Resolute: A New Christmas Eve

I Hereby Absolve ...

I Hereby Dissolve ...

I Hereby Resolve ...
I, Hale McKay, being of sound? mind, do heretofore and hereby solemnly resolve, under duress and witness to the scrutiny of my peers, to make and to adhere to the following resolutions forthwith:

Resolution № 1:
... To cut back smoking to only two packs of cigarettes per day, and to limit such consumption to only after the cessation of sex.

Amendment 1-a: One pack ?

Amendment 1-b: One cigarette ?

Amendment 1-c: On the slim chance sex occurs.

Amendment 2: Cancel Resolution № 1 *¹

*¹(Note: Resolutions should not be onerous, difficult or impossible to achieve.)

I, Hale McKay, being of sound? mind, do heretofore and hereby solemnly resolve, under duress and witness to the scrutiny of my peers, to make and to adhere to the following resolutions forthwith:

Resolution № 2
... To make NO resolutions for the New Year. *²

*² (Note: By making this Resolution, i.e., Resolution № 2, to make NO resolutions, the success to adhere to said Resolution № 2 will be enhanced exponentially.)

The Christmas That Wasn't ... Yet
Have you ever felt like you were just simply struggling to get through life only to have life get in your way? (Raises hand.)

Due to forces beyond our control, Christmas of 2008 will not be an especially memorable or good one for our family, although future references to it will be prefaced by "Do you remember that Christmas when ..."

(Admittedly our misfortune in no way paralleled the lives of those in parts of New York, Massachusetts, Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine who for ten or more days before and after Christmas had to survive without electricity because of a massive ice storm.)

On the last weekend before Christmas we received on Friday evening into Saturday afternoon a foot of snow. Most of Saturday was spent clearing the driveway and sidewalk of the snow. If that wasn't enough of the white stuff, another storm moved in Sunday afternoon and dumped another 5 inches. It got worse. That snowfall turned over into 3 hours of sleet. Naturally the temperature was forecast to and did drop to below freezing.

It just so happened that both my wife and I, because of our work schedules, had earmarked that weekend for Christmas shopping. (If you're keeping score: weekend storms 2, Shopping 0.)

That left us with three shopping days before Christmas: Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday. NO problem! Right? WRONG! There was the certain issue again of work.

I lucked out when one of my clients canceled services for the day on Tuesday, thus freeing up the morning and early afternoon for me. My Christmas shopping was accomplished within those six hours. My wife wasn't so lucky and even had extra hours piled onto her schedule.

Then we learned that my daughter's husband was on call from Christmas Eve through the weekend. It is always possible that there would be no calls and he could be home. Since he works for the cable company and has to answer to problems involving phones, cable TV and the Internet, the prospect of staying home over the holiday was slim and none - and Slim left town.

Next, my daughter found out that her husband's parents would be spending Christmas at the nursing home with the mother-in-law's mother. Was that the final blow? No, of course not! My daughter's sister-in-law and her husband weren't going to be around either having committed to Christmas with his family.

There was only one thing left to do - cancel Christmas. Nah, that wouldn't do, but there was a workable solution - to postpone Christmas until New Year's Day, Jan 1, 2009. It was agreed to by everyone concerned. Thus is born a new holiday - New Christmas Day.

My wife has tomorrow, Tuesday, off. She'll be taking advantage of the time to do her own shopping.

So if on Thursday you happen to hear me say "Merry Christmas" instead of "Happy New Year," you won't think me daft. It'll be because we aren't celebrating Christmas - YET!

Oh yeah, did I mention that last Tuesday from the weight of the melting snow that the roof of our garage collapsed? (That's a story for another day. I think you'll understand that under the circumstances, I don't wish to get into the details of that issue now.)

So Happy Christmas and Merry New Year - Oh, you know what I mean.

№ 1567