Hey everybody, sorry for the blogging break, it didn’t even dawn on me to ask Bert if his parents place in France has internet - it doesn’t - or rather, it didn’t, it does now, they got it the day after we left.

Anyway Christmas was pretty good. We didn’t have snow in France but then again there was no snow here so I didn’t feel like I was missing out. Berts family actually avoided all of the expected stresses - there was no pressure to go skiing every day, Bert and his brother didn’t spend every meal throwing around insults like ‘you naive communist’ and ‘you heartless capitalist’, and everybody was still talking to everybody else by the time we left.

In my books (with my rather tumultuous family) that is a successful Christmas.

Due to a decided lack of luggage space Bert and I decided to split Christmas into two parts so we didn’t have to lug presents half way around the world and back again. So we get Christmas tomorrow as well (yay).

Last night I pulled out the presents I wrapped for Bert before I left and there is one that I can’t for the life of me remember. I’ve tried poking and shaking it to see if it jogs any memories of what I may have bought but I’m not getting any tickles of recolection. In a way I’m almost as excited about finding out what the mystery package for Bert is as I am about getting my own presents.

Anyway, I am back at work now so I should actually get back to work.

I am officially on holiday as of 5pm tonight. Yay! Anyway I thought I’d take a moment to reflect upon the Christmas season – which I love – and share a few holiday stories.

The other night I was up on a ladder in the middle of the sidewalk slinging Christmas lights into our tree. While I was up there five different men walked by as said either ‘thank you’ or ‘looking good. I thought that it was very nice of them to voice their appreciation for our Christmas spirit. Bert thought they were talking about my ass.

Bert was Santa at the office kids Christmas party and he was great, which is a good thing because the whole office is still talking about the time five years ago when Santa was from Kenya and started talking in Swahili to a colleague’s child. All of the kids apparently caught his ‘mistake’ and decided he couldn’t be the real thing because “Santa can’t speak Swahili”. Why, I want to know, can’t Santa speak Swahili? Isn’t Santa here for all the worlds’ children? What ever happened to North Pole magic? Luckily the only thing the kids noticed about Bert was that he’s a tad on the skinny side – he told them that Mrs. Claus put him on a diet.

I went to the dollar store to buy the dog her Christmas present but with Bert in France and me at work all day she’s been so sad and clingy. So I decided that instead of cheaping out with a dollar store bone I would bring Meeka something fancy from France so that she can celebrate Christmas with us when we get back on the 27^th. So I gave her the bone last night and she loved it. And since it took her a good half hour to work her way through it, I was able to avoid a half hour of sad dog eyes – totally worth the dollar (actually, 50 cents, it was a two-pack).

So, every night for the past three weeks or so I’ve climbed into bed to the serenade of a high-pitched squeal.

“I can’t hear it” Bert said,

“Oh,” I bragged, “I guess I just have better hearing than you.”

“Yeah.” Bert conceded not at all impressed by my super-ears, “it’s probably the hot tub”

Unfortunately we couldn’t turn the hot tub off at night for fear of freezing pipes. Until, that is, we finally shut the hot tub down for the season. I climbed into bed that night ready to drift off in blissfull silence.

“Uh Bert. I still hear the squeal. Is the heating turned on?”

“No”

“What about the computer?”

“No”

“The printer?”

“No”

“The humidifier”

“We don’t have a humidifier”

On and on but there was nothing that could possibly be squealing. And Bert still couldn’t hear a thing.

Then it dawned on me, ever since I got back from my last business trip the heating in my office has been making a high pitched squeal. I keep calling the people to fix it and they kept making it go away…OR SO I THOUGHT.

It turns out that they’ve just been turning the volume of the squeal down and, after a full day at the office listening to the squeal, my brain’s been creating some sort of memory of what I’m hearing in the office.

It’s totally true - when I plug my ears the squeal gets louder.

1. The other day Bert and I were walking along when we saw a mailman (hat, bag of letters and all) climbing into a cab - I wonder what happened to his truck?

2. My Mom was in Halifax and was followed along the sidewalk by a drunk midget with a three legged walker (please note that the walker was supposed to have four legs).

3. Creepy George from the dog park at 8am on Sunday stopping by and inviting himself in because ‘he hadn’t seen me in a while’ as I stood in my bathrobe yelling for Bert - who showed up in his boxer briefs.

4. Bert dressed as Santa - actually that was less odd and more cute, he really made a very good Santa although one or two kids thought he was too skinny.

My brother in law got some really bad news yesterday about a ‘sure thing’ job that ended up being somewhat less than sure. My first reaction was shock and disbelief, followed by pity (the good kind) followed by a dull acceptance. Until about 3am this morning when it suddenly dawned on me that Bert and I have stopped planning.

I have always possessed a constant urge to plan. I like to anticipate what’s coming around the corner and, even though life is unpredictable and plans tend to turn into twisted incarnations of their once-perfect selves, having a plan has never hurt – so far.

The problem is that life is pretty comfortable right now so I’ve been lulled into a false sense of stability. Never mind that if we want to have kids we need to get cracking. Never mind that Bert is aiming for 2010 but we have no idea what will happen after that. Never mind that if I stay in the office I’m in for more than five-years my career will stagnate.

Never mind, that is, until 3am this morning when suddenly it became critically important to start planning again.

Poor Bert, when he kissed me good night all was well, when he grunted good morning, I had tipped everything on edge.

So I have a plan…