Country Journey

After a sluggish beginning to the day, Chris finally ventured out to the stores so I could get some gift wrapping done. It seems everytime I wanted to do some, he was there. I know that “all will be known” on Christmas morning, but I like to have at least some resemblance of suprise when he tears open the gift wrap. After I got that done (record wrapping time), I drove over to the stores to get some last minute things (like doggie treats, etc) for our trip to the country.

We both got home and started to get the car ready for the journey. The boyz were excited, as they usually are, especially as Chris was egging them on with “do you want to go see grandma?” or “let’s go see uncle Jake.”

As we were getting ready, my mother called, so I chatter with her for about 20 minutes or so. She was concerned that we might miss each other given our travels (and hers). This will be the first holiday season when my mother doesn’t have anyone but my sister around, as my younger brother moved to Queensland earlier in the week to join my eldest brother (we don’t talk about son number 2). It seems she has the whole week of the holidays planned, and when I was chatting she mentioned that as much as she loves the kids (referring to the grandchildren), she was looking forward to not running all over the place on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day to make sure she gets to see them. It’s an odd thing with my family, my mother travels to see them, not the other way around – which always peeved me off. She was always catching trains, trams or buses to get around, where my brothers had cars and child seats. Anyway, I’m hoping that she enjoys her time with her sisters and brothers over the break. I”m going to try and call her “somewhere” on Christmas Day, but we’ll see how that pans out.

Finally, we got the car moving toward Gilmer around 5:15 PM. We stopped for coffee along the way, and experienced the longest wait for Starbucks I’ve ever had. It seems that everyone else had the same idea as us, just at the same time.

The pooches were very excited (as they normally were) when they got to the grandparents, and instantly started to mark their territory. It was 22F (-6C) when we arrived, and was meant to get down to 14F in Dallas (not sure if it got that low here). It was pleasant, as the fire was roaring and the house was toasty. Jason – Chris’s brother – has decided he can’t make it for Christmas due to his car being rear-ended prior to leaving. Chris thinks it’s a muse to just get out from coming, as he works for a body shop, and has previous experience in the insurance game – so getting a hire car would be no problem. His parents are a little upset about it, but I’m sure they will recover.

It seems the cold is playing havoc with my sinuses/head, so I headed to bed early to get some shut eye and rest. Need to remember to get some Dayquil.