Saturday, December 25, 2004
Merry Christmouse and other holiday entertainments
For the past few days, we have suspected we were involuntarily harboring a fugitive rodent. Besides hearing odd rustlings in remote locations, the cats were acting more annoyed and frustrated than usual at not being able to walk through walls.
So last night, shortly after finalizing the evening's wrapping detail, Caro said, "Listen! I think...I think there's something moving in the trash can!"
She slowly and carefully picked up the trash can, intending to carry it outside while any theoretical inhabitant of said can huddled at the bottom, frozen in fear. After all, traditionally he should NOT have been stirring at all!
What she did not expect was that it was some sort of steroidal action movie mouse. It scrambled up a discarded wrapping paper tube and right onto her chestal area, eliciting a short but loud and emphatic boarder repelling action.
She went ahead and carried the mouse-free trash out, and of course by the time she was back I had regained both my self-control, my breath and my sense of self-preservation. And I really WAS sorry for laughing.
What was really funny was that what was probably the same mouse got back into the EMPTY trash can in the night, and this time he WAS successfully evicted!
We settled down for our long winter's nap, and Mike even let us sleep kinda sorta late--Caro got up around 7 and I snoozed in until almost 8! Then we opened pressies, and I settled in to help Mike with his favorite, an exercise in long-distance passive-aggressive manufactural sadism called "Marble Odyssey".
It looked harmless enough on the shelf. Mike called it a marble roller coaster and I didn't think it would be too hard for him, as the minimum age listed on the box was 8. What I wasn't counting on was a minimalist instruction page with very small blurry pics and diagrams (words must be too expensive to use), some of which are either incorrect or printed with register error so that you can't quite tell which of two diverging images is correct. Also, the design engineer is either a descendant of Escher or from some alternate universe where three dimensional construction is only one of many options....
We called it quits for a while to go over to eat and be merry with Damaris, Nigel, his dad and wife/girlfriend, and the grands. It was a great meal, and afterwards we had fun playing some new version of Uno, Full Contact or some such. Very entertaining.
Back at home, I spent another fruitless couple of hours trying to complete the basic model of Marble Odyssey. It occurs to me that this toy may have been deliberately named, and one is supposed to get that it is a theoretically routine task which will end up taking you twenty years to accomplish.
Anyway, now I am winding down catching up on my e-stuff. My plan is to get to bed early because tomorrow we are arising before dawn to head to Wal-mart and let Mr. Mike fulfill his youthful dream of acquiring a blinking, glowing, flashing sign that says "Santa Stop Here" at 75% off....
Either that or a solar powered lighthouse garden marker.
So last night, shortly after finalizing the evening's wrapping detail, Caro said, "Listen! I think...I think there's something moving in the trash can!"
She slowly and carefully picked up the trash can, intending to carry it outside while any theoretical inhabitant of said can huddled at the bottom, frozen in fear. After all, traditionally he should NOT have been stirring at all!
What she did not expect was that it was some sort of steroidal action movie mouse. It scrambled up a discarded wrapping paper tube and right onto her chestal area, eliciting a short but loud and emphatic boarder repelling action.
She went ahead and carried the mouse-free trash out, and of course by the time she was back I had regained both my self-control, my breath and my sense of self-preservation. And I really WAS sorry for laughing.
What was really funny was that what was probably the same mouse got back into the EMPTY trash can in the night, and this time he WAS successfully evicted!
We settled down for our long winter's nap, and Mike even let us sleep kinda sorta late--Caro got up around 7 and I snoozed in until almost 8! Then we opened pressies, and I settled in to help Mike with his favorite, an exercise in long-distance passive-aggressive manufactural sadism called "Marble Odyssey".
It looked harmless enough on the shelf. Mike called it a marble roller coaster and I didn't think it would be too hard for him, as the minimum age listed on the box was 8. What I wasn't counting on was a minimalist instruction page with very small blurry pics and diagrams (words must be too expensive to use), some of which are either incorrect or printed with register error so that you can't quite tell which of two diverging images is correct. Also, the design engineer is either a descendant of Escher or from some alternate universe where three dimensional construction is only one of many options....
We called it quits for a while to go over to eat and be merry with Damaris, Nigel, his dad and wife/girlfriend, and the grands. It was a great meal, and afterwards we had fun playing some new version of Uno, Full Contact or some such. Very entertaining.
Back at home, I spent another fruitless couple of hours trying to complete the basic model of Marble Odyssey. It occurs to me that this toy may have been deliberately named, and one is supposed to get that it is a theoretically routine task which will end up taking you twenty years to accomplish.
Anyway, now I am winding down catching up on my e-stuff. My plan is to get to bed early because tomorrow we are arising before dawn to head to Wal-mart and let Mr. Mike fulfill his youthful dream of acquiring a blinking, glowing, flashing sign that says "Santa Stop Here" at 75% off....
Either that or a solar powered lighthouse garden marker.
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