OK, so after all the baking, I crawled into bed and slept a little bit, and then it was time to go make christmas eve brunch. I packed up some cookies for all my brunch worker bees, and headed down in the non-snow to the quizzle. I had planned a pretty ambitious christmas eve menu: spinach and red pepper fritatta, vegan gingerbread pancakes, african peanut stew, and figgy bread pudding with hard sauce. It all came together relatively easily. In fact, I had a BLAST making it. Unfortunately, the brunch was pretty poorly attended. Everyone who made it out loved it, and we had a great time dancing around to the Temptations version of Rudolph and also making fun of Michael Bolton's christmas song. But I was sad that more people did not get to enjoy the figgy pudding especially. Those who tried it said it was the best bread pudding EVA! OH well. I beat it out of there by 2:30 and came home to pack up for the trip to Dormont. Oh wait! I didn't mention getting up at 5am to wrap presents, did I? Well I did. I packed everything up and headed out to the store to get the last gift certificate for my sister and her hubby, and to pick up some christmas cigarettes. I didn't have to wait long at all for my bus, and was charmed to get to ride with my friend Steve for a bit, going to meet his new lady friend for christmas eve dinner cooking. Awww. I arrived at my T stop just as the steeler's game was letting out. I decided to sit and have a cigarette while the majority of mopey steeler's fans got on the T. Still, I ended up in a car packed wall to wall with people in black and gold. When I arrived in Dormont, I didn't even get my coat off before a glass of wine was in my hand. Astoundingly, my father's house is now beer and soda free! And my father had made a point of getting some red wine just for me. Aww. I visited with the family for a while, and then sis and bro had to head out for some of the other family events. So it was just dad and his girlfriend and me for dinner. We ate delicious baked orange roughy butternut squash souffle and drank wine and had some nice conversation, and then we watched Midnight Cowboy. Ha! It was great. Late at night we drunkenly stuffed all the christmas stockings with the oddest assortment of stocking stuffers, and then dad and his lady went to bed and I got to watch half an episode of aquateens before the kids came home. Bro was determined that we would watch BEERFEST, but sis and I pretty much slept through the whole thing. Man, I was toast between the lack of sleep and the wine.
I still managed to get up before anyone else and figure out how to work the digital cable so I could watch VH1 Classic Christmas videos. I actually got to see not only some Twisted Sister christmas videos, but the Hall and Oates Jinglebell Rock AND....Billy Squier! Woohoo! That made my christmas special. Dad made coffee and eggs and bacon, and then we basically sat around all day. More christmas videos, and then we got sucked into the Temptations movie. Woah....what a downer! It was a great do-nothing day though. I avoided the temptation to drink more wine...I think that was for the best.
Next up....presents, and dinner, and .....more movies! (of course)