post christmas round-up 2025

Well... it's that time of year again. Time for the Christmas Round Up that is functionally the same as the last however many Christmas Round Ups.

We start out with the Krampus inspired warlock I came up with earlier this month after being inspired by an Instagram reel. She came out pretty well actually, just as a thought experiment. And then I realised that a good use for her was for today. So here we are.

Today, like always, wasn't terribly exciting, but it was, relatively speaking, very laid back. It was also, because I am contractually obligated to mention the weather, it was a pretty mild day. I wore jeans the whole day.

I'd already said to Ma that I wasn't going to rush down for breakfast, also so that she didn't need to rush in getting herself organised this morning. So I basically got up at my regular time and then went for my walk. 

Then I came home, had my usual breakfast and pottered around a little, got ready and headed down to Ma's about 9:15. The downside being that I didn't walk into Ma's place to find goodies fresh out of the oven, the upside being that Ma was fully organised by the time I got there.

We threw on the MTV Christmas songs special on the TV, while I pottered around Ma's place doing some prep work, setting the table, organising the kitchen for me to use, that kind of thing. Once I was done with that, we did presents, such as they were, relatively early.

It was a very DnD Christmas... 

• Dice Advent Calendar (from Mr and Mrs)
• 2024 DnD Players Handbook
• Forgotten Realms: Heroes of Faerun book 

We haven't done Friday Night Christmas yet. So, there's at least that to look forward to.

Once we were done with that, I started on the cooking and whatnot.

I chose to do all the cooking and tidying up and whatnot today, for a variety of reasons, but also just to let Ma chill.

While watching a couple of movies I brought down (that I'd already watched). More on that in the Mini Media Review on Saturday.

I was unsure whether or not everything was going to actually be ready on time and work out properly, because Ma's oven is smaller than mine, and we had turkey and sausage meat and potatoes all to cook at the same time. And I just shoved the potatoes in raw and let them cook the entire time.

I had a little bit of a... not meltdown... let's call it a crisis of faith about how I'd organised things, reorganised them, also didn't like that, re-reorganised them and then went back to the first version.

In the end though it all worked out. And after I pulled the turkey and the sausage meat I let the potatoes keep cooking for a little bit, and was a little lazy and instead of cooking the haloumi, I just threw it in with the potatoes for a bit. That actually worked. What I didn't do was read last year's round-up that told me to take the sausage meat out early. Ah well. Worked out anyway.

I also didn't read the note about putting the basil in the bowls either. I should remember to read last year's advice.

But it came together well. I did my usual trick and just threw together a salad dressing with what was either in Ma's fridge or pantry. And a little mustard and some cranberry sauce goes a long way.

Then afterwards, I cleaned up the kitchen, put the leftovers away, all that stuff, before we put another movie on. And we did the usual thing of having dessert midway through the afternoon. I didn't take a photo of that one though, because, honestly, it was less visually appealing than previous years. Just go look at last year's version. That. 

Once we were finished with the movie it was about 5pm and I packed up my stuff and headed off.

So, you know, relatively normal, relatively boring, relatively the same as every other year. 

post christmas round-up 2024

The Giant Christmas Moth wishes you a Merry Chrimmas! Yeah, it's just a giant-ass moth that was on the wall when I went for my walk this morning, but you know... I posted it to Instagram with the same caption.

And since we don't really do a tree thing at Ma's place these days, you get what you get.

Because I generally report on the Christmas Weather... it was a warm one this year. It topped out at just over 36°C, and, of course one of those times was when I was driving home... obviously.

So... I headed out for my walk this morning, and much like last year, there were what felt like a far larger amount of people out and about also doing a walk than there is on a regular weekday, and certainly more than I remember from back in the day when I used to walk in North Adelaide.

I came back, threw myself in the shower, had indecision about what to wear before discovering that I had a pair of jeans shorts in the wardrobe that I'd never actually worn and have no memory of getting. Happy Christmas to me.

The run down to Ma's place was good... I didn't get caught by the majority of the lights on the way down, or when I did, they changed basically by the time I'd stopped. So I got there around 9:30.

Was the first little while a slight comedy of errors? Yes, yes it was. Did I put the breakfast croissants into an already hot oven without checking the temperature? Yes, yes I did. Did they end up with a healthy coating of charcoal? Yes, yes they did. Did we eat them anyway? Fuck yes. Did I go to shake the Farmer's Union Iced Coffee from Ma's fridge only to discover as I was doing it that one of them was already open and sealed back up with a bulldog clip? Yes, yes I did. Thankfully the spray was minimal. But was I already by 10am ready to just give up on the whole endeavour and go home? Slightly yes.

But we made it through breakfast. Afterwards I hooked my laptop up to Ma's TV and played the Critical Role Winter's Crest holiday album... which, honestly, is not bad... and then cleaned up from breakfast. Mostly I threw Ma out of her own kitchen all day... for a couple of reasons. One of them being that it was honestly just easier for me to do everything myself, and also because it gave her a day where she didn't have to do anything.

Then we did a very brief round of presents.

Honestly, there was also a few bits and pieces like a couple of packs of Bundaberg Spiced Ginger Beer, because it wouldn't be Christmas without it, but I didn't bother adding them to the photo. There was supposed to be a copy of the new Dungeons and Dragons Players Handbook, but due to retail stupidity, I never got around to picking one up, but I'll do that in January. 

And the PS4 was something that got replaced back at the end of July, with the understanding that it was actually a Christmas present. So I just brought the box down for completeness.

So, the list looks thusly...

• PS4 (500GB in black)
• Dice Advent Calendar (from Mr and Mrs)
• Everyone This Christmas Has A Secret book (from Mr and Mrs)
• LEGO Polaroid OneStep SX-70 Camera (from Fluffy)
• Blokey Strokes magnetic bookmark (from Fluffy)
• LEGO Dungeons and Dragons minifigure Mindflayer and Half-Elf Bard
• Bundaberg Christmas Spiced Ginger Beer x 2
  

Afterwards, I set Ma in front of one of the movies I'd borrowed from the library (Wonka, more on that at the end of the week), while I started sticking things into the oven. Because we gave up on the Weber BBQ after last year's complete failure.

I'll also be honest, I have no idea who we specifically fit it all into Ma's oven last year. I mean, I managed, but it was slightly squished. Also, I really need to read the last year's Christmas Round-Up before the following Christmas, because if I'd remembered that I said last year that I didn't need to microwave the potatoes first, I might have actually listened to myself.

This Year's Me will tell Next Year's Me that we can probably take the potatoes and sausage meat out after about 75 minutes, and coating the turkey with some oil like the box says is a good idea. Also, just microwave the beans for like 30 seconds.

What I did do this year was not dump all the basil into the mixture, but added it to the bottom of the bowls, because honestly, it goes all weird in the leftovers.

It still looks pretty good though, honestly. Not bad for just throwing together basil, green beans, roast potatoes, cherry tomatoes, turkey, sausage meat and making a salad dressing with some cranberry, mustard, vinegar and oil. Voila.

Also, yes, that is essentially pretty much the identical photo I've posted for the last... I dunno, several years. On Instagram if not here on the blog. But these days I'm just lazy and reuse my Insta photos.

