Fuck me sideways. Got a nasty virus on my computer. Need sleep and a thumb drive (tis hiding from me) before I try fixing. Grrrrrrrr. Merry f$&@#£%ing Christmas to me.

I don't think I can talk about the latest family gossip, because charges might still be pending.

(What? I have a plan.)

Given my tag, this amuses me.

I need to reread bandpires now.

Family frustrations abound but not a lot of drama. Except my brother and sister in law asked what I thought of my sister's new boyfriend and the best I could say was that he seems to bring out the best side with her. Bro is a lawyer and rolled his eyes at me. Told him that it was factually accurate and technically not mean.

And an uncle is dating two women. One of whom is married and not in a happy poly way. Whatever. He also got shot in the ass once. I'm beginning to understand how that might have come about.

I am not yet home, so gossip is pending. Though I did go to a friends Christmas party and watch someone get chloroformed. It was interesting.

This conversation has made me realize that I probably am the family gossip this year, although hopefully not in a mean way.

My parents are back having just missed a 24 hour interstate closing in NM. This is the first year I remember the kids being really excited about Christmas. We are celebrating tomorrow since they will spend the 25th with Joe.

Vacation is so much better when I don't feel like death warmed over! The kids and I are hanging out in our jammies, Dylan is singing "This Is Halloween" at the top of his lungs and Aeryn is dancing. They are each playing with the other's Hanukkah present front last night.

Unfortunately DH now has the dreaded stomach bug so it's going to be a long day for me with these two. Maybe we'll go over to my sister's and make cookies

My family is fairly boring. Although my nephew, who finally moved out of his parents' house into an apartment of his own, announced he'd be conducting an experiment on the effect of alcohol consumption on video game scores. Kinda mild, as family scandles go, although his tea totaling grandmother would Not Have Approved.

My family also does not go in for gossip-worthy stuff. I mean, the latest is pretty much stuff like: My half-brother and SIL got ... a puppy! My father is ... redoing his bathroom, after finding mold and carpenter ants! My sister is... painting a wall in her new condo "Calico Rose"! My mother is... bossy!

ION I am so un-merry. I need to cowboy up and tell my father when we are coming on the 26th, get some shopping done so we and the cats eat today, figure out what to give the half-brother and SIL with the puppy, and probably I should get a present for my husband, right? Meanwhile he and the kids are watching a TV show called "Searching for Bigfoot."

I am hoping TJ's plus the pet store can accomplish most of the above.

My side of the family is boring, except for the cousin who keeps trying to friend my sister and I on FB, and we reject all of his requests, because he molested my cousin when she was a child.

All the gossip is D related, and comes from his ex, and you know all that -- that she's kinda crazy, and money-grubbing and mean. Although I DID find out --she is a local area editor for Patch, the AOL local news site thing -- that Patch really IS going down the tubes, so it's likely she'll be losing her job this year. I mean, I've been following the Net gossip about it, but she had another area Patch editor over for dinner, and they were talking, and apparently it's pretty much a given that Patch.com is going down.

Part of me is all "Heh" because she's all I R SERIOUS JOURNALIST IMPORTANT POLITICO (@@) and she's...not, but part of me is worried about how it will affect M. She's even crazier when she's more stressed than her usual state of High DRAHHHHMA make her. Also, her writing is not that great.

She made noises about getting a family rate on my resumes -- after being condescending about being "I'm a writer; how hard can it BE to write a good resume?" Her editor friend popped up and said, "Well, no, writing a resume is a real art" and I mentioned my resumes and covers cost between $250 and $500, and THAT impressed her. She also "joked" about how I should freelance copyedit for her, and I said sure; my CE rates are $40/hour. THAT ended the convo.

Again, @@.

Oh, also, I looked GORGEOUS the entire time I was there. And M kept saying things like "Erin is ALWAYS READING when I am at her house. She reads so many books so fast!" and she was kind of snotty: "I wish *I* had time to read more..." and I was all casual, "Oh, it's not a big deal. I'm slammed most the time, but since I can read 6 or 7 books in a day, and it's part of my job, it's not really a big deal..."

BOO-YA!

And she HAD to go to a meeting, and she was all "M needs his jeans changed, his nails clipped and the playroom cleaned."

45 minutes later, it was all done with no arguments or back talk. He argued with her, and her MO is to yell or demand stuff of him, and he gets all arguey and pouty and sad, and all I have to do is raise an eyebrow or start counting down from 10 and he does what I want and is cheerful about it.

I take GREAT shallow satisfaction from this...

I R petty. That's my gossip. However, we did rub along fairly well the entire time, and I was very helpful, and I did have moments of fun, so it wasn't tat bad.