I Lied......

       Yep, I lied......I told you in November that I would not be going back "to town" or Walmart until 2012, totally skipping going even close to any place that would have holiday shoppers.  This weekend, yes, the last Saturday before the Saturday that will be Christmas eve, I went "to town."  My youngest daughter, Casey, had put off shopping.  Back in November when I did my Christmas shopping she saw a glow worm at Target and said oh she loved her glow worm when she was little and wouldn't Taylor like it (her niece, my granddaughter).  That was the day I bought the doll Taylor fell in love with right there in the store so I told my daughter get it now because if she waits she will never find one again and besides, who wants to go shopping in December....so she got it.  That day my grandsons also showed her what they wanted for Christmas from her but she didn't get it because they were with us, and unlike Taylor, they are old enough to realize she put it in the basket.  I might add, at that time back in November the shelf was stocked with plenty of the items they wanted for Christmas.....a Hero Factory thing.  I don't know what they are other than a Lego thing so I won't even try to explain but the boxes have different names on them and you collect them all of course and they asked for specific ones.  Okay, here we are 6 weeks later....Saturday the 17th of December and I ask her if she ever bought presents for the boys.  Uh, no, but she will next week.  Seriously, the week of Christmas????  I pointed out that we are suppose to have 10 inches of snow Tuesday morning, does she really want to put it off? so here we go.  We go to our big Toys R Us.....parking lot was full, there were 3 empty baskets in the store, and wall to wall people.  Guess what?  They had about 3 Hero Factory boxes on the shelf....one Mason wanted but they didn't have the specific one Travis asked her for.  Get the one and we go to Target.  Guess what?  parking lot was full.  There were 3 empty baskets in the Target store (3 seems to be the magic number for baskets in this story) and wall to wall people.   Their supply of Hero Factory was similarly depleted and they didn't have the one Travis wanted but she got one of the other 2 or 3 they had and we hope he doesn't already have this guy.  Then, also this weekend, I realized I was almost out of dog food and that blizzard is coming so I told my other daughter I was going to PetSmart.  She told me Mother, you have no business going in PetSmart.....people will have their dogs in there (meaning you will see a schnauzer and you will turn into a bawling mess because Max just died and you won't be able to drive home)...told me I needed to go to Walmart instead.  Did I take her advice? Yes, I went to Walmart, the Saturday before Christmas week.  Well, oh my gosh, I should have gone to PetSmart.  It couldn't have been as packed and I was about to bawl when I saw Max's favorite kind of doggy treats on the shelf and thought how he always loved getting new toys for Christmas when the kids opened their presents.  And have I mentioned that Casey and I both suffer with anxiety and hate to be around people, crowds, mobs and truthfully, if we had our druthers would just stay home in our pjs and shop online like sane people, but since we are insane.....
   Yep, I lied.....I said I would NOT be getting on this computer until my entire house had been cleaned top to bottom, end to end.  Well, here I am.  I forgot......

     Yep, I lied......I said I was going to clean house like a mad woman.  Well, not yet...  Saturday I slept until 11:30 a.m. because I stayed up most of the night reading, crying over Max, thinking, reading, laying there trying to go to sleep then Casey and I went to town and stayed until time for supper then she came home with me and we watched one of our favorite Christmas movies. Saturday night was a repeat of Friday night....I stayed up playing Mahjongg on the aarp website, reading, thinking, laying there trying to go to sleep.... and slept til 11 a.m. Sunday morning.  Got up when my youngest son called to see if I would have lunch with him, did that, then he and I went to my oldest son's house for a bit, went to my oldest daughter's house and hung out with my grandsons for the afternoon.  Finally, the time had come when I had to tell them about Max......we can't keep them from coming to my house much longer.  They are 10 and 11......we have had Max all their lives and they loved him dearly.  By then my youngest daughter was there too so both my girls, me and my grandsons cried and cried.  By the time I got home from that it was time for supper and collapse in my chair from the exhaustion of telling the boys and us having a cry.  I watched The Santa Clause 3, read the New Mexico magazine that came yesterday and didn't do anything else.  Oh well, the weatherman says it will start raining in the morning, rain all day until night when it will freeze over into black ice on the streets, then it will start to snow and by Tuesday morning we will have 8 to 10 inches of snow...16 inches for the area in the panhandle north of us.  I will have plenty of time Monday and Tuesday to clean house as I won't be getting out.  I already told my son that  won't be babysitting Tuesday if we have 10 inches of snow because I won't be able to get out of my driveway.   I am actually looking forward to the snow.  We need the moisture and it will be so very pretty.   It will seem like Christmas.  Wait, I lied....what am I thinking, I am not looking forward to 10 inches of snow....my two little girl dogs won't want to go outside and when they do they will track mud in on the carpet for a week or two.  I will have to get through it to take the trash and get the mail (my mailbox is across the street), I will eventually have to get out and drive in it, all that frozen rain on the trees and electric lines means power might go out and my house is all electric meaning my pipes will freeze, and I will freeze.... okay, I am going to stop borrowing trouble now and go play mahjongg.........