sunlight.

  6. Find annoying, motion activated Santa that plays Christmas music to put in cow-orkers offices.

Anyway, good for you Scott. And I’m glad you found someone “Christmas compatible” to share it with.

Although Christmas has always made me want to be Jewish, I know some people enjoy it. And that’s fine, as long as I don’t have to be near it.

Whistlepig

4

Canadian Tire. More than just tires.

5

I’ve heard that the “rule” about trees going up after Thanksgiving has its roots in Catholicism. Is that true? Though not Catholic, we do abide by that rule, but mom was raised one…

6

DO IT!!! :smiley:

Everybody else can just kiss yer butts!!! WHOOOOOOOOT! :cool:

7

::ahem:: It’s an artificial tree. :rolleyes:

Bah, humbug. :stuck_out_tongue:

8

Thank you, matt, darling.

Americans: go to www.canadiantire.ca and you’ll see that you can buy just about everything there.

9

Ooh. It’s all twinkly and sparkly. The lights Jer picked out have 16 different “programs.” We’ve chosen one that slowly fades certain colors in as it fades others out. The overall color scheme is burgundy, blue, red, and silver. It’s just lovely. :slight_smile:

10

We’re so gay. :smiley:

11

EvilChristmasTreeCam®: now live at http://216.221.53.156:8080/. (It’s currently 11:24 PM EST.) We’ll leave it on for an hour or two. :slight_smile:

12

EvilChristmasTreeCam®: now live at http://216.221.53.156:8080/. (It’s currently 11:24 PM EST.) We’ll leave it on for an hour or two. :slight_smile:

13

Oh, that explains it! A friend’s daughter is a manager at a Canadian Tire (somewhere in Ottawa), and I’ve always wondered why a woman would want to manage a tire store!
Your cam link doesn’t work for me. :frowning:

14

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!

I am going back to Montreal over the Thanksgiving long weekend and was kinda hoping I’d get the relatively mild weather y’all had last weekend! :frowning:

15

Mama Tiger, it’s because of the period at the end.

Try:

http://68.19.145.237:8080

16

Oops. That’s someone else’s cam.

Try:

http://216.221.53.156:8080/

17

Heh. We put ours up on Wednesday, just to see if it had all its branches - see, we bought it at a flea market about a month ago, in an open box, for US$7. We figured we ought to make sure we don’t need to go out and buy a brand-new one, y’know? So we cleaned the entire house just to make room for the tree, and moved the couch, and rearranged some furniture, and assembled this tree. It has all its branches but one side of it’s kinda yellowed - it’s a white tree with sparkles, not a green one, but it was $7 so we’re not going to complain that it’s not our color. We’re not gay. :wink:

So now the Christmas tree is up in the corner of the living room, being all camoufla - camoflau-- blending in with the white walls of the apartment (can’t paint 'em, though I’d like to), un-decorated, sparkling prettily as you walk by.

And every time we go shopping I buy another ornament or 12. And I bought lights today. It came with five strands: one strand all red, one all green, one all white, and two of those “icicle” things that we’re going to hang in the window. We bought new multicolored non-blinkies for the tree. Anybody want those three strings of all-one-color? Will trade for three packages of blue tinsel.

We’re not decorating it until Black Friday, though.

18

Black Friday?

19

The day after Thanksgiving. So called because the retail establishments get to use black ink (for a profit - as opposed to red ink for a debit) in their ledgers, as it’s the traditional start of the holiday shopping season.

20

When Black Friday comes
I’ll stand down by the door
And catch the grey men when they
Dive from the fourteenth floor
:slight_smile: