festive

We got the tree today, a seven-foot Noble Fir. After looking at practically every tree available at the nursery, I naturally managed to pick the one that sort of leans to one side. It also happened to be the prettiest one, so after propping up two of the tree stand's legs with a plank, it's mostly straight, and that's good enough for me. I was tired of wrestling with it at that point, and wanted to sit down and not think about Christmas trees for a few minutes. After letting it rest for a few hours, I decorated it, put up one more string of lights on the French windows that lead into the conservatory, swapped out a palm and an aspidistra for a couple of poinsettias, and pronounced the house decorated. I bought a wreath yesterday as well, only to discover that the super suction hook I bought wouldn't work on the outside of our front door, because of the leaded beading on the stained glass. It works on the inside well enough, though, so screw my neighbours' view of my house. It looks pretty in the entrance hall. It's so goddamn festive around here I can hardly stand it.

As a pleasant change to my usual experience when I get all the fairy lights out, none had mysteriously died over the course of the previous year. This is a first for us, since usually the decorating of the tree is delayed by my discovery that my lights don't work, the swearing because my lights don't work, and the debate about whether we can make it to the shops on time before they close to buy new lights that probably won't work when we get them home. (This has actually happened.) So I was fully prepared for the worst, considering that last year, instead of very carefully wrapping the lights up and putting them away in a safe place when we were done with them, I stuffed them into an old plastic carrier bag, and shoved them in the bottom of the ornament box, saying, at the time, that they weren't going to work when I got them out again, so why bother with the usual caution? Clearly, it pays to be lazy and careless, so I will make sure to do the same again this time.

So, all is well with the slightly-crooked tree, except the angel won't sit straight on the top, and even if we trim the tip of the tree, I don't think it's going to work this year. We started kicking around ideas for what else we can use in lieu of the angel (who looks very pretty sitting on the shelf just inside our front door), and I mentioned to Phil that Jennipur had Cthulu on top of her tree, and he immediately became madly jealous, because we have no Cthulu to spread tentacled holiday cheer and terror. So I'll be looking for something else, and if only I thought they'd arrive on time, I'd go for one of these, because what's more seasonal than the common cold or stomach ache?