Well, Christmas landed slap bang across my face last night. Let's just say it was Christmas Tree Evening - that's pretty much all you need to know to understand how this weekend has been. So, get comfortable, people. This particular event only occurred last night, and I am already proving very adept at turning it into an epic tale lasting a minimum of twenty minutes, and involving two adults. What I am trying to say is that you may be here for a whiiiiiiiiiiiiiile.
It started a week and a half ago, when Mr Grin and I erected our fake but very expensive Christmas tree. We stood it in the corner, and fluffed up its artificial needles. Mr Grin walked in circles around it and, after a few minutes of serious contemplation, ultimately concluded that since it has been squashed up into a thin column for a whole year in the loft, the fluffiness hadn't fluffed yet. So he declared: we would wait to decorate it. We would do it the next day.
Well.
Naturally, this was stupid. And so, for the past week and a half, Mr Grin and I have been trying to find an opportunity to decorate the damn Christmas tree. And, for the past week and a half, the tree has stood, naked and embarrassed, in the corner. Where it stares at us, fluffs, and taunts me. The tree has not had a good year so far. And Mr Grin and I have been trying to find an opportunity to decorate the tree, even going so far as to retrieve the ornaments from the loft, but then there was just all this other shit that had to be done. Shit like tumours the size of a small dog. We had a Christmas party thing, and then we had another Christmas party thing, and then to mix it up, we had ANOTHER Christmas thing, and then I finally just threw up my hands last night and declared: 'Tonight I'm decorating the goddamn Christmas tree. If you want to help, fine, if not I am just going to throw some baubles on the damn thing and call it a day.'
Fortunately, Mr Grin agreed. Unfortunately, it was not...uneventful. We stood there in the room and the first thing that came into our minds was that we weren't cooking dinner that night. We were going to order a takeaway. So we poured some wine, and called the cheap Chinese restaurant around the corner to order some dinner. While we waited for the delivery, Mr Grin put on some Christmas music and started a fire in the fireplace, and we were feeling pretty warm, and cozy, and accepting of the fact that we were happy and had a fluffed up tree. Then the food arrived.
Mr Grin opened the little tubs of food, and I had my forkful of rice about halfway to my mouth when suddenly, he let out a tremendous cry.
"What the fuck, what the fuck, what the fuck" said Mr Grin.
"AHHHHHHHHH," said myself, dropping my sauce covered fork onto the pale carpet and looking hysterically for the cockroach I was so sure he just found in his chow mein. Instead, Mr Grin was pointing at a piece of pork, glistening in delicious brown sauce, and sporting something both foreign and...curly.
It was a pubic hair. There was a pubic hair in his pork.
"There is a pubic hair in my pork," said Mr Grin. This phrase would be repeated many more times over the course of the evening. I removed the hair, looked at it, and pronounced it of the human pubic variety. This did not make Mr Grin feel any better.
So, he called the restaurant and told them: "There is a pubic hair in my pork."
The restaurant did not believe him. Apparently, the people who work there don't have pubic hair.
He tried again. "No, really," he said. "There is a pubic hair. In my pork."
To which the restaurant then presented Mr Grin with its own theory of the case, namely that Mr Grin had planted the pubic hair in the pork himself. (As you do.) The restaurant also refused to issue a refund, and informed Mr Grin that he would have to prove the existence of said pubic hair by bringing the full meal, pubic hair and all, back to the restaurant, and showing it to the manager.
Mr Grin was perplexed. "Listen up!" he thundered. "Pubic hair! Pork! In Food! Unacceptable!"
And that was when they hung up on him.
Coziness and cheer and warm feelings about the season pretty much...well, they died a violent death at this point, as a raging and cursing Mr Grin snatched his coat and shoes, tossed the pork and offending pubic hair into a bag, and stormed out of the house.
(I wisely used this time to start drinking, and posting on Offtopicz.)
Fortunately, Mr Grin returned a mere hour later, clutching his refund in one hand, and a tub of Kentucky Fried Chicken in the other.
"I AM FUCKING READY TO BE FESTIVE NOW," he hollered.
"I am going to open some more wine now," I told him.
Fortunately, after Mr Grin finished dinner, version 2, and downed three glasses of wine, his mood improved dramatically, and he declared himself ready to start stringing the Christmas lights on the tree. Which would have been fine, except for the fact that...well. You know. They're Christmas lights! And Christmas lights exist on this earth to serve two purposes, and two purposes only, those being:
1. to light up your tree; and
2. to spend the rest of the year participating in a secret loft orgy that causes each strand to become so irrevocably tangled that upon being opened, they resemble not so much individual cords, but rather a Christmas wreath made up of wire and bulbs.
"Hmm," I said, opening the box. "It is a little tangled."
Mr Grin peeked over my shoulder.
"AHHHHHHHHHHHH" he said, for the second time that evening.
I settled myself down on the ground, and began the untangling process. Sighing resignedly, Mr Grin started on the other end.
9:20 - 11:05: We untangled. And we untangled. AND WE UNTANGLED. Mr Grin was thrilled.
When the final knot was unkinked, and the final cord untied, we decorated the tree. (We took lots of wine drinking breaks inbetween.) But yay! Tree is all dressed now! And after all that excitement and drama, it looked pretty damn good. So Mr Grin and I smiled, and wished each other a Merry Christmas, and toasted our accomplishment. Then we passed out.
:24:
