We had a really good Christmas Eve followed by our Christmas and birthday celebration for our Christmas babe Brandon but as usual I’m now ready for it to be done and put away. I’m going to squash that urge until New Year’s Day, however.
We watched three different versions of “A Christmas Carol” (Albert Finney, George C. Scott, and the Muppets). We ate tenderloin and burned Twisted Peppermint candles and the kid made an enormous birthday cake liberally decorated with sprinkles and buttercream and on Boxing Day we saw our big budget Christmas movie of choice “Nosferatu” (yep) and ate a square ton of buttered popcorn and I went to bed feeling sick and full as a tick.
(“Nosferatu” was interesting. I suppose I was expecting it to be a straight Dracula retelling but over our brewery dinner debrief, Brandon educated me that the original version was actually a ripoff of Bram Stoker, which explained the changes (England to Germany, different character names, some characters changed, amalgamated or removed altogether, etc.) I enjoyed all the key performances- Lily-Rose Depp gave an impressive turn in a role that was originally intended for Anya Taylor-Joy and showed she’s more than a nepo baby. I thought she was eerily reminiscent of Keira Knightley. Nicholas Hoult was also impressive (hard to forget, though, that he was the gawky kid from “About a Boy” and quite goofy in The Great (HUZZAH)) and Willem Dafoe always serves. Bill Skarsgård was a fine Count Orlak although in certain lights he sort of seemed like a demonic Omar Sharif as Zhivago and I’d kind of like to see him take on a totally different role next time – how about a romantic lead? I think he’s playing the Crow soon so that may scratch that itch.)
This morning we were up early to take Brandon to the airport as he’s headed out for a weekend with family. After I got home from the airport drop I got out for a three mile run. It’s mild and damp here in Southeast Michigan and the dark-eyed winter junco birds don’t quite know what to do with themselves. I came home with mud splattered up to my calves; I made more coffee, had a hot shower, got back into pajamas, and pulled out my old copy of “The Gentle Art of Domesticity” and my knitting.
I am looking forward to being full feral while he’s gone. There’s always the niggling feeling that I should be participating in some form of capitalism during this time off but for once in my life I’m going to ignore that. There’s a frozen pizza in the freezer, I have a ton of Vlogmas to catch up on, the kid has soccer and mall returns and exchanges, and I’d like to finish one more book in 2024*. I need to make progress on knitting my Christmas socks before I get sick of Christmas colors! There will be time to catch up on emails and bills next week, move into my 2025 Hobonichi, and feel dissatisfied that I haven’t monetized any hobbies. In the meantime, as Nicholas Hoult would say whilst playing one of his other acting roles, huzzah!
*Stay tuned next week for my Big Book Recap of 2024 which may or may not be interesting to fellow book lovers!
Six Ten 