Priceless

Being the red-blooded American that I am, I spent my Saturday finishing up shopping for the family, mostly Number One Son. After hitting all the usual suspects (and some unusual ones) I think I have this year all wrapped up, so to speak.

I was expecting it to be pretty crazy out there, and I wasn't disappointed. It took 10 minutes just to leave the Toys R Us parking lot. But for the most part people were in good moods and were helpful and nice.

Is Christmas in America too commercial? Of course it is, if your life is ruled by advertising and marketing. But I don't know any losers who actually fit that description. People shop and spend gobs of money because they like making their wives and husbands and sons and daughters happy. Would our love be any lessened if we didn't exchange a single gift? Of course not. But it's fun to give gifts (and to get them), and we do it as a family only once a year.

I do have to say that I was a bit shocked to discover, after adding up various receipts, how much I've spent this year.

Roboreptile from Best Buy: $90.

Bicycle from Toys R Us: $80.

"Lego Star Wars II" video game from Target: $60.

Look on Dad's face after seeing bank statement: Priceless.

A Christmas Break-In

A friend came over today and we were heading out to pick up a pizza. I suggested we take my 1969 Ford Galaxie 500 XL convertible, since he had never ridden in it before.

The car was parked as usual in our building's secure garage, but I knew something was wrong when I opened the door and no light went on. I tried to start her but she was dead. Then I noticed the glovebox open and all the contents on the floor. Odd. Then I noticed the stereo -- a Blaupunkt which sits in a custom box atop the driveshaft hump -- was skewed.

It seems someone went into the car and went through everything. After dumping the glovebox contents, they left it open and the little tiny light in there drained the battery. They didn't rip out the stereo box because it has a removable face plate that I keep in the apartment. Since I've heard too many stories about thieves cutting soft-tops to get inside, I never keep the car locked.

I hadn't driven the Galaxie in a while so it really could have happened a couple weeks ago. Building management has posted notices that there have been a rash of car break-ins recently, so I guess we got hit as well.

Oh well. To whoever broke into my car, Merry Christmas, fuckers. I'm glad you didn't get shit from my car and I hope you ring in 2007 in the state prison shower.

I forgot to blog about this a while back, but I was reminded of it with the approach of Christmas.

A couple months ago, Number One Son, not yet 5 years old, came home and said, "You know what Dad? There's no such thing as Santa Claus."

Verrry cautiously, I went, "Oh yeah? Why do you say that?"

I turns out that the Muslim kid at school, who incidentally is Number One Son's best friend there, was going around spilling the beans to everyone.

The good news is that Number One Son seems to have forgotten this cruel truth about the world, so all is good. At least until Mohammed opens his mouth again.

In which case, I've coached Number One Son to say, "Oh yeah? Well guess what? You aren't going to get 72 virgins, either."

Temptation

We got two ginormous Christmas boxes from my parents today. I told the Oriental Wife, "Let's unpack them and see what's in them!"

"No way!" she said. "Number One Son won't be able to stand having to wait a whole week before opening the presents!"

"That's one of the joys of Christmas as a kid," I informed her. "Every kid has to go through the agony of seeing presents under the tree days in advance, but not being able to do a damn thing about it. Plus, I'm kind of curious myself to see what the packages are."

"Aha!" she exclaimed. "You just want to open them to satsify your own curiosity! I'm telling you, if you unpack them, I'm going to end up peeking at all my presents!"

"Aha!" I said. "This isn't about Number One Son! You don't want to open simply because you know you don't have the willpower to make it until Christmas!"

The packages are still sitting in our hallway, unopened.