Merry Christmas 2024!

[Jeff V]

I've always been a net gift-giver to the family since graduating college.

Had I received a box of rocks this year, at least I would have a box of rocks. Not even that. Outgoing gifts amounted to around $1600 for wife and kids and another $1000 for wife's friends and their kids. Hints dropped fell on deaf ears...one was a highly rated chef's knife that was on sale last month for $165. Instead, today she complained none of our knives were sharp enough to cut her meat for the pork adobo she was making. The other was a belt and wallet from Hank's Belts -- the pair would have around $250, but allegedly they last the rest of your life.

Tomorrow morning the flooring is being delivered. I spent time yesterday clearing a path in the garage for them to drop it. Work begins Dec 30, at some point we and the pets must be gone for 3 days and we still lack a plan for that. Too bad it could go a little longer, wife and daughter will be gone Jan 15 for over 2 weeks.

I got my son a couple of things for Roblox programming, a pretty extensive book, and a web-based tutorial He was already running the web app before all of the wrapping garbage was disposed of. I got my daughter a bunch of art supplies, including canvases and wooden chest containing all manner of pencils, crayons, and paints. I also got her this thing where you use included markers to write on porcelain spoons, immerse it in water, and the drawing floats off the spoon, and afterward can be applied like a kiddie tattoo. Sadly, both spoons arrived broken I hope Amazon forgoes the exchange process and just sends a replacement.

[YellowKing]

We had a very chill Christmas, which was nice. Having two teens in the house means smaller presents, fewer boxes, and kids who can actually put away their own things. So we managed to keep the house in decent shape. We cooked a nice Christmas dinner and my mom came over. A lot of extended family was out of town, so we didn't have to entertain a lot of company which was a bit of a relief after just having survived Thanksgiving with most of them.

Now I'm looking forward to the long break. We plan on getting a couple of home projects done (painting my son's room and decluttering), and get out to see Nosferatu at some point.

[hepcat]

Had I received a box of rocks this year, at least I would have a box of rocks. Not even that. Outgoing gifts amounted to around $1600 for wife and kids and another $1000 for wife's friends and their kids.

Good Christ, a thousand bucks for friends of your wife???

[Kraken]

Jeff is of the school that says anything worth doing is worth overdoing.

[hepcat]

You’re just upset you and Mrs. kraken’s application to become a friend of Jeff’s wife wasn’t approved.

[Kraken]

Now that's just hurtful. Our application included a very appealing bribe, but was not even acknowledged.

[Zarathud]

Had I received a box of rocks this year, at least I would have a box of rocks. Not even that. Outgoing gifts amounted to around $1600 for wife and kids and another $1000 for wife's friends and their kids.

Good Christ, a thousand bucks for friends of your wife???

That's a cultural thing. My Taiwanese partner keeps buying me Star Wars art for my office. He received the other 3d printed Star Trek bust last year -- of Jean Luc Picard because Chakotay from Voyager isn't as popular.

Fortunately, my brother-in-law knows where to find my list of D&D miniatures and asks about my kids playing D&D so my family now reliably ask him what to get me. It's much better than no box of rocks.

[TheMix]

My meal today actually turned out to be a piece of bread with a slice of kraft cheese with mustard and kraut on it and chili with some french onion dip.

Cue hepcat with the "you all eat some weird foods" quote.

Here ya go.

From some of the stuff you folks eat Id think you were pregnant.

[Madmarcus]

My dad didn't make it down and my brother arrived later than expected (he stopped by to spend time with dad so it was a good thing even if it was awkward for having food on the table) but it was fun to have both kids, one daughter in law, MIL, my brother and his wife.

I had been hinting about two new hobby projects I want to get into in the new year. Naturally I got parts for both of them but not enough to do either one! Still good as the gifts will help me actually start instead of planning continually.

[Archinerd]

Every year for the last 15 years or so, I've made Christmas cards for my niece and nephews on my wife's side. This year's theme is Lesser known members of the Claus Family.
You'll also note, that I'm somewhat of an influencer on instagram. I have 10's of followers and only one of them is my mom.

[hepcat]

Nice!

[Holman]

A tragic Christmas story I should have posted earlier:

I went to my big local Shop Rite for major holiday groceries on December 23. Naturally I wasn't the only one; the place was packed.

About five minutes into my shopping, the power went out.

Having lived in this neighborhood for 22 years, I knew I had to act fast. There is only one other major grocery store nearby, and it has about two-thirds of Shop Rite's register capacity.

I quickly returned my selected produce to its bins (I'm not a monster) and bolted for my car. I was probably one of the first to make it to Shop Rite's rival Acme, and my grocery shop was a speed run. I triaged only those items that were necessary for holiday recipes, and I moved as quickly as I could. As I was finishing my shopping, the place was as crowded as I had ever seen. News of Shop Rite's closure had spread (apparently a water line had broken, shorting out their electrics), and I could see Acme staff spreading the news that they should be ready to get slammed.

I got into line as the third for my register. By the time I had paid, there were ten or more people behind me.

The next day I returned to Shop Rite for some specialty items I had skipped the day before. They were in a re-stocking frenzy. There were three tractor-trailers at the loading dock. It was clear that even a few hours without power meant that a lot of frozen or cold items had had to be discarded.

[hepcat]

That’s not tragic. Tragic is that I’m not a friend of JeffV’s wife and missed out on part of that thousand bucks.

[Holman]

That’s not tragic. Tragic is that I’m not a friend of JeffV’s wife and missed out on part of that thousand bucks.

You attempted a bribe. It was supposed to be wrapped as a gift.

[Jeff V]

Had I received a box of rocks this year, at least I would have a box of rocks. Not even that. Outgoing gifts amounted to around $1600 for wife and kids and another $1000 for wife's friends and their kids.

Good Christ, a thousand bucks for friends of your wife???

She has lots of friends, and they all have lots of kids.

At least we'll get back some of that in savings, one of them is going to let us (and 3 cats and 2 dogs) stay at there house for 4 days starting Thursday when the floors get finished. We were going to have to find an AirBnB that would accommodate the animals.