![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
A Festivus for the rest of us
Dec. 17th, 2005 11:20 pm
High temp today, here: -4. Dewpoint then: -8. High dewpoint: -8.
High temp today in TO: -3. Dewpoint then: -7. High dewpoint: -7.
Yes, so, today I have been to the Kitchener market--Your Kitchener Market (TM)--supposing that something Christmas-presenty might be found there. I contemplated cheeses and apple butter and empire cookies. I think it's a relatively crappy market, which I'd suspected it would be since the Mennonites and the tourists are all up the road at St. Jacobs, but, you know, seeing as it was a Christmas shopping trip, I was going to have a bad time anyway, so.
And then I went to used bookstores, and had a much better time, despite the fact that I actually did buy Christmas presents at them (serendipitously ancient and obscure biographies of Frederick G. Gardiner and William Lyon Mackenzie), and not at Your Kitchener Market (TM). I also bought a copy of Peer Gynt--a.g.b. Book of the Month for January (as if I didn't have enough to do before January)--which I had come to believe did not exist in mass-market paperback form. (Every other used bookstore I've looked in has piles of Hedda Gabbler and A Doll's House and something about a duck or something, but no Peer Gynt.) And a copy of English-Speaking Justice by George Grant, which is one of those books I stare at blankly for a couple of minutes at The World's Biggest Bookstore whenever I have Chapters gift cards to burn and no idea what to burn them on, for $3. And children's bibles for L.
Elsewhere, I purchased a Christmas card. Actually, a holiday card, after briefly being tempted by a Christmas/Hanukkah fusion card. I believe I have never bought any such card before--Christmas, holiday, Hanukkah, Festivus, what-have-you. I think I's growed up now. But mostly I remark on this because immediately above my holiday card was another holiday card with chickadees on it, and these chickadees had pink chests. Now, the thing is, last week, I learned that both L. and her mother are somehow possessed of the misperception that chickadees have pink chests, which they manifestly do not. And now here's this card. What the hell is up with that?
I also enjoyed the "Patriotic" section of cards. I guess you gotta take what Hallmark sends you, and I guess it ain't worth Hallmark's time to send out different batches to foreigners. The one I looked at had American flags on the front, and inside it said, "I was thinking about what's wonderful about America, and of course I thought of you." I suppose it had a picture of a Christmas tree or something. I should've bought it for the kitsch value. Then again, probably best not to encourage them. Merry Christmas, Santa Claus.
Still banging away at that paper. This must end tonight!
High temp today in TO: -3. Dewpoint then: -7. High dewpoint: -7.
Yes, so, today I have been to the Kitchener market--Your Kitchener Market (TM)--supposing that something Christmas-presenty might be found there. I contemplated cheeses and apple butter and empire cookies. I think it's a relatively crappy market, which I'd suspected it would be since the Mennonites and the tourists are all up the road at St. Jacobs, but, you know, seeing as it was a Christmas shopping trip, I was going to have a bad time anyway, so.
And then I went to used bookstores, and had a much better time, despite the fact that I actually did buy Christmas presents at them (serendipitously ancient and obscure biographies of Frederick G. Gardiner and William Lyon Mackenzie), and not at Your Kitchener Market (TM). I also bought a copy of Peer Gynt--a.g.b. Book of the Month for January (as if I didn't have enough to do before January)--which I had come to believe did not exist in mass-market paperback form. (Every other used bookstore I've looked in has piles of Hedda Gabbler and A Doll's House and something about a duck or something, but no Peer Gynt.) And a copy of English-Speaking Justice by George Grant, which is one of those books I stare at blankly for a couple of minutes at The World's Biggest Bookstore whenever I have Chapters gift cards to burn and no idea what to burn them on, for $3. And children's bibles for L.
Elsewhere, I purchased a Christmas card. Actually, a holiday card, after briefly being tempted by a Christmas/Hanukkah fusion card. I believe I have never bought any such card before--Christmas, holiday, Hanukkah, Festivus, what-have-you. I think I's growed up now. But mostly I remark on this because immediately above my holiday card was another holiday card with chickadees on it, and these chickadees had pink chests. Now, the thing is, last week, I learned that both L. and her mother are somehow possessed of the misperception that chickadees have pink chests, which they manifestly do not. And now here's this card. What the hell is up with that?
I also enjoyed the "Patriotic" section of cards. I guess you gotta take what Hallmark sends you, and I guess it ain't worth Hallmark's time to send out different batches to foreigners. The one I looked at had American flags on the front, and inside it said, "I was thinking about what's wonderful about America, and of course I thought of you." I suppose it had a picture of a Christmas tree or something. I should've bought it for the kitsch value. Then again, probably best not to encourage them. Merry Christmas, Santa Claus.
Still banging away at that paper. This must end tonight!
