Sunday, December 27, 2009

Holiday-ditty-oddity

Or why I need a thesaurus and a dictionary to write my Christmas gift tags.


Nearly 8 years ago, I bought my darling husband a set of DVDs for Christmas. You see, we'd been watching The History of Britain on TLC or some other channel that entire fall. Now, it's a long series, with many, many episodes and we completely enjoyed watching them.
When we could stay awake, that is.
You see, we'd start out watching an episode and one or the other of us, sometimes both, would fall asleep before the end. When we'd try to recap for each other, we'd find we couldn't remember crucial details, like what happened with Queen Mathilda or exactly what led up to The War of the Roses.
Strangely, this only deepened our love of this series, as we could watch it over and over... and over again and again and it never got old.
So, the perfect Christmas gift for Michael that year was, of course, the complete series on DVD. I wrote a funny little ditty on his gift tag, complete with rhymes and references to Romeo and Juliet.

Wish I'd saved the little bugger, since that was the beginning of a FAMILY TRADITION. You know what I mean, every family has them. We have many, i.e. Advent boxes, hanging the stockings, the angel at the top of the tree. Christmas just wouldn't be Christmas without certain traditions, and though at times I'd really like to just write simple names on gift tags, doing so would likely cause some kind of holiday horror, like Santa not coming or the hot chocolate curdling.
So, each year, several days before Christmas, you'll find me gearing up for a burst of creativity, searching for the thesaurus and dictionary. I decided to record a few of this year's gems for posterity.


For Michael:

Hark! The herald angels sing
Glory to this great new thing
Hook it up and watch amazed
All those choices? You'll be dazed

No more lonely nights downstairs
You and dogs are now prepared
View it to your heart's content
Never mind how much I spent

Glory to this great new thing
Watch the wonders it shall bring
Glory be to heaven on high
Look at all your money can buy

He got a Roku player for the downstairs television.

For Melissa:

Well, doctor, it's a new field of study...
but preliminary analysis of the data indicates
the torture and murder of simulated creatures
is but one small step away from... ack! ugh!
No... no... don't lock me in here ... HELP!

She got SIMS 3.

For Stephen:

Recycled though I'm not
your mom, she didn't plot
The eco option wasn't there son
forcing her to buy a new one
Still and all you must admit
She tried and tried, yet did not quit
Greenest green I may not be
Still, greener than CDs, you see
Mama tried, she fought, she parried
then she bought, a little harried
Still, a good price she sure did find
Gee, she hopes you will not mind

He wanted a reconditioned Ipod Touch, but received a new one.

For Sarah:
(to the tune of Yankee Doodle Dandy)

More than useful, ornamental
that's the gift I aim to be
Use me with an air of caution
Heat and style you're sure to see
Made to aid the artsy-fartsy
Creativity!

She received a special kiln for the microwave for making fused-glass beads.

Okay, as I'm writing these down, I'm realizing the need for that dictionary and thesaurus probably isn't apparent. You see, I lost a couple of the best tags, so you'll just have to take my word for it!

No comments: