for what ive done

Home, home, home. I cruised in yesterday afternoon after taking an excrutiating 3+ hours to drive the moderate 110 miles from Davis. My car = unhappy and in duress. Hopefully my mechanic can figure out what's wrong with it (and not to the tune of $3,600 - thanks a lot SpeeDee in Woodland) while I'm in Oklahoma next week.

For the first time in many years I'm actually looking forward to my trip to the midwest. I love my grandparents, but there is little to do on the ranch now that we are all older and my grandma is not well. While I normally anticipate with dread 4 days of sitting on the couch, cross-stitching, knitting, reading, overeating, and napping, this year I'm eagerly looking forward to 4 days of writing my thesis (and overeating). Hopefully I can get the bulk of the data analysis finished and write up a lot of the observational data so I don't have to worry about it anymore.... I'm throwing myself a huge party in March when this is finished.

Christmas this year should be pretty low-key. We're doing brunch on Tuesday, which is new, but I'm looking forward to it because it means less awkward-time with the cousins and more quality-time with my immediate family. I'm also way looking forward to the present giving and receiving this year. I did an excellent job of gift selection this year (Burberry Brit for Mom, the fashionista and The Lost and Biggest Brother for Dad, my true literary soul mate) and, for the first time in many years, I have absolutely no clue what my parents got me. Of course, it's not the gifts that are important, it's the time spent with my fabulous fam, but we get more creative every year and it's fun to see what everyone comes up with. Except my brother, who never gets anyone anything.

I also bought some sweet books today to take with me to Oklahoma (you know, for plane rides and study breaks), including The Keep, Second Glance, and Everything After. It's all I can do to keep from digging into them right now. However, I promised myself I would finish my second go-round of Girl Meets God and give Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell a fighting chance (I've been letting it fight for over a year but... you know. I can never leave a book unfinished, no matter how impossible it is to get through), so I'll persevere.

Mmmmm, books.