So, basically I dipped in and out of watching Wonka while getting lunch prepared. And then after we finished lunch (and the end of Wonka), I cleaned up while I put on the other library movie, Suzume, for Ma. The clean up wasn't too arduous honestly, because I'd been keeping a relatively clean kitchen throughout. But I did dip in and out of the movie a few times.

As is usual, we didn't have dessert directly after lunch, we never do. It generally ends up being late in the afternoon before we even bother. In this case it was after the movie. While I never really keep track of what time anything happens on Christmas Day, I do know that it was after 4:30, because when we turned the movie off, I just flicked through the TV and stumbled across the Christmas episode of Mythbusters from the first season, so we just threw that on.

I packed up afterwards and headed home sometime just before 6pm. Which was also around the time that the temperature spiked again. Good times.

And I got stopped at pretty much all the lights on the way home. Which is what you want when you're in a metal box that has been sitting in the sun all day.

So I got home, unpacked and then threw myself under a cold shower. As one does.

And that, mes amis, is Christmas 2024. For what it's worth.

character saturday: le petit chat noir

So... this week's DnD Character Colouring Book was... a journey. Which started when I wanted to play around with the new "opera gloves" and their variations. One of which is what the site calls "Long Fingerless Glove". And originally I was aiming for Shadow Sorcerer... forgetting that they didn't actually bring that across in the 2024 rules. So I pivoted to Shadow Monk. The Rogue part came a little later.

The longer I looked at her, the more I realised she was giving me slight Catwoman vibes... and I tried a version using the cat ears and a domino mask... and I liked that... but then I remembered that recently they did a wrestling pack... complete with a Luchador Jaguar mask.

One thing led to another... add in my favourite Hero Forge jacket...

And voila, The Cat. Halfling criminal, Shadow Monk and Thief Rogue. Is a full head mask that limits your vision and muffles your hearing a good idea for someone who relies on sneaking around? No, of course not. When has that ever stopped any superhero or supervillain ever.

But other than the fact that the character wouldn't completely come online until Level 6 at the earliest, this is absolutely a character I would play.

Anyway...

This week I made a much better quiche and added some mustard to my potato salad... which was a good plan.

For Mini Media Reviews this week... well, these are a little more Maxi, but still not full reviews, although I did consider it for the first one...

First up is Boy Kills World. And this absolutely is going to show up if I do a list of the best movies I watched this year, regardless of then they came out. Firstly... Bill Skarsgård. Who is a beautiful, beautiful man. But the whole premise, which I was intrigued by when the trailer came out (although, I'll full admit I had completely forgotten the movie existed until Fluffy mentioned it again), of a "deaf mute" assassin who doesn't remember what his own voice sounds like, so his internal monologue is the voice of his favourite video game, aka H. Jon Benjamin (Bob from Bob's Burgers). And the writing is perfectly pitched and very sharp. 

Yes, it's incredibly gory and bloody and brutal. But also, unlike a lot of other movies, the violence in the finale of the movie actually means something and has stakes to it. It's just a very smart script. The cast is incredibly solid and playing up just the right amount of ham. I can absolutely see this picking up a cult following over time, because it deserves it. If nothing else, it should tell you a lot that I watched it a second time before I took it back to the library. Just because.

The other thing was the very odd anime, That Time I Got Reincarnated as a Slime. The main character, Human Man From Earth (he has a name, I forget what it is), who... well, the title basically sums up what happens to him... he is a complete pervert. The last thing he tells someone before he "dies" in the first episode is to put his computer hard drive in the bath and make sure it can't be accessed. That tells you everything you need to know about the pornography he has accumulated. Also, he, and the show, are a little too obsessed with bewbs. In a "if you weren't a little round slime, women should be slapping your face continuously" way. I also kind of hoped the show might be self aware enough for him to, for example, lust over Lady Elves, and then have the whole idea flipped on it's head, and have all the elves be highly androgynous or something. But no. Bewbs.

Having said that though, and putting that to one side, it's actually a really interesting concept and executed incredibly well. While he's a little bit of a "oh, he can do everything and is super powerful, blah blah blah" aka Marty Stu type character, the idea that he can just absorb other creatures powers because he acquires a certain set of powers due to the things he said while he was dying is a fun concept. As is the show's premise that "monsters" (I'm sure the show uses Japanese names for most of them, but the English dub and subtitles default to some fairly common fantasy races) don't have names, but once a powerful creature gives them one, they essentially "level up". I only borrowed the first half of the first season... so I do want to at least finish out the season. I don't know if I'm in it for the long haul beyond that though.

I figured I would do what little decorating I do for Christmas... which is essentially the knock off Lego Christmas wreath, the three Christmas themed Winnie the Pooh critters (my three spirit animals, Piglet, Tigger and Eeyore) on a ribbon, the baubles on the support cage for the (slowly dying) parlor palm and the neon Christmas tree. Admittedly, I did also add a little tealight candle holder thing and the clear resin reindeer with the bells that I haven't gotten out in a hot minute.

The intent was to get Fluffy to plug the neon tree in when he got here yesterday, because it involves some Lying On Floor and Reaching For Things, both of which my back has previously not been a fan of. So I was just connecting the neon to the base and I heard a snap noise. Yes. After a very long time, the neon broke. Admittedly, the tree has had a good run.I didn't initially know when the hell I bought it, although I did remember that I got it from Arndale at The Reject Shop. But after a little bit of a deep dive into the blog, specifically the first couple of Decembers, just in case... and I found a post detailing previous Christmas decorations, which lead me back to an "ABC's of Me" post from 2005, including the immortal entry...

N is for Neon Christmas Tree... I got it the other day... it's tacky, stands 32cm high, is really really bright and only cost $10, but I like it

Turns out "the other day" was a post for when we went to see The Corpse Bride. It does actually astound me on occasion how many things I've actually detailed in the blog that eventually, if it happened after July 2005, I can generally find a reference. Which means it was a 19 year old neon tree. Also, for some reason I had $25 in my head... but yeah $10 makes a whole lot more sense.

So, pour one out for the very cheap and elderly neon homie. Who bathed various apartments in green and pink light and made many of my Christmases feel slightly more festive. And absolutely was worth the price. Ye shall be missed.

Friday Night DnD was cancelled for reasons, so instead Fluffy and I did a movie night.

And his choice was One Cut of the Dead, a Japanese movie from 2017. I'm not going to say a lot about it, but it's absolutely worth watching. I went in knowing nothing, was somewhat confused for about 10 minutes, spent the next 20 minutes waiting to see if my theory was correct and then enjoyed the rest of the movie. It's very "low budget indie movie", but it's worth a look. I think I enjoyed it more for what it was trying to do than the movie it actually was, if that makes sense.

In return, I showed him Soapdish from 1991, a movie that completely accidentally, has some superficial connections in theme to One Cut. Also, it's a movie that, in 1991 seemed perfectly fine, but in 2024 absolutely shits the bed in the last... three minutes. And it could absolutely be fixed with two to three very small changes. But it's a movie that is amazing for 95 minutes and stumbles as it takes it's bows.

