I've had quite a memorable Christmas so far. D and I arrived in Salt Lake at 9:10 a.m. after one hour of sleep the night before (our ride woke us when he rung the bell, in fact). I spent the afternoon at my mom's surrounded by hyper rugrats from my stepdad's family for Christmas eve dinner and present exchange, then came back to my dad's to exchange presents with him, my stepmom, my sister, and her boyfriend. The most momentous present was the engagement ring my dad gave to my stepmom. He gave her a bag filled with tissue paper and, while she was distracted looking through it, presented the little black box by sleight of hand. The most shocking present - I still don't know what to think - was the 1998 Ford Explorer (my stepmom's old vehicle) that my dad and stepmom gave ME. I shocked my dad and stepmom back by giving them a fully-loaded laptop plus printer (which I bought today, not wanting to take it on the plane), mouse, wireless card, docking station, extra power supply, and external floppy drive, all wrapped separately. (They currently use my ponderous 133MHz Pentium I desktop that I bought when I left for college in 1999.) D gave me a very cool four-piece puzzle ring, my mom gave me a serger, my dad and stepmom also gave me a gift certificate to a spa, and my sister gave me fuzzy slippers (the only present that I was actually expecting).

D was hard to shop for this year. I ended up getting him more weird geeky socks (though my source is running dry), some ShapeLock, Nutcracker tickets, and a recliner, but I couldn't top the year I did the twelve days of Christmas or the year I gave him keys to a bike then made him find it. Ah well. I should go donate something in his name somewhere, too.

Tomorrow I party with my dad's family, then with my sister's boyfriend's family.