Well, the silly season’s over for another year; here’s how I
spent my Christmas Eve, Christmas Day and Boxing Day for 2014!
Christmas Eve:
For some reason, the English ministry had decided to hold a
Christmas Eve service, meaning after wolfing down a quick dinner, dad tootled
me off to church and I found my usual spot in the hall: first row from the back,
the most left chair. Only Wilfreddy came and hauled me all the way to like the
third row from the front! Well, technically, he didn’t haul me; I presume I’m
rather too fat to be hauled by anyone, but he suggested and said he’d walk
behind me up to the front, so I complied. XD
Peter Pie was the chairperson that night; he was funny,
saying something like, “In case of fire, fling your hands in the air, scream,
and run in that (he pointed outside toward the main entrance) direction.” XD
Turns out, the Christmas Eve service was basically a skit
outlining the nativity play with singing and dancing added; to be honest, I’d
actually expected some pastor to deliver a sermon about the upcoming birth of
the baby Jesus!
The night started with Jacinta Lam, playing a little girl
(although technically she’s not little anymore; she just graduated year twelve
last year!) who ran up to her ‘dad’, played by Tony, screeching excitedly, “Dad
dad dad, it’s almost Christmas!’ Tony asked her what was that special about
Christmas, and Jacinta raved on about Santa and presents and the like, which
led Tony to begin to explain the whole nativity story to her.
His story begins with the choir performing a song that I’ve
never heard before, Mary Did You Know. I thought the song beautiful, and
wondered who was the female conducting the small choir; she looked familiar,
but I couldn’t place her coz she wasn’t facing me and I couldn’t see her
features!
Tony’s story continues, interspersed with lotsa questions
from Jacinta and more songs from the choir. Another group even danced,
re-enacting the crucifixion of Jesus (played by Kalos)! Someone told me later
that the choreographer was Aggie~ Top stuff, Aggie, the dancers looked very
pro!
After the service concluded, everyone was invited downstairs
for some supper. Aunty Yvonne kindly walked down with me, where I visited the
bathroom once then took my usual spot to the most left. Aunty Yvonne returned
with an amazing-looking cupcake for me; Lana, I’m sure I’ve told you this a
squillion times before: quit your day job and start a bakery, coz I’m certain
you’d be stinking rich in next to no time!
Several people wandered over for a chat, like Esther. I
asked her did she know who’d conducted the small choir, and she was like, “um,
me.” XD
Aunty Yvonne also kindly passed me a plastic cup of water,
and told me that neither she nor the rest of their family would be present at
the Christmas service tomorrow, because they were going bushwalking!
Pole and Josh also wandered over to say hi, naughty Josh
ripping leaves from some overhead branch and tossing them at me; Pole socked
him in the gut for it, but come on, this is Pole
I’m speaking about, do you really think she could put any strength behind her
blow?? XD
At 9:30pm, I rang
for parental pickup. The home phone registered no response; I presumed that the
parents were still out viewing Christmas decorations and hadn’t returned home
yet. I tried mother’s mobile next; she replied that she and dad were on their
way.
Only after I hung up, everyone decided to all leave at once!
Meaning by the time the parents arrived, everyone had cleared out! When the
parents arrived, mother immediately groused at me that I should’ve rung them
earlier, but hey, I didn’t want them to come take me home when everyone was
still there; how did I know everyone would scatter promptly at 9:30pm?? XD
Anyways, back home, repeat the usual nightly procedure, zzz~
Christmas day:
I woke up, and bid my teddy a very Merry Christmas! Mother
entered my room a short while later, dumped my clothes onto the bed, then left
me to get myself kitted, which I managed with just fine, although I did have my
tee on back-to-front originally. >< It’s rather difficult to get yourself
kitted properly, especially when you only have one more-or-less functioning arm
… somehow, mother believes that by leaving me to struggle with getting myself
properly clothed, I will somehow become more ‘independent’…
Anyways, outside, mother placed one cup of plain milk in
front of me. “You’re not serious, are you?” I asked her, mock-incredulous. “I
mean, today’s CHRISTMAS, and you can’t even come up with a mug of chocolate
Nesquik or even Milo for me??” Obviously not; mother’s
totally uncreative like that. XD Dearest dad, however, did fry some eggs with
very thinly sliced Spam ham, and I enjoyed one tiny portion of that with one
slice of unbuttered toast.
