So after a bit of struggle, my dad finally came home from the hospital yesterday. He was relieved to be home, to say the least, but the hardship isn't quite over yet, unfortunately. He still has some healing to do, and I don't know how long it will be until he can get back to accepting work, so I'll be helping out with bills and such. Luckily I'm finally taking my drivers test soon, so I'll get a car within the month and be able to help out that much more. It'll be a bit tough for a while, but it's not as if there aren't any other families around who also have to tighten the belt.
With my dad finally home, we made merry with Christmas celebrations. As promised, I'll go through the list of gifts, but first a story about two in particular:
As some background, my siblings know that one of the few things I truly loathe with every fiber of my being is The Family Circus. It is a blight on humanity, a truly terrible creative endeavor. Fast forward to yesterday: One of the last presents I opened was from my sister, and when I looked down after tearing open the wrapping paper, I saw a volume of Family Circus comics staring up at me.
"Family Circus?!?!" I bellowed, shaking my fists to the heavens. "NOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!"
"Read the foreword," my sister suggested, which I did. And I couldn't believe my eyes.
In a long, detailed note, my sister revealed a plan she had orchestrated with my brother for a solid month before Christmas: They bought two early Family Circus collections, went through every comic and added snarky, dark commentary ala The Comics Curmudgeon. I leafed through the pages and, indeed, in colored pencil were comments for every soulless, god awful comic there.
It was just ... amazing. Best present I've ever received; I couldn't believe my brother and sister put so much effort into that present. Let's just say it was a bit dusty in the room afterward.
Nothing I gave was quite to that level, but my dad did open my gift -- The Star Wars Encyclopedia -- and exclaim that he'd wanted that for a long time and seemed genuinely excited for the first time since he'd entered the hospital a week ago. So that was nice. :)
The rest of my gifts:
-- The Anime Encyclopedia by Jonathan Clements and Helen McCarthy
-- If Chins Could Kill: Confessions of a B Movie Actor by Bruce Campbell
-- Loose Balls by Terry Pluto (about the American Basketball Association, not testicles)
-- What the Dog Saw, and Other Adventures by Malcolm Gladwell
-- Your Movie Sucks by Roger Ebert
A clean sweep for literature this year (if you can count The Family Circus as "literature"). Merry Christmas.
