A tidbit kind of day ...

As I look around the house at 6:53 a.m. on Christmas Eve, it seems there's nothing better to do than write. That may be true, but the questions remain:
What about the bare Christmas tree?
The dining room table laden with stuff (including half-made Christmas presents)?
The desk that I naively suggested could be cleaned up and closed up (into its better armoire self) for tomorrow night's dinner?
The laundry in every state of done and undone -- from the dirty clothes baskets to the washer to the  living room couch where it awaits folding, and the baskets that beg to be carried upstairs?
You get the idea.
I'd like to tell myself it will all get done. Or at least hidden.

Some of you will be able to relate to my Big Moment at Wegmans yesterday: I scooped licorice and sunflower seeds from the bulk barrels and managed to remember the six-digit item numbers for each -- as I walked the entire 20 feet to the do-it-yourself scale. I'll admit I took an educated guess at the final two numbers, but that didn't stop me from exclaiming joyfully ('tis the season for exclaiming, after all): "I actually did it!"
Then I noticed the woman a few feet away. Staring. I tried to explain ...
um ... Merry Christmas to you, too, ma'am.

If you like lists, too, you might want to check out asylum.com's Top 100 weird stories of the 2009. Take it in bites or you'll never get those Christmas presents made.

7:30ish
Instead of rolling over in his grave, I'm betting my dad's having a good laugh about now: A childhood aberration has just earned credibility from the Vatican. Way back when we were in grade school, one of my sister Liz's friends, Debbie Hall, called on a Saturday afternoon asking what time 9 a.m. Mass was the following day. Dad felt  Debbie had been vindicated when several local churches began having midnight Mass at 11 p.m. a few years after that. This morning's news included a piece on the uproar in Italy over Pope Benedict announcing he would be saying that Mass at 10 p.m. this year. It was only a matter of time. (By the way, I'm with the pope's p.r. folks who are saying he just needs some more sleep.)

8:05 a.m.
If you want to trade sanity for frugality, try measuring each piece of wrapping paper and the package it's going on -- before cutting. Think of all the paper you'll save. Nah, I'll go with sanity.