completing the hipster look: a ukulele!
January 12th, 2010
My, it has been a long time, hasn’t it?
Truth be known, we’ve been the sickest ever this winter sampling each of Winter’s nasties. So, between flights of bedridden illness there was the obligatory frantic holiday shopping and crafting, booking of holiday trips, the attendance at holiday gatherings, avoidance of some due to flights of illness, then holidays and the taking of holiday trips… and I just never found time to check in.
Rather than boring you with what we’ve been up to, I figure I’ll start the year off with some learnings from 2009:
1. If you have to see the Nutcracker at Christmas, and you aren’t going to see your child or beloved family/friend, get tickets to the San Francisco Ballet. It is incredible.
2. The Madame du Cirque Scene in the Nutcracker is when all the three year olds in the audience exit to the hallways to run about.
3. Star Wars is not, as we parents believed, about spaceships and space. According to Will, it is about people and killing and …
4. 5 year olds don’t want guitars for Christmas. The fact that it was made by Santa doesn’t matter.
5. Santa’s giving your 5 year old a guitar for Christmas will make him appreciate the backpack, new markers, and fresh sets of Legos you bought him.
6. When booking your next trip to Disneyland, stay at the Howard Johnson across the street. The pirate themed waterpark attached to the hotel was our favorite Disney attraction.
7. You have to do New Years Eve at Disneyland once in your life. It sure beats standing around for 8 hours in single digits to watch a ball drop out of the sky.
8. Buy and cook fresh Dungenous crab for Christmas. Fresh, it is $4.99 a pound! At my house, we make the vegetarians boil those suckers alive.
What you miss by leaving Disneyland before the sun goes down:
Will rang in the new year missing a front tooth after knocking it lose in a freak rootbeer making accident. (We made rootbeer floats for Christmas Eve lunch.)
In other news, Santa brought me a ukulele to complete my hipster look. What a blast! The beauty of 4 strings is you can pretty quickly start plunking out identifiable tunes. I’m getting pretty decent at the classics like Leaving on a Jet Plane, She is Leaving Home (Beatles), Edelweiss, I’m so tired (Beatles), All of Me, Puff the Magic Dragon, Tonight You Belong to Me and Rainbow Connection. Still working on While My Ukulele Gently Weeps and Blackbird. I take requests… Maybe a tour in 2011?
When I’m not obsessively strumming, we’re training for the Napa Marathon on March 7th.