So, I made it home to Alabama for the Christmas holidays on Saturday before Christmas. It was a very good start to my trip that morning before I left Minnesota (see Body Art post), and made better by there being no delays to my flight. That's always a good thing. I made to Atlanta by 8:00pm and had my luggage and was on my way to the car by 8:49pm. If you've ever flown through Atlanta airport, you know that's super fast to be in and out of the airport there!

Mama and I had our prerequisite argument on the way home, but it wasn't as bad as it sometimes is. I let her bitch about what she didn't like and then put my foot down on the subject. I can't let her live my life for me. I'm happy and healthy. I'm not hurting anyone, and I'm not being hurt. That's all that should matter to her. It ended there, and didn't resurface. Yay!

Sunday was pretty low key. Mama drug me along to church with her. UGH. I didn't enjoy that part. The sunday school teacher told total lies and no one called him on it! He stood up there and said that no religion other than Christianity sings in praise of their god. That's so not true! I can't think of any religion that doesn't include some form of song. That bugged me. Then the sermon started, and the preacher yelled for an hour straight almost. Really, I don't need to be yelled at to get the message. I much prefer not to be yelled at. When it happens I tend to just zone out whatever is being said until the volume drops. My ears were ringing half way through. I was not impressed. But Mama wanted me to go, so I did. I won't go back there. After we took grandmother a couple of toquitos and a side salad for lunch and hung out for a while.

Christmas Eve we went back out to grandmother's for the family christmas. It was good to see everyone, but it was odd having Christmas without granddaddy. It's our first year without him, and it's just not the same. No one wanted to sit in his chair at the table. I felt like I wanted to set a place for him even though he's not with us anymore physically. Grandmother had me a copy of a picture made of her and granddaddy the day they were married as part of my christmas present from her. It's a beautiful picture. They look so happy! That's how I'd rather remember my grandfather than how he was last year, too weak and sick to really enjoy the holiday at all. We did anonymous gifts this year despite some of our protests. Poor Daddy got his gift stolen from him three times! I didn't like that part of the game. I don't think someone should be able to take a gift from someone else, or if they can, you should only be able to take a gift from each person once. I felt bad for him. And Grandmother ended up with lotions she couldn't use. I swapped with her, and since I couldn't use them either, I ended up swapping again with someone else. I just wanted to be sure grandmother got something she could use. I ended up with this cool little gadget that vacuum seals ziploc type bags. Daddy got a screwdriver set. Mama got a gift certificate to somewhere. It wasn't bad, it just wasn't our normal christmas.

After we got home from Grandmother's christmas eve, we opened our presents at home. Mama and Daddy got me too much! They had sent me money to buy clothes, but they bought lots of stuff too. I worry that they spend too much for stuff like that. I got an aircompressor for my car, a car cover since I have to leave my car outside the garage, an electric ice scraper, a super warm fuzzy blanket, some cool craft scissors, and lots of other little things and candy. Daddy liked his atomic clock/ indoor-outdoor thermometer thingie, but we couldn't get it to register the outside temp. I think he's gonna take it back and exchange it to see if he can get a different one to work. Mama liked her dress and jacket set. I'm glad about that. I never know what to get her or if she's gonna like it.

Christmas day we just chilled out, slept late, and watched chirstmas shows on tv together until the evening. I took Daddy to opening night at the movie theater to see the new Alien vs. Predator. He never goes to the movies alone, and he and mama tend to like different sorts of movies. Plus she doesn't like going to anywhere but the drive in. She doesn't like being around all those people in the theater. I try to get him out of the house to at least one movie when I'm home. It was a good movie. We both liked it. The logic was a little off in some places, but that's most movies. It was really cool overall.

I missed having Steffie with me. I would have loved to have had her there with me for Christmas. But only a few more days and I'll get to see her again. On my way home today. My flight was suppose to leave at 4:30 Eastern time, but the flight is delayed. No surprise that considering it's the day after Christmas. I gave Tanya a call to let her know the flight is delayed and that I'm suppose to be in MSP at about 7:00pm. I had a good time in Bama for Christmas, but going home is good too.