And so this is Christmas...

Twas the night before Christmas, but these creatures were anything but silent. More on the escaped lab rats later.

As you know, the Zoo Crew is late with everything and Christmas was no different. The morning started out with Constructo Mom helping the boys build a wooden labyrinth for Opa.

In the middle of Angie's wood shop project, Santa Clause stopped by for coffee.

Note to all: never, ever ask Eisi to play Santa for your children. He sucks.

Eisi is an actor who loves to improvise. When he showed up at our house, he did not even have this creative yet somehow unbrilliant costume. To improvise, he had his killer dog Clooney tear apart Tom's Nerf soccer ball, much to Tom's rather loud disappointment. Thanks again, Cujo!

What Eisi lacked in role playing, he made up for with his keen ability to keep yappity kids quiet for ten minutes. Please stay.

After Santa and Cujo left, we hit the road to Grams and Opa's. We left the house an hour after we were supposed to be there, so Grams and Opa had already started fighting with the tangled Christmas lights.


'No, take your side under and....'

'Wrong! It's your side that's crossed. You need to...'

'Not over - under!'

'Quit pulling!'

The Grams and Opa show continued on for fifteen minutes until they finally untangled the big ball of knots. In the end, we did not even need the third string of lights. The first two (untangled to begin with, I might add) were enough to do the trick. At least the show was entertaining, but act II was awesome! These three goofy-looking kids got on stage and amazed the crowd by dropping round, painted glass thingies on the floor without breaking them.

After the animals finished, we stood back to admire the tree. Somehow, the density of ornaments was slightly higher towards the bottom half of the tree. Tall Mama stood in to undisproportionate things. What - that's a word, isn't it?

After Big Bird saved the day, Grams taught the boys how to play Dominoes.

At the mention of Dominoes, I thought the boys would start salivating for pizza. They knew that Mama wasn't cooking, though, so Pavlov had no chance.

Act III was a poem recital from Peter.

Despite what it looks like, Peter can not read. I'm not worried now, but if this is still the case in ten years, I can only hope that Hooked on Phonics is still around. Peter sounded like the Scatman as he speed-read the memorized story. In the middle, Tom started crying and David decided it was the right time to bust out his Michael Jackson moves in front of the main speaker. Somehow, the presenter lost focus and forgot the last couple verses. Luckily, Peter didn't mind - he was still grinning like the village idiot, only smarter.

After the bedtime story, we brought the boys upstairs to get ready for bed. This is always an hour-long task, which gave Santa plenty of time to dump his load under the tree. Just before pajama time, a booming and rather sexy voice rang out.

'HO-HO-HO!'

I, along with the entire neighborhood, could hear Peter screaming that he had seen Santa flying away as they both tore down the steps.

When he saw the BIG LOOT, Peter decided it was time for the White Boy Dance. Unfortunately, he is not as coordinated as White Boy and wound up whacking David in the forehead with one of his flailing limbs. David managed to suck it up, though. Maybe the mountain of gifts eased the pain a bit.

Tom was mighty nervous about his first present and rightfully so. Peter and David have both given him 'gifts' that have resulted in bruises, swelling and/or nose bleeds. This time, Santa decided to give the little guy something he could retaliate with.

That's right - a hammer! Tom snatched the hammer and began beating the ever-loving shit out of the plastic balls without us even explaining the game to him. Barb walked in on Tom in the middle of his furious frenzy and summed it up with a name - Temper Tom. It's kinda like Destructo Dave, only David always laughs when he breaks shit. Tom was scowling as he went to work on his new toy.

To pry the hammer from Temper Tom's clenched fists, we gave him another one of his eight million gifts.

It's not loud, it does not have a zillion pieces that 'someone' has to build, Tom cannot bludgeon guilty siblings with it, and best of all - it forces him to burn energy as he races up and down the hallway with it. Right on, right on, Santa!

Now, Santa - when you're good, you're good. Quiet, easy to build, not dangerous - all good. But, come on - what the hell were you thinking with this one?

What Angie is looking at is page 26 of the 500 page manual to put this freakin' castle together. It certainly wasn't quiet, since the boys started killing each other to play with it before it was even built. I think the last statement already addresses the danger aspect. Bad Santa! When it comes to building colossal pieces of castle, alcohol helps.

I don't know if the castle was really sober upon completion, but Maiden Mama didn't care. Luckily, the boys didn't either.

All good things must come to an end so that the adults can play games and drink heavily. At least Christmas had a happy ending.

Despite the boys' failed attempt to choke Opa, they seemed genuinely happy. Until David asked for a glass of water.

'Sure - with bubbles or without?'

'Without.'

'Ok, we have that upstairs. Let's go.'

We said goodnight to everyone and headed up to bed. I gave David his water without bubbles and the meltdown began.

'Water with bubbles.' (crying)

'Yeah, but you said downstairs you wanted without.' (malicious giggling)

'Water with bubbles.' (screaming)

'Yeah, but you said downstairs you wanted without.' (evil snickering)

'Water with bubbles.' (snot-bubbling, full-on freak-out)

'Yeah, but you said downstairs you wanted without.' (hysterical cackling)

Eventually, we got David two waters, one without bubbles and one that was freakin' hilarious. It at least neutralized his argument, which seemed to baffle him. He seriously looked like he was searching for a reason to continue freaking out but since we had the all fronts of the whole 'water battle' covered, he reluctantly went to sleep.

After drinking wine all night, I thought it would be wiser than three men to switch to whiskey when we started playing poker.


Let me just state quite clearly: wine and whiskey for Christmas - not smart. Stupid, if it weren't me. Moronic if it had been Angie. If you're Tommy, I would simply ask you to whack me in the head a few times with a hammer so I know what tomorrow morning will feel like. Bad Santa!
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Ladder Talk: [Bubbly water, wine and whiskey competed with Ladder Talk today; turns out, ladders are not really that competitive]