jaysaint Getting it all down on paper…

The good folks at Airtran managed to get me on an earlier flight today, so I have already eaten my Chinese takeout and am sinking into my couch watching North and South. I should still be in the air with an hour left to go. So grateful that I’m not.

I haven’t unpacked a thing, and it won’t surprise me at all if I don’t at all tonight. Tomorrow FreshDirect brings me many crates of groceries, about which I am hugely hugely excited. All I had to do is point and click (and pay) and they just bring it right along. I’ve got a marinade of cheese and olives I want to make, and I’m going to try stuffing some apples with saurkraut. I realize that second recipe probably doesn’t have wide appeal, but I think I’ll like it. And I’m the only one I’m feeding this week.

I’ll go to DC for New Year’s Eve to spend that with Damon. It will be great to see him again so soon, but good grief I could stand a few days at home. Next weekend Andrew makes a return for one more visit before he heads back to Germany.

Zoe is so happy to have me back. When I walked in the front door she ran half way down the hallway and then flopped over on her side and started rolling around and waving her paws at me. Of course I threw everything on the floor and showered her with much love. Kristen did a great job of looking after her, even leaving a DVD of Mary Tyler Moore playing for her amusement. I’m sure Zoe’s been fancying herself a career girl all day.

Can I just mention again how happy I am to be home and alone. In a perfect world Damon would be in NY, but perhaps at work. While I don’t want our schedules to be opposite, it would be nice if they didn’t align perfectly.

The visit with Mom and Jerry went really well. It’s the first time I’ve seen them in years and years that I haven’t been pulled in a thousand direction at Christmas. I loved not having to answer to any needs/desire/requirements but those of the four of us. We saw Lemony Snicket, we saw another movie that I’m blanking on. My fatigue must be showing a little bit. Getting home was quite the ordeal. We got to the airport around 10:45 and I finally struggled in the door around 7, carrying a duffel bag along with laptop, briefcase, rollie and handbag. The duffel bag weights about eight gagillion pounds and just about detached my arm at the shoulder by the time I finished bussing, training and walking to the apartment. That said, it was necessary because we had so many presents, and so I felt pretty cheerful about it.

I had such a good time yesterday that I’m sore. That’s a good day.

Mom and Jerry took us to play something called pickleball. It’s kind of a tennis/racquetball/whiffle ball combo, if that makes any sense. Oh, but you use paddles instead of racquets. It’s hard to describe. But the important thing is that I was very good at it. It’s not often I find something physical to do where I can run circles around Damon. But he was unable to come even close to my pickleball mastery.

After that we cleaned up, ate and went to town square. There was a wedding-ish band playing “Rocky and the Rollers.” Yup. But that didn’t stop us from dancing like fools. Mom and Jerry were really good, and I was so tickled to watch them go. My Mom was definitely the most soulful white lady out there, but not in that embarrassing overcompensatory way. I should point out that they’re all white ladies. That was one of our early conversations, “Don’t you miss black people?” She said she does but she loved this place too much to pass it up. She’s also hoping the place will integrate a little more as it grows. Anyway, I got my Mom to dance with me and that was lots of fun. I was struck by how popular line dancing is. Those people will force that onto any song playing, no matter how ridiculous. But they did seem to be having fun. My Mom says she wants a BB gun to shoot them with because they take over the whole dance area. There are certainly plenty of ample behinds to aim for.

This morning we exchanged our Christmas presents and much quality loot was exchanged. I gave Damon some new shirts and sweaters, some warm gloves and one of those seen-on-TV tiny hair trimmers. My Mom had one when we were visiting last Christmas and he was fascinated by it. We gave Jerry the first season of 24 and Mom, Damon and I all went in together to get him six months of Netflix. We gave my Mom some fun parrot-green and hot pink shirts and some pink wooden slides to help ease her into her Florida life. We also got her some super-soft socks, just because I couldn’t resist them.

I also got plenty o’ good stuff. Damon gave me a stripe-y linen suit, a candle that smells like Sarah (lavender) and a candle snuffer. I love him for supporting my candle habit, even though it drives him crazy. Mom and Jerry gave me new jeans and a pullover and very snuggly sweater, flannel pajamas, crock pot cookbooks, the latest Mark Helperin book and, truthfully, a ton of other stuff. They gave Damon and me several joint gifts, which was fun. The best of those was a “1C” they made for our apartment door, since I had been complaining that we couldn’t find them at Home Depot. They’ve got magnets on the back, since our door is metal.