Anyway...

Today was... a lot of doing things we probably could have done in the last several weeks, but didn't because of reasons.

We started with Supermarketry. This week I'm defaulting to Tuna Noodle Doo. I'm trying to not just make the same thing every single week like I did last Summer, even if I can swap between like three different options, it's enough.

Then we did the Big W/Kmart loop. Ma wanted to poke around Big W, I needed some things at Kmart. It's been a minute, but also, I had slightly forgotten that I need to not be anywhere near the shops for pretty much the whole of December. Because people is nuts in the lead up to Christmas. Obviously.

Kmart was the better result overall. What I did find was an accidental Christmas tree replacement. Not neon, obvs, because lightning does not, in fact, strike twice. But I found a three part candle (well, two parts are a candle, the top is... the top) that make up a tree. Is it perfect? No, the colour is slightly too sagey, and for no reason I can think of, the top is two shades lighter than the rest of it. That would be fine if they were going for an ombre, but I'm pretty sure the bottom two are exactly the same colour.

It's pretty enough though. And also candles.

I also got a gummy bear "drink jar", which is very cute, and some beads with which to perform crochet experiments.

Not a bad run, honestly.

post christmas round-up 2023

Rain on Christmas? Clouds and cold weather?

Yeah... "Adelaide recorded its coldest Christmas Day since 2006 (17.9 degrees recorded at the Kent Town observation site)". Although I do love how difficult it is to find any reliable reporting on the temperature at Christmas, other than the Bureau of Meteorology, because media outlets are always screaming about it being the hottest, coldest, wettest, cloudiest, humidest, blah di blah di blah Christmas since [insert random year].

But otherwise, it was actually a pretty good day overall. I both didn't take a lot of photos, and the photos I did take weren't what we would consider my best work, so I did find this great retro pin-up Caducado piece that can serve in place of the usual Christmas tree photo (also, we've kind of stopped doing full on Christmas tree-ness, but Ma does have little tiny trees that she can take down without assistance come January.

I didn't do anything particular festive last night... I made pizza, which fulfilled my Christmas Eve Pizza requirements, packed up some stuff that I was taking to Ma's place but that was about it.

This morning I did my morning walk. And it was odd, because I only started doing this again in January (and mentioned it briefly at the start of February), so it was interesting doing the Christmas Morning Walk, which I haven't done since the old days of North Adelaide. There are always a couple of folks out and about, although I did see more folks out walking their dogs (we get a lot of that in Norwood) when I was driving to Ma's.

Anyway, I got back, got ready and, as I said, headed down the road and got to Ma's shortly after 9.

Note to self: If we buy croissants a day early, check if they're in those bags that are designed to not make bread products go soft. Because that's great for certain things, but not for croissants. But the insides were mostly good.

So, yeah, our usual croissant breakfast. After I pre-breakfasted on some of the ham hearts Ma was literally pulling out of the oven when I got there.

The weird thing is, because we do basically the same thing every year, and, honestly, not much of anything really happens, I always end up not really remembering the order in which we did anything.

I think we did presents next.

So, we have...

• Yarn in 7 colours (you know, basically a jewel-tone rainbow) plus black for my 2024 Hexagon Granny Square Cardigan project (there's also more black yarn not shown)
  
• Dice Advent Calendar (from Mr and Mrs)
• Haighs Milk Chocolate Baubles (from Mr and Mrs)
• The 99% Invisible City book (from Fluffy)
• Pink and Orange Skull Dice (from Fluffy)
• Saga, Volume 11
• Lego + Disney 100 Wicked Queen and Robin Hood minifigs
  
• Bundaberg Christmas Spiced Ginger Beer
• Chocolate Crackle Candle
• Black Body Pillowcase
• Mossimo Mens Canvas Slip-On Shoes (not shown... I forgot to put them in shot)

See what I mean... I forgot to put shoes in the shot... and I only realised afterwards that I had put the Dice Advent Calendar down upside down.

I was also pleased with my Lego + Disney minifigs... especially given that they were the last two in the box when we bought them. Would it have been perfect if I'd gotten Cruella, Stitch or Baymax? Yes, but at least I got my Wicked Queen.

I'd also brought my laptop up to Ma's, so at a certain point I hooked it up to Ma's TV (which she can't do with her laptop because it's a little old and crusty) and just stuck some Christmas Lofi on while we did other things.

There was a hiccup when we went out to light the Webber. Well, more so when we went out to check on it after lighting it. Because of the wind, it wasn't catching the way it needed to and the coals weren't heating up like they needed to.

So, we basically gave up on that, came inside and cranked up the oven. Thankfully it was, as previously discussed, the coldest Christmas Day in 17 years, so that wasn't really an issue.

It was also slightly odd... because we only do this whole thing once a year, it's kind of easier to track the changes to our routine... and this year, I ended up doing a lot of the cooking and organising and prepping and whatnot. Which let Ma relax. In previous years we've mostly been sharing it all, but I just got on with it.

And for the most part, shoving it all in the oven worked out. It was a little more crowded, and I probably didn't need to microwave the potatoes first since they were in the oven the whole time (they were fine, just a little too crispy).

While things were cooking, I put on the Scrooge musical that I'd watched last year, because it's colour and movement and takes up time and is still pretty good. It also meant that I could walk away from it to do Christmas Lunch prep and not actually be missing anything.

I did swap back to Christmas Lofi Beats when we were eating dinner though.

And, like I said, other than slightly overly crispy potatoes, it was pretty well done. I mean, it isn't going to the top of the list of our Christmas Salads, but it was tasty.

It also really doesn't matter how early we try to get organised or how early we intend to have Christmas Lunch... it always ends up being about 2:30.

Then we finished lunch, we finished Scrooge and then tidied up from lunch. And I threw together some Eton Mess, as we usually do.

We continued in the Christmas Carol vein with A Christmas Carol Goes Wrong (also on YouTube), which is always fun.

Then we packed up my stuff and the leftover food I was taking home and I toddled off home... and it rained most of the way home. And by rain, it wasn't exactly bucketing down.

So... that's it for Christmas 2023.

character saturday: adventing 2023, part three

It's odd how these colour stories come together. Week Three of the Hero Forge Advent Calendar took on a very brown and purple vibe. And we can mostly blame the Nautilus Spear for that one. Because, of course I was going to do purple tentacles. That was one of the items that was definitely better in the silhouette and/or my imagination... it's a little... clunky.

I will say that I quite like the axe, the corset top will probably see some use, but the folding fan! I've already redone my pain themed cleric, Whipmaster Demyan. Because as much as I liked the shield and whip combo, and he did in fact carry a whip in game, he also very much carried a fan. Because in one of the early games I played him in, the aircon at the gaming store was... questionable at best, so I brought a fan in with me for my own comfort, which then became my go-to Demyan prop.

But he'll probably be showing up as a Character Colouring Book in January.

Anyway...

This has felt like a very long week. Mostly because at the end of it (last night) was Friday Night D&D Board Game Christmas. And the final reveal of The Secret Project.

But I started off with a much better quiche for this week. My biggest hurdle right now is trying to cut the thing into 5 roughly even pieces.

