Tuesday, December 19, 2017
Today I am grateful for wrapping presents. I LOVE wrapping presents and it’s a good thing because this is turning into a Very Visa Christmas! Being “down” with illness, a computer and a credit card, has proven dangerous. I’m going with the God-Will-Provide angle. Are you listening up there? It’s me, the nut case, counting on you!
I guess loving to wrap gifts is my compensation for hating shopping, because I really, really hate shopping. We went to the Q-Mart in Quakertown on Saturday and there were so many people that I almost created an international incident. . .by ripping off all of my clothes because I got so overheated! And I wanted to scream at perfectly lovely people, “Don’t STOP in the middle of the aisle! Move the hell over! Can’t you see I hate shopping and I’m in frigging meltdown and you’re making me crazy?”
How rude would that have been? So instead I patiently (on the outside) stopped, waited and said, with what I think was sincerity, “No problem, take your time. Merry Christmas.” Growl! Grumble! Bah! Humbug! It’s isn’t their fault I hate shopping. It isn’t their fault I was sweating to death. It isn’t their fault I was exhausted. So I ate an emotional couch and was a nice person. How tedious is that?
Until we got to the car. Then Himself unloaded about how much he hated shopping, too, and the flood gates were open, so I did a ten minute rant on our way to Walmart, another Hell-Hole on Saturday. Probably the worst!
I got the same power-surge and walls-closing-in feeling there, too because of the sea of frantic shoppers. Just as I was heading to a reasonably short line a woman said, “I’m holding this place for my mom.” Swell. No holding places! Don’t you know the rules? My inside voice was pissed. But she was really nice, too, so I smiled and backed up. A little. I wasn’t about to be usurped by someone else who didn’t know the rules.
Mom showed up shortly thereafter with a cart full of crap topped by the most amazing cake I’ve ever seen! She apologized for budging in front of me so I said, “No worries. I’m going home with you and that cake, though.” She laughed and told me how it was the last one. Half of it was red velvet and the other half carrot, all in one huge cake! We had a blast waiting in line while we discussed the benefits of those combinations. It doesn’t take much to amuse me. Or her, I guess.
I offered to wrap her gifts if she’d only let me come home with her and that cake, but she respectfully declined. Apparently SHE likes wrapping gifts, too. Just my luck!