And now we’re about 10 minutes away from our Christmas Eve dinner, so I had better sign off.

I just checked in with work. I’ve got just over 260 emails sitting in my inbox. My New Year New You page looks out of whack. …Must…Disengage…

We spent HOURS today riding around The Villages in a golf cart. And I got to drive the whole time. I don’t know if anyone else thought that was fantastic, but I was thrilled. Would that all transportation were golf-cart centric.

I’ve been absent from the living room for under ten minutes and the “Hey, what are you doing?” chorus has begun. Better return. Sigh.

It’s Christmas week. It’s 70 degrees. Damon is going swimming in the heated outdoor pool. It’s safe to say my reality is shifted.

But all in a good way. It’s great to be here with my Mom, it’s wonderful to be sleeping in the same bed as Damon. It’s hard to overestimate how good it feels to have him sleeping there next to me. And since we’re in vacation mode we’re getting along flawlessly. Which is not to say that we fight. But I think in the normal course of things we get along normally, which is to say that it’s positive, but we’re still able to be fairly annoying to one another from time to time.

Saturday night I got into Orlando about 9pm and Mom and Jerry and I waited around at the airport until midnight when Damon’s flight landed. He got off the plane sporting a newsboy cap and a new short and choppy haircut. It took me a day to get over the hair shock, but he does look awfully cute. Because I’m a copycat I think I’ll go get my hair cut short today. I want to get it done here and pay the Florida rate rather than the Manhattan rate.

Sunday morning we went to the worst church service I’ve ever attended. It was 75% passionless white protestant singing and 25% a totally incomprehensible message that liberally incorporated Tim Allen and the movie ‘Christmas with the Kranks.’ It seemed to make the central point that people who love Jesus will put snowmen on their roofs. Or something like that. Mom said they have a different officiant every week and that this one was awful, it’s normally much better. We will have to take her word for it. After we caught a few minutes of tuba Christmas and then went off to brunch. Vegetarians are for sure few and far between down here. I had more or less a plate of mashed potatoes. But they were good, so that was fine. After the brunch was a definite high point — we got out the golf cart and I drove it all over The Villages, which is what this little city is called. This is a ride right at my speed, and I had a ball. Damon was such a good sport and didn’t even try to take a turn since I was so clearly having a ball swooping around and waving at other drivers. Mom and I dropped him off at the pool, which was as warm as bathwater. She and I went to the store to buy dinner fixings. After that it was serious naptime for me and Damon. We had my Mom’s amazing salad. I’m sure there was other food, but I was all about the salad. I also bought myself a copy of ‘Return of the King’ at Walmart. So much for frugality. I bought all the fixings and made some beautiful sangria, which needed 24 hours to really get good.

Yesterday we drove into Ocala to Christmas shop. Damon and Mom and I did a hilarious round robin where we kept pairing up and splitting up, trying to shop for each other while in the same small radius. Mom has all of her gifts beautifully wrapped and waiting under the tree, so she was the swing. Damon and I needed to shop for each other and for her. I feel great about everything I found and I’m all done now. I feel a little uninspired since I got them both clothes clothes clothes. But it seems to be what they want. I got my Mom two casual, v-neck pullovers — one hot pink and one parroty green. And then I got her a green silk twinset. Then to top it off I bought little pink wooden flipflops. So I’m helping her transition into a Floridian. No such thing as too much color to her, so she’ll like it. Her house really reflects that. It looks Mexican — cinnamon colored walls, others are apple gree — it’s just gorgeous. People are always blown away when they see her house and she gets frequent requests for decorating help. She should be good, she watched HGTV all day long. Her latest triumph is creating a faux fireplace prettier than the real thing.
Dinner was everything I could ever want. Mom made stuffed artichokes, which has always been my favorite food. In a move that will cement Damon’s position as first in my life forever, he gave me the heart from his artichoke. And the sangria was perfect.

That’s pretty much life up until now. Mom’s at doctor’s appointment and Damon is swimming again. We’re all getting along great. Anytime my Mom pushes me a little too hard Damon does a little ‘down down down’ motion with his hand to remind me that I will be sorry if I don’t bite my tongue. So that’s working, and she’s not pushing me much.

In an hour I’ll go off to get my hair cut and then maybe we’ll go to the movies. I think Damon wants to shop some more. And tonight I’m going to make linguini with clam sauce.

This may be the longest LJ I’ve ever written — that’s vacation for you.