On Tuesday I wrapped presents. And was very thankful that I'd completely incidentally watched a couple of videos about wrapping presents in the last week or so. Which meant, when I cut the wrapping paper too small for the giant box I had to wrap, I didn't freak out, I just turned the paper about 45 degrees and did probably a 7 out of 10 on the wrapping, because the sides were not even and the paper was a little loose in spots, but I got there. It looked reasonable. And when you mostly have a random pattern on the paper with no stripes or directional details, it definitely helps.

Wednesday I made Rocky Road. Only the one. But then, of course, it turned out that the container I used was almost the size of the two disposable foil trays I've used in the past. Or it took up about the same amount of space in the fridge.

Thursday was a new Christmas recipe... Christmas Crack from my favourite internet baker, B Dylan Hollis (other cracks are available). And, honestly, my most successful attempt at something from his cookbook (The #1 New York Times Bestselling Cookbook Baking Yesteryear) to date. It was wildly successful. And super easy.

Friday started out with trips to two different libraries, because I noticed one of the new books that I had on hold was just casually sitting on a shelf at the library near my old house. So I jumped in the car, headed down the road, snatched it up and came back to hit up my library for the second time this week (I'd run out of books on Thursday and things were waiting for me, but then something else came in on Friday, and given they'll be closed for part of next week, I headed off to get it.

I'll fully admit that I've spent all week in a state of... anticipation, I guess. Because, as I said, yesterday was FNDnDBGC, but I only really realised what I was feeling and why on Friday morning. Because giving people presents is part of my love language (along with Physical Touch... honestly, looking at the five love language options, are there any  of those that aren't at least partially me... hmmm... maybe not Acts of Service) and it's been a hot minute since I've been able to actually have present people with... well, presents. And I was kind of riding that high especially on Thursday and Friday.

Also, any day I can emotionally torture Fluffy is a good day. Because I'm evil.

I also hid the giant box in the boot of the car so that he only saw it when we got to Mr and Mrs' place. 

[evil grin]

And of course, I made sure I went last. Because DUR. I will mention it again later, but I'm very excited by the copy of The 99% Invisible City Fluffy got for me after I introduced him to the podcast this year. Or, rather, he finally paid attention to me after recommending it to him about five other times. It will definitely be one of my first reads of 2024.

But I finally got to reveal what was behind all those [clandestine reference to ongoing secret project] mentions. I learned to crochet and made Fluffy a big granny square blanket. There will be a whole post on it, probably in the week between Christmas and New Year, but soon anyway. And not to toot my own horn, but I did good. And I know that by the number of times he said "how dare you" to me when we left and were headed back to the car.

[does Snoopy Happy Dance for an extended period of time]

I also made a dice bag for Mrs, an Emotional Support Mind Flayer (basically an octopus, but he's planning on running a DnD adventure for us that has a lot of mind flayers in it, so it seemed appropriate), plus small things for the twins and also cat toys for the cats. Basically, many crocheted things.

[contented sigh]

And then what better to get us all in the mood for Christmas than a nice game of Mansions of Madness that was very "big snek energy" coded. Or, to use the appropriate Lovecraft reference, very "Yig". Which we absolutely should have won, but lost one turn before victory, even though we had all four idols, had prevented a bunch of folks from turning into big snek monsters. But sadly, we did not and now all our investigators are also snek monsters.

Pour one out for "Ashcan" Pete the Drifter, Ursula Downs the Explorer, Rita Young the Athlete and Diana Stanley the Redeemed Cultist.

Doubly so because we finished up at 1am. It was a good night though.

Anyway...

Fuck the supermarket on the Saturday before Christmas. Because we do this on Saturday every week... you're just taking up space and getting in everyone's way. And, for the record, deciding to go first thing when the supermarket opens is... the exact same idea that everybody else has had, so maybe stay home, go later.

Actually, it wasn't that bad. I mean, the deli counter and the fruit and veg section was a shitshow and there were people taking up space everywhere, but I think we managed to time it a little between People Who Showed Up When The Store Opened and People Who Showed Up Later To Avoid Those People.

We didn't do anything else, because, no, absolutely not. Y'all lose your tiny minds the weekend before Christmas, doubly so when Christmas is directly after that weekend. So, no shops for us.

That it.

post christmas round-up 2022

So Kris actually belongs to the Jingle Bros (Part 1 and Part 2) from last year. But I ran out of time to add him to the roster, so, you know what, he can be part of today. And he's just as I made him last year, I didn't bother remaking him.

And of course he's a halfling.

Merry Christmas to the, like, handful of people who still bother reading my blog. Essentially it's just a diary I shout into the void these days. But I'm still grateful for anybody who has stuck around.

So, indulge me for a little bit if you will. I'm feeling a little... garrulous.

The observant amongst you would have noticed that there was no traditional putting up of the Christmas Tree this year. No scantily clad Christmas hunk posted earlier on Christmas Day.

Yeah, I wasn't, and am still not, feeling it.

What I am feeling is more pain than I would like. And the sentence that has been whirling around in my head all day, and was originally going to be the opening line for this post is thus.

Surprising nobody, pain changes your brain chemistry. Regular pain more so. And for at least the last month, my brain has been dealing with intermittent pain from my back. Or, weirdly, pain that SHOULD be in my back, but is often on the sides of my calves, because nervous systems are fucked up little monkeys.

So, the last thing I wanted, or was physically able, to do at the start of the month, was drive down to Ma's place and put the Christmas Tree up. And so, left to her own devices, and under strict instructions that if she attempted to construct and dress the whole Christmas Tree I would be Very Angry With Her, the image above was the result.

It's not great, it also doesn't suck. It's the top third of the regular tree, inserted into the base of the regular tree. And had I been involved I might have attempted something with the Christmas Lights, it's not terrible.

But, going back to... well, my back. I can't sit for long. Not in most places. When I do, the aforementioned pain starts to creep in around the edges. And then all I want to do is go lie down. But after I've been lying down on and off for almost a month, that also fucks with my brain.

So, clearly, given this little story, I'm in a weird place this Christmas. Last Christmas was pre-moving stress. This is... less intense. But, honestly, I didn't much care about Christmas this year. And, yeah, I know, if you go back through the last few years, I've been saying some version of that for the last several years. But it's still true.

I still went through all the motions. But it was mostly for other people. And while I had fun along the way, I wasn't feeling it. Which brings us to today. Let's just say that left to my own devices, I probably wouldn't have bothered much.

I woke up about as early as I have been of late, which is a little too early for my tastes. And I'd already told Ma there wasn't much of a point in me being down at hers super early. So I wasn't in any kind of rush. I faffed around, watched some YouTube stuff, and finally got my ass into gear, before having a shower, loading up the car with what little there was to load it with, closed up the house with the aircon on so I'd come home to a nice cool house and toddling up the road to Ma's place at about 8:45 or so.

We had our usual breakfast of croissants, and I'll be honest, as much as Ma always asks what I want on/with them, generally speaking I just want a little butter and that good, good warm pastry.

