My Last Christmas Break Ever - Day One.....

It's kind of depressing to think this is my last Christmas break as a teacher. In fact, it's so depressing that I'm considering putting off retirement for a few years.

Not.

Whenever I have an extended break from school, I alternate between doing absolutely NOTHING of value (and feeling kind of guilty about that) and trying to cram as many useful activities into a single day as I can (and feeling kind of exhausted from that). Not much middle ground.

I would have put today in the former category until I started thinking about writing this blog post. I spent most of the day waiting for the big brown truck to arrive with the Warrior Princess' Christmas gift, and it didn't come until about 3:30. But if I had dared leave the house, that bad boy would have driven up at 10:15. I could have used the time I was "trapped" at home to do some -- oh, I don't know -- HOME projects. But I didn't.

It wasn't a total waste, though. I shipped Sweet Girl's package to her and was assured it would get there on Wednesday, much earlier than I was afraid it would. I bought a couple of gifts for my godchildren, some sweetener I forgot to get at the grocery store, and some antacid tablets for Hubby. I prepared my fantasy gymnastics team line-up for week one (and my team is NOT heavy with UGA gymnasts, believe it or not), and I paid our car insurance. I did two loads of laundry, cooked an almost-actual meal for dinner, and loaded the dishwasher.

The best part of the whole day, though, was taking a walk with Hubby (and Gus) in the park. We walked for about an hour, and it was glorious being outside in the fresh air. It was about 60 degrees and would have been PERFECT for a bike ride, thank you very much Mr. Big Brown Truck. Rainy weather is supposed to be moving in tomorrow, so I may have missed one of the last good riding opportunities for this year. We'll be out of town for four days right after Christmas, but I hope to squeeze in at least a couple more rides before the end of the year.

I don't usually plug other people's blogs here (especially people I don't even know remotely, as in this case), but I have to tell you the story behind this one. Warrior Princess called me last night and said, "I'm afraid I may have misrepresented you to my co-workers." (And I got teary-eyed that she has other co-workers now and I'm not one of them, but I'm working through those issues.) It seems she was telling her co-workers about my blog and my writing style and my sense of (?) humor, and one of them came in saying she thought she had found my blog all by herself.

She thought it was called "People I Want to Punch in the Throat."

I haven't read many of the entries, but part of me is sad that it ISN'T my blog. Part of me is grateful, though, because if I've learned one thing about my writing, it's that I can't maintain a writing style consistently. I can't be funny all the time, I can't be sentimental (hardly ever, in fact), and I can't even be grumpy all the time. I can do sarcasm, but I'm always afraid it comes across as more pissed off than I really am, so I try to use it modestly.

No, really. I do.

I have found much to love in this blog so far. I do find some of the language offensive, so I hope Warrior Princess corrected her co-worker about its authorship. Still, some of the ideas could have come straight out of my head. I just wish I could express them as well.