The Precious

Did I just take a photo of myself in the reflective surface of my shiny new toy using the surprisingly flash camera of my other shiny slightly-less-new toy, then load the photo onto the current oldest of the shiny toys and from there onto my weblog? Did that just make me sort of want to vomit with the force of the realisation of how very much I am currently embodying my demographic? Am I nonetheless extremely pleased with my current toy-situation? Yes, yes, yes, yes YES! Damn it yes. My new iPod is beautiful, and we go good places together, my toys and I.

I spent this morning with two sisters, my brother and a stray friend of theirs, living out our family rituals despite being significantly reduced in our numbers. It was lovely. It scares me a little that my siblings are all grown up (the last one just finished highschool), that we are no longer kids but adults clinging just as strongly to our kid-rules as ever. Stockings are for before breakfast, presents are for after, and stocking candy doesn't count as breakfast (although you can gorge on it as early as you please). You have to wear the silly hat after you pull the Christmas cracker. "Santa" also has to wear a silly hat, preferably several. Christmas photos will feature us in our pajamas being ridiculous. No child will leave a family Christmas event with a mass of presents smaller than the mass of their body. And so on.

I wrangled the horrible public holiday timetable to get a train back into the city, and went to a friends' for a gorgeous lunch (new-old friends, another gift from this surprisingly benevolent universe). I came home to make a salad and head out to dinner elsewhere but, possibly due to the imbibing of a little too much, well- there were the cocktails with breakfast, beer at lunch, and a light smattering of other, less taxable intoxicants- I wound up curling up for a 'quick nap' instead and missed the whole thing. Feel rather foolish about that but I suppose it'd been a long, full day already. Now it's the middle of the night and I'm not sure whether I should go to bed, start packing for the Big Northward Holiday, or stay up all night and get fingerprints all over my shiny new toy. The first two would be sensible, but the last one sounds most appealing.