We fucked around a bit after, I complained, as I do every year, that none of the TV stations just digs into their stock of shitty (or not shitty) Christmas movies and just runs them end to end all day. There are enough channels these days, they could totally do that. I don't want to WATCH them, you understand, but I like some, as we call it, colour and movement going on in the background, since it's just Ma and I.

I never keep track of time on Christmas Day at the best of times, and it somehow tends to just flow through my brain like water anyway, so who the fuck knows when anything happened... 

But between mostly ignoring and quite often going "Hey, it's that person who was in that other thing", we put the original 1947 Miracle on 34th Street (it does kinda fall over a bit when you realise that Santa is also Captain Wiles from my favourite Hitchcock movie, The Trouble With Harry) and at some point in the process it was time for presents, such as it was.

And I say that only because a lot of my presents are what happens when you say "oh, that thing I need, or that thing we just bought, that can go away for Christmas". For... like the last four months. So it's all some combination of kinda from Ma, kinda from me to me.

But it also includes the presents from Mr, Mrs and Fluffy from Board Game Christmas.

So, starting there...

• LEGO Horizon Forbidden West: Tallneck
  (from Fluffy... nearly made me cry because reasons)
• IKEA BLÅHAJ Baby Shark
  (again, Fluffy... because we got slightly obsessed with some stupid IKEA Japan videos and the sharks in general)
• Here to Sleigh expansion deck (from Mr and Mrs... they bought me the original game a couple of years back)
• Q Workshop 2022 Advent Dice Calendar (from Mr and Mrs at the end of November)
• IKEA PIPSTÄKRA quilt cover (which also has an associated fitted sheet and a couple of pillowcases for other pillows, but I didn't bother including them)
• IKEA VINTERFINT Apple scented candle in metal tin
  
• Bonds Essentials Move Pullover Hoodie (plus a couple of Bonds tees, also not included)
• Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes sourcebook
• Before the Coffee Gets Cold by  Toshikazu Kawaguchi
• Seven Kinds of People You Find in Bookshops by Shaun Bythell
• LEGO Minifigure Series 23 Cardboard Robot (the one problem with blind box things is sometimes you get the one you're wildly ambivalent about instead of one of the 11 you really, really like)
• Chessex Polyhedral Dice Sets in Translucent Orange, Translucent Yellow and Light Blue

Oh, and some Bundaberg Spiced Ginger Beer, which is not so much a present, as something I was definitely taking home.

I took some photos, moved some stuff around, and then we started on lunch prep. Which went about the same as always, albeit slightly smoother than some years.

We put the potatoes in with the turkey and the sausage meat, so they got all good and crispy. But mostly it was switching between half watching The Holiday and doing prep.

And I'm just now remembering that I forgot to steal both the last of the mango salad dressing AND the mince pie ice cream from Ma's place. Oh well.

I have no idea when we sat down to eat. Sometime after 2pm maybe. No clue.

It was pretty good though. And some combination of the pepper I put on the tomatoes, the chili in the salad dressing and the ginger in the ginger beer definitely made it nice and tasty.

The intent was probably to play some Here to Slay, but, I'll be honest, I wasn't in the mood.

We tidied up, we watched a good chunk of Robin Hood: Men in Tights, which it seems like Ma hasn't seen before, and she groaned through all of the groan-worthy parts.

And then I threw together some Eton Mess with mince pie ice cream, lemon meringues and fresh berries. It's a good Christmas dessert. Even if, traditionally, we have it about three hours after dinner.

Then, honestly, by that point, I'd kind of had enough. Mostly of sitting and standing.

So I packed up the car with more stuff than I arrived with and headed back up the road. And other than the heat, it wasn't a bad run. I think it was around 6pm when I got home, and after unpacking all the stuff, threw myself into a quick shower and then had a lie down until I felt able to tackle this post.

Which is done now.

So, for another year, Merry Christmas, and thanks for listening to me unpack my internal monologue as part of the post-Christmas round up. It's becoming a tradition at this point.

Current mood:

character saturday: adventing part four

Of course, this week had to feature three pieces of headgear... leading to a little picture in picture action.

Much more of a blah week for this week's Hero Forge Advent Calendar, but some nicely rendered pieces again.

• Current item count: 29 (including two versions of the helmet, some handheld snowballs and two sizes of the arcane lantern)
• Current item's I'd actually use count: 14 (although it's a big maybe on the helmet, circlet, lantern and axe honestly)

Favourite item? Visually, the axe. Although I don't make a lot of heavy weapon wielding characters.

So, we have one more week to go, because this Advent Calendar runs for the whole month and doesn't end on Christmas Eve. Tomorrow does tend to be the big one though. All I'm really hoping for is less hats.

Anyway...

Sunday was Rocky Road Day. As in, the day I made this year's batch of Rocky Road. Which I ended up making in two batches, because I don't have bowls big enough. All while watching the 1970's version of A Christmas Carol, Scrooge. Which is free on YouTube and nobody seems to have noticed or cared that it's there.

Originally it was just for "colour and movement" while I was doing other things, but, I'll be honest, it's actually really, really good. It's also a musical and none of the child actors can really hold a tune. But it does some interesting things with something that is so overdone and I've seen so many versions of at this point.

As I've said to a number of people, it's the best version of the story that doesn't include Muppets.

Monday was Board Game Christmas Day.

And it was a good day. We played a bunch of games. A little L.L.A.M.A, followed by some Uk'atoa, then the adorable Calico (which was the only game I actually won, by a single point) and then finishing up with Shadows over Camelot, which was a co-operative game that we lost as a group. Well, except for Mrs, because it turned out she was the traitor, and because we all lost, she won.

We also did presents (which I well detail tomorrow), but suffice to say, Fluffy got me a little emotional, for reasons I can't quite explain, with his choice of gift.

I just threw home made tomato and onion relish (the food item I mentioned last week) and big boxes of Rocky Road at everyone.

After Board Game Christmas, Fluffy and I came back here and watched Hackers (which he'd never seen, which is a crime), and the aforementioned Guillermo del Toro's Pinocchio. And between the movies, I made a quick pizza with stuff I had in the fridge.

So, quite a long day, in fact, from when he arrived to when I dropped him home, Fluffy and I hung out for over 12 hours. A good day though.

The rest of the week was pretty much nothing much, but a lot of me laying down to help my back out. Because it's getting there, but it's not there yet.

Fast forward to Friday for Chiro Day. As in the actual day I was intended to go to the chiro, not one of the several other times I've been this month.

And then it was Friday Night DnD.

I finally understand why many people said that the final area of this adventure was problematic. And doesn't make a ton of sense. Because while I'd prepped it, it seemed okay. But then the map showed me something that the text seemed to contradict and then suddenly I was in the realm of WTF. So I'm going to tweak some of the bit and pieces and see where we end up.

Because the "as written" instructions are actually kinda dumb.

But we'll get there.

And I don't really care because the stuff that I layered in which was more interesting is still paying dividends in ways I didn't forsee. And I still have some tricks up my sleeve even now.

But there are some spots in this final area I'm excited for them to get to, even if they're not super involved.

Anyway.

Why is it that when Christmas Eve DOESN'T fall on a day we would normally go shopping, the supermarket is insane and crammed full of people. And on the year that it DOES, the supermarket was... still busy, but not insanely so.