One more loo trip for me (on dad’s command; usually, I wait
until we arrive @ church before visiting the bathroom), before dad tootles
mother and I off to church for our Christmas service. While he drives, I sing
my litany of four secular Christmas carols, knowing that once we’d entered
church, we’d only be singing Christian ones. Those four secular Christmas
carols were:
(1)
Rudolph the Red-nosed Reindeer, (2) We Wish You A Merry
Christmas, (3) Jingle Bells and (4) the Twelve Days of Christmas, although I
only remembered the first five days. XD
At church, I visited the bathroom
twice before service started. Luckily, I found my usual spot at the far left in
the back~
The choir sang a song, Mikey
played the piano and Julz had the drum under her control. Speaker that day was Thomas,
because I believe both pastor Chris and Reverend Lam are away on holidays.
After service, we headed down for
the luncheon. I’ve learnt to always get my own food; that way, I know I can
enjoy one full bowl of food; when mother gets food for me, she never gets me
more than half a bowl; dad’s even worse: he only gets me 1/3 a bowl! ><
We sit with Uncle Jerry, Aunty
Sandra and some other people. Nomnomnom~
After lunch, we head home. One
bathroom trip for me, and then I plop online, while mother hits pigland
upstairs. Not sure what dad does, but he’s back home and telling mother and I
to shower before nightfall, because we’re having a BBQ at someone’s place! The
family lives in some suburb called New Beith; can anyone please teach me
whether it’s pronounced ‘Beeth’, ‘Bayth’, ‘Beth’ or something else entirely?
‘Twas a fairly long drive to the
place; by the time we arrived, the BBQ was almost starting! I found a seat and Aunty
Amy brought me over some yummy green grapes for munching; she tells me that Yancey’s
ice skating requires training five/six mornings a week! Like twenty years ago, Pole
and I tried ice skating lessons once; I was totally put off after some poor
girl got a blade sliced into her calf! o_O
Two fires were set up, and we
began cooking away! I saw mother holding two skewers over the fire, and asked
her could she please get me one also to cook, but she was like, “Ask your dad.
I’m busy.” Well, fine; after dad appeared (think he’d been inside the house),
he moved me closer to the fire, skewered some pork balls for me, and I began
cooking!
I sat around the fire with people
whom I mostly didn’t know. There was one guy who kept calling me ‘mui mui jai’,
which in Canto roughly means ‘very little girl’. He’d be like, “mui mui jai,
you might wanna turn your pork balls around now, else they’ll get burnt on one
side and uncooked on the other!” At some point during the night, when he
referred to me as ‘mui mui jai’ again, I laughed and told him, “Uncle, I’m
turning twenty-eight next year; I think I’m a bit too old to fit into the ‘mui
mui jai’ category anymore!” The guy laughed, responding, “well, I’m gonna keep
calling you ‘mui mui jai’ if you’re really turning twenty-eight next year,
because that means I’m still slightly older than you are!”whoops, he’s not
‘uncle’, then, but rather, ‘gor gor’ (older brother in Canto). XD
After dinner, mother took me once
to the bathroom, after which I crashed on the sofa and Whatssapped Merry
Christmas to all my contacts.
The night ended very early,
around 8:30pm! I guess that was
because the host’s family lived so far away from everyone else and it’d be a
long drive back home.
Mother took me once more to the
bathroom when we left, and while she was putting her shoes back on, Lok Yee
suddenly ran up holding a rangy dog by the collar! I thought mother would shriek/wave
her arms in panic/explode or something dramatic like that (remember, mother’s
the nurse that’s afraid of anything that moves that isn’t a human being XD) but
I was very proud of her for not even batting an eyelid! Turns out the dog’s
only young (two/three years old) and her name’s Kiki.
And that was the night! Everyone
left around 8:30pm, which I thought
was rather early, but it made sense considering how far new Beith was away from
Brisbane.
