I just did a bit of historic research, and was reminded of something I have long not thought about: I actually took public transit to Olympia for Christmas for the first time in 2011, and the second time in 2012. Both of those years, Shobhit rode the buses with me, as he was visiting home while living in Los Angeles, where he left his car, thus making it a better option than renting a Zipcar. I totally forgot I had done this so long ago, before it became the typical means of my getting to Olympia for the past five years. In 2011 and 2012, though, we took buses down on Christmas Eve, and then bussed back home on the day after Christmas. (We were able to drive in 2010 because, even though Shobhit was living in New York then, he kept his car at home in Seattle while he lived there.)

By 2013, we reverted back to what had previously been a bit of a tradition, driving down to Olympia, with a top at Danielle's place in Renton along the way. Shobhit's car was still left in L.A. in 2013, when I opted to rent a Zipcar rather than dealing with the bus again; we went the Zipcar route again in 2014 and in 2015. By the time Christmas 2016 rolled around, Shobhit had moved back from L.A. with the car, and we drove that every year between 2016 and 2018.

The shift that occurred in 2019 was that I started taking the bus down to Olympia Christmas Eve, then Shobhit drove down Christmas morning, and then we drove home together Christmas evening. This has been what we've done every year since—with the exception of the covid year, 2020, when we merely drove down to hang out with just Dad and Sherri on their back patio for a couple of hours on Christmas Day—for three reasons. First, Shobhit got tired of how cold Dad and Sherri's guest room tends to be, which gave him more of an excuse to say he didn't want to leave the cats at home alone for too long. Second, Shobhit started getting late shifts at work, at the time at Big 5 Sporting Goods and these days at Total Wine & More. And third, I don't like to miss the traditional Christmas Eve dinner with the family, which I'd have to miss if I waited for Shobhit's work shift to end.

Mind you, if Shobhit really wanted to, he could schedule a day off on December 24. But, he also probably can't do that every year, and he needs all the hours he can get regardless. In any event, since 2019, this has become the workable Christmas compromise between the two of us: I get to Olympia early enough to make it to Christmas Eve dinner; Shobhit gets his work hours and doesn't have to sleep in the cold guest room. (One of these days I might see if we can't stay at Gina and Beth's instead, and perhaps convince Shobhit to stay overnight on Christmas Eve again. I'm not super keen on that idea though, only because I really like to be at Dad and Sherri's on Christmas morning.)

So anyway, this has been the way Shobhit and I got there and back four of the past five Christmases: 2019, 2021, 2022 and 2023. And probably all of them for the foreseeable future, unless Shobhit gets a different, higher-paying job again one of these days. (Or, in his wildly unlikely, total dream scenario, he wins the lottery.)

I guess I should actually get to our Christmas Eve Morning gift exchange, to which the above shots at the top of this post reference. I managed to get our typical "family photo" with the cats in front of the tree on Christmas Eve rather than at the end of Christmas Day like I normally do—because I was able to put all our gifts inside the collapsible wagon I bought, so we could pose with that as well.

After we borrowed Karen's collapsible wagon for walking through the Pride Parade in June, we both just fell in love with that thing—and even used it a couple of times for bringing up masses of goods to the condo from Costco runs before we had to return it. We talked a lot about buying one for ourselves, and then never got around to it: I ultimately decided it would make a great Christmas gift . . . to both of us! In fact I even wrapped the thing in the huge Amazon box before it finally occurred to me that I could have just wrapped the wagon's box itself, which would have been a little smaller. Still, it was fun to wrap a giant box for Shobhit (somewhat similar to what he did when he got me my first iPod back in 2006, when he placed the iPod inside another wrapped box inside another wrapped box inside another, giant wrapped box). Do you think I hid this gift very well in our guest room? I placed it there on December 10 and, as it happens, Shobhit did not notice it until a few days ago, when he himself was using the room to store gifts for me.

Conversely, on Friday morning, Shobhit suddenly said he needed to go to Home Depot to get something for me. I didn't think that much of it, except to think vaguely: Home Depot? What the hell was he going there to get for me? Well, it was among the many gifts he actually wrapped for me this year: a toolbox! And a pack of allen wrenches! Both of which we keep having to borrow from Alexia (I recently replaced the washer in one of the master bathroom sink faucet handles because it was leaking: I'll out-butch you any day!—as long as I have YouTube tutorials handy, anyway), so this was sort of a Christmas gift to her as well. (The same could be said of the wagon for Karen.)

