Lazy Weekend

Christmas has already come and gone. Every year there is a huge build up beforehand, and when he big day comes around so much time is spent reciting the script of "tradition" that it's almost impossible to enjoy the actual day. Everybody has their routine for the day, and as a newly-married couple Dana and I spend our time driving back and forth to participate in all of it.

As Scrooge-like as I can be, it can be a pleasant day when you get down to it. The giving and receiving of gifts is always fun, and it's interesting to see what kinds of stuff people think that other people will want/use/appreciate. Knowing the recipient well enables the gift-giver to give a better gift then those who do not. Also, having a maintained and well-advertised Amazon wishlist can help improve your odds of getting the things that one wants.

Geoff wins the award for most novel gift (or at least the most novel delivery). He bought me MegaMan 9 and Lost Winds for the Wii. He paid the points and had the games downloaded to my console on Christmas morning. I've played Megaman 9 a little bit since then and am markedly terrible at it. I can't tell if my platforming skillz have substantially degraded since the 90s or whether 9 has a so much higher a difficulty level then some of my favorites (2, 3, and 4) did.

Dana's mother, always the consumate gift-giver, got a bunch of small but useful things for me. I picked up a few new CDs for the long commute, a few good technical books, and a few videogames. Dana and I have spent the last few days playing Guitar Hero 3, Wii Fit, and the new Mario Kart. I'm sure I'll write more about some of the books I got in the coming weeks as I read through them more and start applying the cool new things I learn.

Lazing around is great since I've been a little bit under the weather, with a fever and swollen glands and the whole works. Tomorrow isn't as lazy since we have Dana's family coming over for lunch and we have to clean the apartment. I haven't done any work on Wikibooks or Parrot this weekend, which is a little bit unusual for me. I usually manage to fritter away a few hours each weekend on one or both of those projects, but I guess I just needed the time off. Instead, I've been catching up on old episodes of Questionable Content, a fun webcomic that I've become completely addicted to. I've spent a few hours reading from episode 1, and I'm already up to episode 720. Only about 300 more episodes to get through until I'm completely caught up!

No idea what we're going to do for New Years, I'm sure I'll have something to post about it as we get closer.