We did get there a little earlier than usual, and yes, the fruit and veg section was a little nuts, as it usually is. But I got served instantly at the deli counter (because they had a ton of staff on) and in a minor Christmas miracle, I just randomly picked a checkout because the person being served was about to leave, and it turned out to be the lovely girl we tend to gravitate towards on a normal week, because she's efficient, knows how to pack a bag and seems nice.

But it was actually fairly easy overall.

Ma didn't stick around for long afterwards, which is fine because I'm seeing her most of the day tomorrow, and it gives her more time to prep at her end.

So that's that about that.

Current mood:

post christmas round-up 2021

It's Saturday, but it's also Christmas Day... which basically just leads to my brain imploding in on itself at a certain point.

So we're going to do a modified weekly round-up, such as it is, then do the Christmas thing, such as that is.

First and foremost, I need a Bundaberg Spiced Ginger Beer... because that shit is tasty, tasty Christmas in a bottle, and I love it. I don't think I've mentioned it before, but it's fucking great, and I'm 100% here for it.

Secondly... I told you we had one DnD Character Colouring Book Reindeer to go.

Cousin Rudolph. Because, he's definitely not a Jingle Brother. And of course he's a Warlock. And a little bit extra. With Santa as his patron. I do really love how his outfit turned out to be honest. And I also love that the little doll in Hero Forge can be coloured to look like Spiderman... because that's silly and fun. And it's also the thing he "inherited" from Santa. And his Talisman Pact Boon. Or else the doll is the talisman and the staff is the thing he inherited. One of those.

So there's that.

This week was all topsy turvy... 

We had Friday's DnD on Thursday. And it was basically almost entirely a roleplay episode. Because we came back to the place where all the NPCs are right now, so we tend to talk to all of them. And my character got Wine Mom Drunk and spoke Truth to one of the other characters about them being awesome. I mean, she is due... she's had a hell of a couple of weeks.

Thursday was also Supermarket Day. Which I did on my own. At 7:30am.

Only to discover that every other muthafucker had also decided that 7:30am on the day before Christmas and the same amount of people we usually see during the course of one entire supermarket trip were all crammed into the fruit and veg department.

Grrrr.

But I was out of there and back home by 8:30 give or take.

I also wrapped up my Dice Advent Calendar from Mr and Mrs... which ended up in a very eclectic set of dice, plus one red and white Santa themed set, which I quite like. But the weird thing being that, other than that set, I did not get a single d8 dice. Everything else. No d8's. Weird.

I had assumed that while the dice were "random", there would be the Santa set, two full sets of random dice (as in a d20, d12, d00, d10, d8, d6 and d4), then the extra d4 from the Santa set, the special metal dice and... you know... another d20, probably. But not, the dice were super random. I got a lot of d6's... Fluffy got a lot of d20's in his calendar... and it was just... odd.

Anyway...

Welcome to Christmas Day.

I woke up... fairly early... but no earlier than I've been waking up of late.

And because we don't have places to go and people to see these days (and honestly, even if we had, I would 100% have cancelled it, because, The World Right Now), I didn't feel compelled to head down the road super early.

So I messaged Ma, wished her a Merry Crimmas, futzed around on my phone for a bit, got up, had a shower, did my physio exercises (because while my shoulder is 95% there again, I'm still doing the exercises for the foreseeable, just until the little bit of weakness that I can still feel is gone), which watching things on YouTube... 

And then, honestly, it felt very weird that I didn't get to open a window in the Dice Advent Calendar, since that has been a thing every day for the last 24 days.

But I finally packed up the car and headed down the road at about 8:45am. The roads weren't perhaps as empty as they have been when I've done the super early drive, but it was find.

And of course, when I got there, Ma was pulling a bunch of Ham Hearts out of the oven, so yummy ham, cheese and puff pastry morsels for the pre-breakfast snack. Because, fuck it... it's Christmas, and I can have breakfast before my breakfast.

Anyway, we did the croissant thing. Because as much as I loved having to get up two and a half hours before I intended to leave in order to make fresh bread, bake the bread and then take it down the road to Ma's place... honestly, I just fucking wanted croissants. Because I have bread on the regular, I never have croissants.

I could just say here that everything happened in much the same way as previous Christmas Days... but it kinda didn't. I mean, mostly it did, but it also kinda didn't.

And I'm not super getting into it, but for any number of reasons, we barely did presents this year. There were a couple of bits and pieces, but Ma gave me some money, because, honestly, either I need major items that I wouldn't expect to get as Christmas presents, like a *whispers* newlaptop *whispers* (we don't say it too loud so the laptop doesn't hear) or a new TV or a new iPhone... or I don't really need much of anything right now.

Anyway.

We kind of pfaffed around... a lot. I messaged a bunch of people with Christmas greetings. After that we prepped for lunch. After the semi panic of, I think, last year... or the year before... I can't be bothered looking it up, I prepped all of the individual things that went into the salad beforehand, so it was just kinda plug and play.

And then we did... "presents". Most of these were things I got from DnD Christmas with Fluffy, Mr and Mrs... but we do the full list here, because... tradition, I guess.

• The Wild Beyond The Witchlight Campaign Book (from Mr, Mrs and Fluffy)
• Thousand Year Old Vampire (from Fluffy)
• Wyrmwood Dice Box (from Mr and Mrs)
• Q Workshop Dice Advent Calendar (from Mr and Mrs)
• Handmade Embroidered Bear with a Whip ornament (from Fluffy, crafted by Fluffy's Mum, themed around my Asshole Cleric)
• Wooden Incense Box
• Avengers: Endgame DVD
• Shang Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings DVD
• Light Up Crystal Ball (sadly, not as pretty as I'd hoped, but we got it real cheap when they were selling out Halloween shit... and I can make some use of it)

So, there's that.

After all of that prep... including just throwing together a salad dressing with mustard, cranberry sauce, oil and vinegar at the last second (because the one that Ma had was a little too... much)... and I burned the haloumi because fuck Ma's electric stove top.

But thanks to a Jamie Oliver Christmas cooking special was on in the background at some point, I squished the roast potatoes part way through, and they came out really nicely. Sadly, throwing dressing on them makes them much less crispy instantly, but overall, it all worked out.

Then we cleaned up and played a few games of L.L.A.M.A... and then a game of Here To Slay, which we played last year. While mostly ignoring White Christmas which was on in the background.

We made the usual Eton Mess thingy with gin and lemon meringue, mince pie icecream and fresh berries. It's always nice, it's always super sweet and super rich, and I couldn't deal with it more than once a year.

And when White Christmas finished, I packed up and came home.

In a word. Blah.

Current mood:

character saturday: jingle bros part two

The second half of the Jingle Brothers for this week's DnD Character Colouring Book - Xmas Edition.