The toolbox itself is inside the wagon in the above photo, covered by other gifts. Shobhit commented on how "we were both very practical" in our gift giving this year (although to say booze is "practical" would be a dubious claim—except to say we know it will get used). We'll be delighted to be able to use a wagon for Costco runs again, that being easily the most expensive thing either of us bought for each other—I paid about $60 for it, which was actually less than Shobhit had assumed it would cost—and I'll be happy to stop using a junk drawer in the master bathroom as my "tool box," which I've been doing for decades. (At dinner Sunday night, Beth asked why I got a tool box for Christmas, as she seemed amazed we did not already have one: "It's like you're home owners." That was a bit of sarcasm, as we've owned the condo for 15 years now.)

The cats got a few treats in their stockings, with recycled toys added because they don't know the difference. They always approach the stockings, and especially the gift wrap, with great interest every year though.

Shobhit's on Weight Watchers which meant filling his stocking with sweets this year would not work. I packed it instead with chili peppers (I got those packaged at m2m Market on Broadway, freezing them for a few days in an effort at keeping them from going bad), and the requisite two bottles of red pepper flakes. And, of course, one of the two Christmas ornaments we bought this year, which we always buy together on our travels anymore anyway.

So! This year I caught the Sound Transit 594 bus from 9th & Stewart at 12:15 on Sunday. Shobhit needed to head to work around that time anyway, so he drove me to the bus stop—although after getting half a mile away from home, he had to backtrack when he realized he forgot his phone at home. I ran up to fetch it, we drove back to 9th & Stewart, and we made it there with only minutes to spare before my bus arrived, on time to the minute.

Bizarrely, the One Bus Away app said the bus had departed four minutes early, which had me panicked for a split second. But then I remembered the exact same thing happened last year, apparently One Bus Away doesn't know what the fuck it's talking about on Christmas Eve, and the bus came right when it was supposed to. It then arrived at the State Route 512 Park & Ride at 1:34, right on schedule.

One of my stocking stuffers from Shobhit was a bottle of boozy eggnog, amazingly my first eggnog of the year this year—I did incredibly well resisting it until Christmas Eve. At Shobhit's suggestion, I poured myself some to take in a tumbler for my bus itinerary. Quite smartly, I did not drink any on that first bus. That said, I still took the bus that was half an hour earlier than the itinerary had suggested, because that one had me getting to SR 512 P&R less than 10 minutes before my connecting bus was to leave, and if my first bus were even slightly delayed, I'd be stuck waiting something like 90 minutes. This way I only waited for about 40. (The later bus still got there on time in the end, but it's still never a risk I wanted to take.)

It was very misty-wet and therefore a bit of a piercing cold, so I walked over to the Taco Time to get warm, buy a crisp bean burrito, and use the bathroom just because I could—this did prevent me from having a painful bladder by the time I reached Olympia, even without drinking anything along the way. Still, I took a few sips on the 620 bus from 512 Park & Ride to Olympia, since I had managed to pee. At Dad and Sherri's house, though—my bus arrived at the Olympia Transit Center on time to the minute, and Dad came to pick me up as usual—they had a half gallon of Dairgold eggnog, which I drank quite a bit of. I used it to cut the boozy eggnog from my tumbler, which was indeed a bit boozy on its own. The eggnog in a little glass stenciled with snowmen made quite the festive drink.

Dad and Sherri and I just hung out at home for just under a couple of hours, and then we met other family at The Emperor's Palace, the Chinese restaurant we eat at every year—with two more people than usual this year, dinner for ten!

Christmas Eve Dinner Roll Call!

1. Dad
2. Sherri
3. Gina
4. Beth
5. Me
6. Jennifer
7. Matthew
8. Hope
9. Chase
10. Ian

The unusual additions this year were Gina and Beth, who traditionally host a big Christmas Eve dinner with friends at their house. The thing is, two of the gay men they typically host are brothers, and they have a bunch of family visiting this year who don't usually visit, so they are hosting others on their own this year. That freed up Gina and Beth for dinner with us. Gina recently had a pretty major surgery on her foot anyway, and this probably made for a less stressful Christmas Eve for her than it otherwise might have been. (That said, Dad and Sherri had gone over to their house in the morning, when David and Jackie and their two small children were there.)

