Excuses

Light blogging today, with a 50% chance of afternoon procrastination.

But I have a good excuse. Really.

My plan today is to light a cigar (outside in the winter snow. Well, OK, what’s left of the snow. And what’s left isn’t all that pretty anymore, since the bits the dog hasn’t yellowed, he’s plowed over and back under and over again like a suped-up John Deere plow tractor farm thingy. Anyway.)

I’m going to start that sentence over again, because it got hijacked by a mad band of fundamentalist parantheticals, then slammed into the office tower of introspective blather.

My plan today is to light a cigar out in the back yard, and smoke it slowly on the swing bench while I scratch my dog on his head. But if he rolls over on his back — as he’s wont to do in the snow — I’ll be feeling too calm and self-satisfied to bend my Cuban-seeded stinky self over to rub his belly.

Why such bliss, you ask? Why, I’m done with my Christmas shopping. As of December 16, 11:01pm Mountain Standard Time, I am done. I have no shopping left to do. I am sans shopping. Shopping free. I am well and truly and completely without shopping. Yes, we have no shopping today.

Or tomorrow or the next day, right on through New Years. Hell, even the freezer is full of steaks, and there are plenty of Cokes in the fridge — I won’t even have to drag my butt out to the grocery store.

There are family-type gifts for the family-type persons. Manly-type gifts for the brothers-in-law. All sorts of gifts for Melissa. (Shopping for my bride is deceptively simple: just get her one of everything, two if it’s shoes or earrings.) And except for a couple of things which haven’t arrived yet, everything is even wrapped.

So if I’m feeling a little self-indulgent today, well — indulge me.

NOTE: I have a stupid question. The slight gag above about pairs of shoes and earrings got me wondering about pants. Pants come in pairs. Fine, I understand that. But the pant part is called a pants-leg, not a pant. So where the hell is the pant, of which two make a pair?

ANOTHER NOTE: If you want to really know why I’m not blogging much, just read the first note. I really ought not be allowed anywhere near a keyboard today.