• Comet - The Light Domain Cleric
  The kindly young healer that lights up the lives of everyone he meets
• Cupid - The Fey Wanderer Ranger
  The quiet and calm bowmaster who got lost in the Feywild as a child
• Donner - The Clockwork Soul Sorcerer
  The debonair arcane spellcaster harnessing the magical power of toys
• Blitzen - The Way of Mercy Monk
  The stern eldest brother with a heart of gold who is beloved by the toymaking elves

Of these four, I think Comet is my favourite. I just love how his colour scheme came out, but I have a bit of a soft spot for Cupid also (even if, in this arrangement of images it kind of looks as though he's about to take a potshot at his brother). Blitzen had to be the stern and serious one because his costume is kind of the silliest... along with the candy cane bo staff.

Those of you playing Reindeer Bingo at home, might be saying to yourselves... "hey, you missed one"... never fear, after all, Christmas Day is on a Saturday.

Moving on...

So... Tuna Noodle Do for food this week. Without eggs, because I ate entirely all of the eggs last week.

Then, on Monday afternoon I went hardcore on Rocky Road, by which I mean I made a big old chocolately mess, filled two foil trays with it and then later on cut it into appropriately sized pieces and filled the bottom shelf of my fridge with it.

I also finished off Fluffy's present, which was a collection of recipes, mostly from the blog, but also from life in general, and a simplified version of a couple of the DnD recipes (because he's got the book, but some of those recipes definitely over explain things... plus you don't want to get the pretty, pretty book out every time, it could get dirty). But it looked quite smart in the display book I got.

Then we get to Wednesday, which was Board Game Christmas with Fluffy, Mr and Mrs. Well, mostly Fluffy and Mrs... Mr had other things he needed to be doing, but he did show up a few times.

I made cheese, chive and black pepper bread, and took Rocky Road for Mr and Mrs. We did the present thing first... and I'll mention those with my other presents next week. Then, we were on for games. We played quite a bit of L.L.A.M.A. followed by several rounds of Coup, a spirited game of Disney Villainous: Perfectly Wretched where I played Cruella, obvs... and Fluffy won, because, for some reason, Fluffy always fucking wins Villainous. Followed up by a seemingly quite short game of Mysterium, and then rounded out with a few more games of L.L.A.M.A. And we fitted lunch in there somewhere. Possibly between Coup and Villainous I think.

It was a fun day. We got there just after 10am and didn't leave until... just after 4 I think.

Then Fluffy and I came back here and watched Christmas movies. The original idea was Bad Netflix Xmas movie, but, honestly, I wanted "camp bad" not "people who can't act bad"... so in the end we went with Santa Claus Conquers the Martians (which is freely available on the YooToobs), which is unabashedly, certifiably TERRIBLE, but fun to make fun of. We really knew what we were into when the credits at the start of the movie listed the "Custume Designer".

But, fun fact, that movie is the first documented appearance of Mrs Claus in a motion picture. And the second is in Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, the Rankin Bass stop motion animation classic, which came out three weeks later.

Then we went down the road and grabbed a pizza, came back here and watched The Muppets Christmas Carol, because after all that bad movie, we needed something good to balance it out.

It was a long day, and I want exhausted by the end of it. Which is weird, because it doesn't sound like all that much. But, you know, stuff.

Friday was DnD as usual.

Except, you know, I somehow cast a DnD spell in real life. The short version is that there were some bad guys coming up towards the cave we were in, so my druid cast Call Lightning, a spell that, unsurprisingly, creates a 60 foot radius storm cloud that you can call down lightning from.

And not 10 second after I'd said that I was going to cast that spell, we saw a flash of real lightning outside. It's not even like the day had been stormy or rainy... it had been filthy hot, if overcast, all day, and a lightning storm was the last thing any of us expected.

So, yeah... that was weird.

Otherwise, it was a decent game. We mostly did diplomatic negotiations... well, after we murderised the bad guys at the start. And I talked to plants again. Which, honestly, was more confusing than the diplomacy.

Moving on.

Today was... brief and to the point.

With everything going on right now, the last thing I want to do is to be making unnecessary trips to places... so we did the supermarket, came back here, didn't really do much here, and then Ma shuffled off home.

It does mean that I'm going to need to sneak in a shopping trip sometime towards the end of the week. Most likely first thing on Thursday morning honestly, since the supermarket opens at like 7:30am. And I don't need a ton of stuff, due to, you know, Christmas leftovers, mostly just some salad stuff and some milk products. But, you know, grocery shopping two days before Christmas... everyone pray for me.

But that's that really.

Current mood:

post christmas round-up 2020

I just looked at my Christmas post for last year... and the bit that stuck out to me was this...

"Fuck Christmas this year. More than at any other point in recent history, Christmas was literally just a Wednesday with turkey. Granted not the worst ever Wednesday, but yeah, fuck Christmas 2019."

Aha-ha-ha-ha-HA-HA-HA-HA-HAH-HAH-HAH...

Oh you sweet Summer child... you knew nothing.

Honestly though, having said that, this year felt... both more like Christmas and less like Christmas. Less because all those things that makes Christmas special or interesting or feel like Christmas, for me at least... the picking of presents, and then the giving of same... making Christmas goodies... all of that isn't happening right now.

I realised yesterday when I was getting ready that that is the thing I miss most over the last... four years... without the income to splurge on Christmas gifts for the people I care about (and, you know, honestly, myself as well), Christmas doesn't feel like Christmas. And yes, it's not about the gifts, commercialism, blah blah blah.

But the way I show people I care about them, at least in a holiday (or birthday) context is to pick up on things they've said during the year and get them either a thing they absolutely want or a thing that they didn't even know existed but would still absolutely want if they had known.

It's not a "buy your love" situation, it's more how I say "I hear you, I see you, I understand who you are as a person". Even if it's some dumb tiny thing... like the year I did a Secret Santa at... I dunno, somewhere I worked... and I'd been having a conversation with the girl who was my Santee (you know, I'm the Santa, she's the Santee... is that not a thing... fuck it, I'm making it a thing) about particular calendars (probably beefy men ones or some TV show, I dunno), so I went and got one of those for her. Because of course.

Anyway, enough of the nostalgia wander through my psyche.

I think maybe it felt more like Christmas because it wasn't just the one day, it wasn't just yesterday. This year there was also Boardgame Christmas on Tuesday with my Friday DnD group, where we got together in the actual day time and played boardgames all day, did presents (all of mine were food what I had made, because of course) and hung out and had a lovely time. So, you know, being around other people who give a shit about Christmas (as much as anyone does right now), instead of just being on my ownsome and then, boom, Christmas, may well have made a difference.

For the record, we also were supposed to do Friday DnD on Wednesday... instead of my regular Wednesday DnD (which had we attempted that would have invariably been called off)... but we didn't really do DnD... we mostly talked through our plans for what comes next since and our assumptions and expectations. So not a total waste of time. And probably useful for the DM. Certainly better than trying to push through when people weren't feeling it.

So our next, action packed, oh no, oh no, why are you doing this, fun filled game won't be until New Years Day.

Otherwise my week up until yesterday wasn't much of anything really.

I made bread again this year. I set it going on Christmas Eve (and for, I think, the second year in a row, I watched not a single Christmas movie in the lead up to Christmas, not even my usual Christmas Eve staple, Arthur Christmas, not that I dislike it or have watched it too much, I'm just not feeling it right now) and then got up just after 5am to prep it for the oven and leave it to proof for another two hours, all during which I caught up on Christmasy YouTube videos, and I'll admit, went back to bed, not so much for a nap as to futz with my phone... and maybe a little nap.

