So my computer is doing this fun new thing where it dies anytime it’s idle for more than ten seconds. Everything works great if I’m moving my pointer or typing or streaming a movie, but if I stop interacting with the screen for more than ten seconds, WordPress and Gmail are replaced by darkness and sadness.
I spent about two hours working through this with Microsoft support the other day, and they ended up recommending that I upgrade to Windows 11. The upgrade process was particularly not fun because I had to sit there for a full hour making little circles with my pointer because I didn’t want the system to shut down in the middle of installing the update.
Blogging is not fun either. I feel a little frantic knowing that I can’t put too much time or thought into each sentence. The words have to keep coming in a steady stream! No time to breathe! No time to think! No time to punctuate appropriately!
I am currently in my pipe organ era. I very randomly attended an organ concert at a local church and it was so cool. The pipe organ is really too much power for one person to wield, but man, I want to wield that power. I started googling organ instructors near me. I found one name which led me to… her obituary. She died last year. So I’m still working on that. But in the meantime I’ve been enjoying watching Anna Lapwood’s YouTube and practicing my piano as if I will one day play these pieces on the organ.
It is the Christmas season and I am really struggling to get into the spirit. I seem to enjoy Christmas less and less every year, and I find this fact depressing, especially since I know the real reason behind my lack of enthusiasm is that I am the mom of the family.
Here is a list of things I like about Christmas:
* baking and decorating cookies
*listening to Christmas music
* the kids lighting the candles on the Advent wreath at dinner
* Christmas lights on other people’s houses
* doing Christmas puzzles
* watching Christmas movies
* setting up the nativity
*the green and red M&Ms
*how cozy my local bar feels with the Christmas decorations up
Here is a list of things I don’t like about Christmas:
* buying gifts
*wrapping gifts
*opening gifts in front of people
*shipping gifts
*ordering gifts online and then fretting about how long shipping will take
*dealing with all the boxes and packaging from the shipments
*buying gifts
*mailing Christmas cards
*the pressure to buy Christmas pajamas for the whole family
*the pressure to buy ugly Christmas sweaters for the whole family
*the pressure to buy Advent calendars
*the pressure to do gingerbread houses
*buying gifts
*traveling during the Christmas season
*getting a tree
*decorating a tree
*watering the tree
*buying gifts
*taking the tree down
*doing our own holiday light display on the house
*the fact that my cats refuse to wear Christmas sweaters
*Christmas activities outside the house where there are other families and children
*buying gifts
In reviewing these lists it’s clear that I don’t actually dislike Christmas. I dislike buying gifts, wrapping gifts, and receiving gifts. If we could just do away with that whole aspect of Christmas I would be much happier. Unfortunately, when I polled my children about what they liked most about Christmas (in a blatant attempt to cut out the stuff that nobody cares about) they named presents as the most important thing.
I had resolved last weekend that we should do more Christmas-y activities in order to trick myself into enjoying Christmas. I even made a list of local Christmas events that wouldn’t make me want to die. But here we are about to step into a merry December weekend and all I have planned is to make nachos and watch Star Trek: Lower Decks as a family tonight.