Dad tootled us home; I got my
usual half cuppa of milk, brushed teeth, used the toilet then hit the sack.
Zzz~
Boxing Day: I enjoyed another
great sleep over Christmas night, not waking until 6:05am.
When mother came, dumped all my clothes onto my bed and ordered me to get
dressed without assistance (she’s been doing that all year; apparently this’ll
make me more ‘independent’? Not sure how that works, but hey, no biggie,
because I’m seated and can fully concentrate), I sat up and sang her Happy Birthday
before complying~
Over breakfast, I told dad, “Are
you gonna take mother and I out for the Boxing Day sales today? Because if
you’re not, please take me to Charlsy’s place; he’s opened it up for everyone.
I didn’t RSVP on time, but I asked him last night and he says I’m welcome to
still join.”
Dad considers, then says, “I’ll
take you two to the Hyperdome; Carindale will be too crowded.”
Awesome! Before we head out, I
open the boot to check that Sparkless 2 (my manual wheelchair) is still there
then hop into the car.
You can imagine my distress when
I find out dad doesn’t intend to lemme use Sparkless 2 once we arrive! Yes, despite
the cruel and unfaithful God’s intentions for me never to walk again, I’m
relieved to say that I can walk short distances independently with very close
supervision (which makes mother not bothering to walk behind me while inside
the house very dangerous ><). However, for longer distances I require my
manual wheelchair; I also go for shopping (my fortnightly trips to Garbo) in my
wheelchair, because nowadays, just standing’s the hardest thing for me, meaning
if I’m to go browsing at objects, I’d need to be seated to be able to look at
stuff. I mean yes, obviously I can look at things while I’m standing, but I
wouldn’t be able to focus on anything because I’d only be thinking about the
next place I can sit down and not losing my balance and falling over where I’m
standing right at that moment.
However, dad’s ultimatum is shop
walking or go home, so I grit my teeth, remind the cruel and unfaithful God
that I’ll try my best not to let Him ruin another day for me, and head into the
Hyperdome.
First stop: Coles, to buy juice
for our night’s guests. After that, we wander the Hyperdome; to my complete
delight, we find a Jay Jays! I thought Jay Jays were only found in Westfield
centres? I’m fairly certain the Hyperdome isn’t a Westfield
shopping mall…
But no matter, I enter Jay Jays
and get a new minion tee! :D
More wanderings around the Hyperdome;
we enter stores like Myer, where I find a comfy couch to crash on while mother
goes browsing around the store. From somewhere, dad finds me a little booklet
full of quotes penned by Oprah!
Lunch is at the food court: I
enjoy a very little bit of Red Roosters (did you know, they sell APPLE fritters
now?? Pineapple ones are better, though!) and some sushi, just drinking water,
while the parents enjoy Coke/Pepsi. Dunno why mother refused to get me a Boost
Juice, but hey, no biggie, she’s always gleefully imposing one restriction on
me or another. *sigh*
And so ended our Boxing Day
shopping trip for 2014~ The same thing happened as before: dearest dad tootled
mother and I home, I plopped online after one toilet trip and mother hit
pigland upstairs.
Before all our guests arrive, I
take a shower, and after they arrive, head outside to sit on my dearest dad’s
awesome deck after one more loo trip.
Aunty Winnie’s also made some
sushi! I get a slice or two of that, lotsa lettuce and a lil meat, like some
yummy pork.
After dinner, we all head back
inside. Everyone just sits and chats (barring Mel and Sam, who watch television),
eating fruit and drinking tea.
When our guests decide to leave,
I walk them out and thank them for coming, before returning to the sofa and
tearing into the presents that Santa brought me! I carefully open the first
present mother hands me (the book Carol Lockwood bought for me), just to prove
that I am, in fact, civilised, then just rip the rest. XD
I remember a blog I created
several years back to note down items I’ve been given; haven’t opened it for
years but amazingly, I still remember the password! If I ever get the time
(which I doubt I will, alas), I may log in all the presents I got!
But next post here should be how
I spent my New Years’ Day; until then~
Cheers,
Em. ^^
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