But I threw the bread in the oven, myself in the shower, packed up the car and headed down to Ma's around 8am, listening to the My Dad Wrote A Porno Christmas Special, as has been my Christmas morning tradition for the last several years. I honestly didn't track when I got there, but I hadn't quite finished the first MDWAP episode, so, inside of 40 minutes I'd say.

As usual Ma was finishing up ham hearts and mince tarts... so while I did have a loaf of fresh, warm bread with me, I also absolutely ate several fresh out of the oven ham hearts. Because I'm only human.

But eventually we sat down at the table and breakfasted on fresh bread. Honestly, I think maybe I feel the same way this year that I did last year. Not that "special". Compared with when we used to do croissants, which felt more special, mostly because it wasn't something we did on the regular. Again, Ma's mileage may vary, because I make fresh bread weekly at this point, and she only ever gets a piece the day after and not the fresh out of the oven stuff.

I fully expect that I will 100% forget I had this opinion again by this time next year, because I had the same opinion last year and didn't fucking remember. Somebody remind me mid December, yeah?

Once again, there was a dearth of Christmas movies on during the day. I mean, seriously, it's not that hard network programmers, look at the list of available Christmas movies from overseas companies. Is there a man and a woman on the cover? Are they wearing red and green in some orientation? Does the title have the word Christmas in it? Does it star a woman who was famous or slightly famous on TV in the 1990's? Is it by MarVista Entertainment? If the answer to at least 3 of these questions is yes (you get a bonus point if it's by MarVista), then get them to send them over by linear measurement ("give me three feet of Christmas movies please!")... because, seriously, I have no doubt that they'll totally do it. And given the quality and the sheer number, they cannot be that expensive.

Anyway, I digress, and I'm fairly certain that there are no Australia TV network programmers reading my blog, more's the pity.

But there was interesting enough stuff on SBS World Movies (Fifth Element, a German version of Heidi, something wacky about teenage witches from Denmark)... the latter two we left on with no sound, but subtitles, and I sassed them as appropriate.

We did presents first... after I showed Ma the stuff I got on Boardgame Christmas, and she showed me other stuff she'd gotten.

I got some good stuff overall, I think you could call this "a little bit of what you like"... I got a little something of any number of my interests with the exception of maybe a novel of some sort:

• Tasha's Cauldron of Everything book
• Out of the Abyss book (from Fluffy, to run for the Friday group, probably not until 2022 tho)
• Spider-Man: Homecoming and Spider-Man: Far From Home DVD double pack.
• Typo 2021 Fuck Yeah calendar
• Here To Slay board game (from Mr and Mrs, the other half of the Friday DnD game)
• Critical Role Don't Forget To Love Each Other mug (also from Mr and Mrs)
• Chessex Borealis Royal Purple and Gold dice with glow in the dark glitter (Mr and Mrs again)
• Kiki.K notebooks and fox head pen (Mrs really couldn't help herself)
• L.L.A.M.A. card game (for "winning" Boardgame Christmas, because, sure)
• New canvas shoes, basically the same as the last four pairs I've bought
• Smash A5 holographic cover notebook
• Scentsia Tealight Holder with Spinning Silver Snowflakes
• Primrose Hill Set Grilled Peaches and Honey candle
• Aeroplane Jellies (Lime, Raspberry and Purple Grape... I have no idea why, except Ma)
• Hersheys Chocolate Syrup
• Coles Gingerbread Man/Iced Biscuit

And given this year there were things I knew about, things I had known about and had forgotten, things I didn't think were going to be for me (for example, the tealight holder... I knew Ma bought one, I had assumed for someone else... also the notebook was supposed to be for someone else, but I'd said she could slide it my way if she changed her mind), and things I didn't know I wanted until I had them (which pretty much covers Fluffy and Mr/Mrs presents).

Ma enjoyed her calendar, which was something of a relief. Like I knew it was good, I knew I liked it, I wasn't 100% certain it would be her aesthetic. She loved it. Phew. And this year, as opposed to the last... two years I wanna say... I didn't forget to get her the nougat she likes. So she was pleased with that.

I got a Merry Christmas message from Fluffy as we were finishing up, so I took that usual 5-10 minutes that happens at some point on Christmas to relay my Christmas wishes via text and social channels to the folks I care about. And then my phone did the random beep dance on and off for like the next three hours. Not that I texted that many people, some of them just took their time LOL.

Anyway, eventually I did the present photo... I forgot my camera yet again (doubly annoyed at myself because I remembered I needed to take it when I was in the shower this morning, but forgot as soon as I got out), so I was doing the iPhone thing again. Not bad, but never as good in the quality department honestly.

This year at least we got the BBQ and the lunch timing right... and put the potatoes in to roast with the turkey and sausage meat. I honestly don't remember what we did in the hour the turkey was cooking... but we did something, I prepped everything else for Christmas Day Salad, and we went from there.

Normally I do a more complete table photo... but I realised two things, a) they're basically all the same, b) this year's one was shitty quality because iPhone plus directional lighting and c) who cares. If I'm interested at any future point, we had fizzy red grape juice this year instead of fizzy apple juice. And I made the salad dressing with olive oil, vinegar and cranberry sauce.

So we did the lunch thing. And it was... essentially it's the same thing we do every Christmas at this point. It's nice, we always make way too much of it, it's never as good as left overs, and it can vary massively depending on the dressing. This year wasn't bad, as per the above.

After lunch we tidied up, and then I taught Ma how to play Here To Slay. When I say teach... we played four games, I accidentally won the first (I didn't realise I'd gotten enough heroes until like a turn and a half later), she kicked my ass on the second and third games (while still not completely being sure what she was doing) and I barely squeaked in a victory in the last game, otherwise I might not have been speaking to her for the rest of the afternoon... lol.

Then, several hours later we had dessert. Not quite our usual, only because we didn't do melted chocolate things this year (I mean, I did, but we didn't do it together), so no leftover chocolate shards to stab the dessert with. Otherwise it's basically the same, meringues, mince pie flavoured ice-cream and fresh berries. A decent effort.

It was a little after 6:30pm by the time I gave up, we packed up my car with various and sundry goodies and presents and whatnot, I left Ma's place at 7 and had a pretty decent run home. Where I unpacked but didn't immediately put all my presents away.

So yeah... not the worst Christmas ever for the yaniism household. It's just this year that makes everything worse and harder.

Today, being Saturday, and the shops being open albeit later than usual, I went and did some shopping. I did go on my own, because it's supposed to get hot today (it's starting to now, but isn't quite there yet), and I saw Ma yesterday, so it didn't make a lot of sense for her to come down just to do minimal shopping and then drive home again). I didn't buy a ton of stuff, but I needed a few essentials, like milk, sugar, that kinda stuff. And weirdly, for going to the supermarket at 10am on the day after Christmas, it felt remarkably like the usual Saturday crowd.

No clue what I'm doing with the rest of my day though. So, you know, same as every Boxing Day really.

Current mood: