Yes, I was insane last night. Yes, I have survived the party. Here, at LA's request:The Hubs, if anything, wanted to go less than I did. We are apparently perfectly matched in terms of social anxiety. But we went. It was not exactly what I expected, which, I suppose, was the worst. There was no loud music playing, so the noise levels were managable. It was not a crowd of dozens of people milling around a buffet. There were about 25 people seated at three tables, a sit-down meal. (I hate eating at buffets, for a whole lot of reasons.) Although I was introduced to, more or less, everyone, I only had to make actual conversation with four or five people. One of these turned out to be a woman I'd met several times before, with whom the Hubs had worked years ago at another place, and who recently came to work for his current place as well. So I sort of already knew her. Probably the least desirable aspect of the evening was that the Hubs' boss sat on my deaf side. But that worked out okay, too.
I didn't partake of the appetizers, but my plan to eat very little was pretty much shot because, as I say, the boss was right next to me and it seemed rude not to eat the meal he was providing. But I didn't eat the potatoes, and had a reasonable amount of the chicken, and no dessert. I did have after-dinner coffee, decaf of course, which turned out to be a mistake.
Without going into what the Hubs actually does, which is a somewhat narrow field in which he has worked since he had a grunt-type job in it while he was in law school, let me say this: he is quite clearly heaven's gift to these people. I've mentioned this before, but it bears repeating, because whenever I meet someone he works with, or who knows him, or who has ever worked with him, they sing his praises, and they're not kidding. When R did the same grunt-work for a couple of summers, and she would tell people her name, they would say "Oh! Is your dad ... ?" and say it with awe. On the way home last night, the Hubs said "I think they have an over-inflated opinion of me." "Yeah," I said; "I think you have an under-inflated opinion of you."
When I got home, I got into a rather lengthy discussion with K on religion, politics, the death penalty, the conservative right, and more. I think we talked for two hours. I was growing somewhat amazed that I was not falling asleep mid-sentence, but finally, around 12:30, I realized that I had to go to bed. I didn't fall asleep until 4:00. You know, there's that bit of caf in decaf. I forgot. Having even decaf that late at night turns out to be not a good plan for me. I had to get up at 7:00 this morning, and I think I spent the first twenty minutes that I was awake murmuring "Oh! What a horrible night!" over and over.
I went for my weekly weigh-in this morning, and it was not the disaster I expected. I don't know that I lost, but it doesn't appear that I gained. I don't know how this is possible. When I weighed myself at home Thursday and Friday mornings, I practically cried. But it was okay, even after eating cookies around 2:30 this morning, when I finally got out of bed.
The highways were empty this morning. I know it was still early, but I expected way more traffic. I was in Best Buy around 8:00 (got the Citizen Kane) and it was basically empty. After my weigh-in, I dropped by the Big Book Store, since R is working in the cafe this morning, and there was plenty of available parking in the lot, and no customers in the cafe at all. I keep seeing on the news how crowded the malls and stores are, so I was surprised. Even last night, when the Hubs came home to change and so we could go to the party together, he had to pass one of the big malls to get home, and a trip that normally takes ten minutes, fifteen tops, took him an hour.
So now I'm in. I have that last DVD to wrap, and then I'm all done with that. I need to tidy up the mess in the kitchen, since Christmas Eve is one of those few nights a year that the four of us sit down together and eat the same meal.
That's it for me for today. Have a great holiday, everyone!
