"I Can't Find the Bon Jovi Shot Glasses!"

Christmas is over, and as it will just be me and Jillian this New Year's, my "holiday season" is also over. I have no problem with that, the baby takes the pressure off of finding something to do for New Year's Eve.

Since I have deemed the holidays over, I find myself reminiscing about holidays gone by. Some good some bad. Let's take a walk down memory lane, shall we? A meandering walk, as I am not going in any particular order. Rather, this is a stream of conscious stroll.

I went to law school in the South. Where people like to put Christmas decorations on their car grills. Like a wreath tied on to the jeep, etc. Justsomeguy didn't exactly "get" this practice, or if he did, he thought it was bizarre. I am not sure how, or if, I got involved in the car decorating debate but I somehow was involved in justsomeguys dealing with the decorations. One night after classes and studying I walked to my car to find a GIANT plastic Santa tied on to the grill of my car. This Santa was just a head and his finger was supposed to be pointing to his chin in a contemplative manner. Except, as I later found out, he was from the dollar store and thus cheap. So his finger was more picking his nose.

It being late and cold, I just left the Santa on the car. Mind you, I had no idea who had put it there, given my indifference to the whole car decorating controversy. Anyway, the next morning, I forgot about the Santa and went back to school with it still on my car and still not knowing who had put it there. Eventually justsomeguy came clean and a few days later he helped me take it off my car. We hid it in TFry's carrell I think, or B-Rich's, neither of whom had any idea where it came from. Anyway, I drove around for way too long with a nose picking Santa on my car.

In college, the holiday season was synonymous with greek semi-formal season. When I was a junior, I was going to a fraternity semi-formal as was my roommate and soon-to-be acclaimed author, J-Bux. Apparently, I had a bit to drink at the pre-dance dinner, and continued boozing at the party. Lucking, when I went to the bathroom, J-Bux decided to accompany me. I went into a stall, did my business, and could not get the lining of my fairly tight, short dress, to pull down. I thought I got the outside part down and thus was decent so I gave up on the lining. Coming out of the stall, I hear J-Bux saying "wait, let me help you..." I insisted that I didn't need help and it was all good. Thankfully, she forced her help on me, because absolutely NO PART of my dress was pulled down below my waist. I am a classy date.

My parents' friends have a Christmas party each year, with the location rotating among their houses. This party involves a trip to Italian delis, bakeries, pasta shops, lots of wine, no guest with a last name that does not end in a vowel, overuse of the phrases "lemme tell you...." and "I'm not gonna lie, this is the best (fill in the blank with some kind of food)..."

One year, my parents were hosting and there was not enough room in the fridge for all the beer. My mom instructed me to put the beer on the porch. I was home for law school and bored, so before actually doing so, I took a couple cans of Coors light and dressed them as players in the nativity scene. Yup, construction paper robes and cotton ball beards. I carefully arranged them on the porch as a welcome to our guests.

Well, given the guest list, you can imagine that these people are Catholic and it is not just a religion, but a culture. While some people found it funny (including my mom, to her credit), others found it a bit out of bounds. I guess using a chocolate Santa as the Baby Jesus could be viewed as sacreligious but I didn't mean it that way and I am at peace with it. I think Jesus is too, and maybe even found it funny. My God has a sense of humor.

Also at this very party, I decided to drink a bottle of Jack Daniels by myself. I shared with my littlest sister, who was maybe 18 or 19, and got wasted. To the point where my dad told my sister to get me out of the party. He said to take me anywhere. Only my sister was drunk too, due to me feeding her booze. We did finally find someone who could drive and they took me to my local diner, which was our high school hang out. It was so weird, almost trippy, to be back, watching people I gave tennis lessons to when they were 10 smoke cigarettes and drink coffee - black.

Now to the title of this post....this year I finally got to attend my cousins' ridiculous Christmas Eve party. I got there and one of the first things I heard was that no one could find the Bon Jovi shot glasses. These shot glasses are apparently the lynchpin of the operation. I haven't seen my cousin as distraught about the holidays since the year when Vinnie Testiverde did not want us to have a good Christmas. Anyway, the shot glasses where eventually found, after a false alarm of thinking some fancy mustard was them (don't ask), and mine was the New Jersey album. Many shots later, and my uncle's rendition of "Man I feel like a woman" on the karioke machine, we stumbled home at 2:30 a.m. I am already looking forward to next year's party.

And don't worry, here are some pictures of J - they speak for themselves. I would imagine that my next walk down the holiday memory lane will involve more Jillian-centric stories, less booze, and hopefully no decorations from the dollar store.