I also do this every year, so here's a log of the Christmas Eve Dinner counts since 2012 (*asterisked years include Jennifer):

2012: 5
2013: 9*
2014: 4 [at Lemon Grass]
2015: 7*
2016: 11*
2017: 7* [at Applebee's due to Emperor's Palace snow closure]
2018: 10*
2019: 8*
2020: 0
2021: 3
2022: 8*
2023: 10*

This year was, indeed, the most we've had for Christmas Eve dinner, not just since before covid, but since 2018.

Gina and Beth declined to come to the house after dinner ("I'm all peopled out!" Gina said), but Jennifer and her family did. Dad had hoped we could play some games, particularly the national parks game Gina and Beth gave him for Christmas last year, which I guess he has now enjoyed playing several times. But, only up to five people can play, and there were too many of us. Instead, we all just sat in the living room visiting for maybe two and a half hours. During this time, both Jennifer, and Dad and Sherri, opened their calendar gifts.

The theme this year was Australia, because of our trip there this year. I kind of unnecessarily worried that people wouldn't be that into it, because I've actually done that very same theme before—for Christmas 2020, on the 2021 calendars I made, after our first trip to Australia, in early 2020. No one seemed to even remember that, though, and everyone who opened a calendar with me around seemed to really love them, the Australia photos for each month as well as the photos I always put in the grids for birthdays and anniversaries.

Jennifer & company left around 9:00, at which time Dad was somewhat surprisingly game for going over to check out "Oly Lightstravaganza," a huge light display at a house all of about half a mile from Dad and Sherri's house. I was happy to just walk if I needed to, but Dad said he'd drive us (Sherri didn't feel like doing). This ultimately made Shobhit happy, because he didn't want to have to wait until dark on Christmas Day to go look at it, thereby delaying our drive back home that evening.

Between Oly Lightstravaganza and Wilson St Winter Wonderland, I keep all of those photo albums in one collection on Flickr, for Olympia holiday light displays. We only went to Wilson St last year and the year before (though we did try Oly Lightstravaganza last year on our way back out of town, only to discover we were too early and the lights weren't turned on yet), so I hadn't seen this one since 2020. And that year, of course, there were social distancing measures in place, so I hadn't seen it presented as normal since 2019. It's basically the same, so I'll be happy to skip it next year, and maybe go back to Wilson Street again. Still, it's very pretty.

I brought my laptop with me, so I could process photos as I went along, even for only a one-night visit. I love having that laptop to travel with, it's been such a game changer for me. I worked on photos for a bit after getting back from the lights, but then we getting too tired and so I went to bed.

So that brings us to Christmas, and . . .

Christmas 2023 Roll Call!

1. Dad
2. Sherri
3. Angel
4. Brandi [Angel's daughter, my niece]
5. Nick [Brandi's husband]
6. Jaycee [Brandi and Nick's daughter]
7. Gianni [Brandi and Nick's son]
8. Enzo [Brandi and Nick's toddler]
9. Britni [Angel's daughter]
10. Gina
11. Beth
12. Matthew
13. Shobhit
14. Wendy [Sherri's sister]

I might as well also get this out of the way, the Christmas Roll Call history:

2011: 11
2012: 28
2013: 16
2014: 20
2015: 33
2016: 9
2017: 15
2018: 20
2019: 20
2020: 8 [four in person, just Dad and Sherri, Shobhit and me; four at a separate time on Zoom]
2021: 19
2022: 17
2023: 14

The number we have at Christmas really seems to go up and down over the years—this year being the smallest number there's been in a non-covid year since 2016. (Ricky and his family were scheduled to come over for leftovers today, apparently not having had the time to make it yesterday; I already noted that David and Jackie came to Gina and Beth's on Christmas Eve morning.)

This was also the first Christmas hosted at Dad and Sherri's house since the pandemic—Gina and Beth have hosted the past two years, as well as hosting most other holidays. They hosted Thanksgiving this year too, but with the state of Gina's foot, they were happy to hand the hosting duties back over to Dad and Sherri for this year, which it sounds like Dad has kind of missed doing anyway. But, somewhat to my disappointment, since they did Christmas this year, Dad opted not to do a New Year's Day family get-together after all, and says that assuming Christmas will shift back to Gina's and Beth's again next year, he'll probably get back to the New Year's gathering again then.

This might work out okay for me this year anyway. Shobhit called Faith to wish her a Merry Christmas, and when he suggested she fly up from Palm Springs to spend New Year's Eve with us, she sounded surprisingly into the idea. I'm skeptical of her actually following through on that, but it would be really fun, in which case I'd be otherwise occupied for the whole holiday weekend anyway. If that doesn't happen, then I'm hoping, if he's available and at home, I can just take Shobhit's car while he works New Year's Day and go hang out for a bit with Gabriel, perhaps watch a movie.

Speaking of covid, just like last year, there's been a clear uptick in infections, and several friends and family have posted to scocials about having to stay home for Christmas due to testing positive. It's made me a little paranoid, but I did test just for peace of mind before leaving on Sunday morning, and I was negative. I mentioned this to Dad and Sherri later that evening, and they hadn't tested that day, though Sherri had tested just a few days before, as she does relatively frequently, apparently, due to other ailments that leave her frequently fatigued, and this years-long chronic cough that has nothing to do with covid. Dad went ahead and tested while we were hanging out before dinner on Christmas Eve, and he was negative as well.

If I had to guess, no one else I hung out with on Christmas Eve or Christmas Day did a covid test. But, well, I did my part. Thankfully no one in our family was sick this year.

And: even with the number of people who didn't make it to the house this year, I was able to give all but three of the calendars—for South Puget Sound people, anyway—in person. The only ones that had to be taken by others to pass on later were David and Jackie's (which Gina took), and both Ricky's and Alex and Caitlin's (which Angel took).

When Brandi and Nick opened their calendar, it was like a Big Family Event, both because they clearly love the calendars and look forward to them every year, and because, among all my nieces and nephews, their family is currently the biggest, with three kids. And they were all eager to find out what photo I used for their birthdays in the grid pages. Jaycee, who is 14, was of course unhappy with my choice, but she seems to be at an age where she's unhappy with everything. (When I quickly managed to snap this very sweet shot, she said, "I saw that. Delete it. Delete it." I was like, "Nope. Nope." I refuse!)

Anyway, Shobhit arrived at the house, having driven from Seattle, at about 10:30. It was well after noon before anyone else arrived. And to be perfectly honest, once we got to our peak of 14 people, I was perfectly happy for it not to be more—the cacophony from just that many people was more than enough. Even when Beth was trying to state the rules of the White Elephant gift exchange, she had to quiet everyone down.

I'll mention just a few things about the gift exchange, in which both Shobhit and I participated. Shobhit gifted a Seattle Kraken scarf he got for insanely cheap at Bartell Drugs when it was closing, was sure it would be popular, I was skeptical it would be, and Shobhit was right: Nick opened the gift, was super happy with it, and then was bummed when Wendy stole it from him. The gift I got was the "Fuck Off, I'm Adorable" coloring book I bought at Retrofit on Capitol Hill, which really cracked me up, and I guess I was the only one. Being clearly a book of some kind even when wrapped, it was the last gift anyone chose, and Nick opened it after the scarf, which was what he really wanted, was stolen from him. He was moderately amused by it. Shobhit was convinced Jaycee would be into it, and she insisted she was not. (That said, Brandi has demonstrated how often Jaycee insists she's too cool for whatever, only to get into it later.)

The gift Shobhit opened was both very exciting for him and perfect for him: a set of mixing bowls with both lids and graters that can be fitted into them. Britni very nearly stole it and then changed her mind, so we got to bring that home. The gift I opened was a pair of ThermoFlask insulated bottles, which at first I wasn't that excited about because, just by virtue of working at PCC, I already have countless bottles of that sort. But! Then I realized these have straws, and none of the ones I already have do, and suddenly I was much happier with them, as it will make it much easier to drink drinks I sneak into movie theaters.

Before I forget, I should mention the fruitcake, which has been in the family now in one form or another for 25 years, and most of us are now ready to be done with it—including me. But, I had given it to Angel in 2021. I totally was thinking it was last year, but she forgot to give it to anyone then, and forgot it again this year. She was really excited in 2021 because she'd never gotten it, whereas several of the rest of us had had it more than once. She later posted to Facebook "Entire Family" group that she gave it to Ricky, who had also had it once before, in 2010.

As much as I loved having that fruitcake passed around for two and a half decades, even I think it's more than enough. Ricky should incinerate it. If it ever comes back to me, that's what I'll do with it. After Britni ruined the first one in a defrosted freezer in Hawaii in 2011, and the only replacement one I could find in 2016 was far too much bigger, it's just too much of an inconvenience to whoever has it. God knows our bottom-drawer freezer can't accommodate it anymore.

[posted 12:23 pm]