Tra la la.  Can’t you hear the joy in my voice?  I have a beautiful singing voice.  It’s true: perfect pitch, impeccable timing, and never too much vibrato.  I would have moved to New York and starred in musicals on Broadway, but I didn’t want to drive a U-haul™ all that way.

[I fibbed.  That entire previous paragraph was a blatant lie.  I don’t sing; I play the piano.  And I’m not a prodigy; I’m marginal at best.]

Nevertheless, for brilliant musical minds like myself, Christmas is the most miserable time of the year.  Since Thanksgiving, my weeks have been booked to the brim with song practices and rehearsals, and I’m getting used to having no free time whatsoever.

I’m getting used to it, but I’m not happy about it.  In fact, I can’t remember the last time I felt cheerful about anything Christmas. I’ve already decided I will never teach my kids about Santa.  Poor Kyle and I are not exchanging gifts.  Forget the figgy pudding—I’m having Chinese takeout.

Not only do I not feel the Christmas spirit…I’m beginning to loathe it.

Oh, sure, I think it’s fine to have a time to honour Jesus Christ more than usual, but that’s the only thing that hasn’t bothered me so far this season.  I am sick of everything else: the carols, the colours, the baking, the spending, the wrapping, the twinkle lights, the *sob* inspirational stories, and—oh yeah—this:

Those temperatures are in Fahrenheit (a word I am learning to spell with sudden speed, on account of typing it in every email I send to my relatives in Arizona, who have never heard of sub-freezing anything).  I mean, no offense, Poor Kyle’s family, but you guys are nuts.  For living here.  In this cold cold nether-region.  (What is a nether-region?  I’m not sure, but it sounded good…)

It’s so cold here, I’ve stopped locking Tamra Camry’s doors because the locking mechanism freezes and it becomes nigh on impossible to get her unlocked again.

It’s so cold, I bend over and breath steam on the the toilet seat before I sit down in the morning, to alleviate the sudden jolting chill.

It’s so cold on these Canadian plains, I can’t breathe through my nose because my nasal hairs freeze instantly [and you haven’t felt cold until you’ve felt your nose hairs freeze and then splinter off].  But I can’t breathe through my mouth, either, because the frigid air gives me an on-the-spot case of the whooping cough, and my two poor little desert-bred lungs stop functioning—they go into shock from the cold, and simply fail me.  So any time I need to leave the house or the car, I can only go as far as I can hold my breath.  Otherwise I die.

Here’s the picture I’m sending out with my Christmas cards this year:

Not this actual photo, but the photo in the photo.

So yeah.  Merry Christmas, I guess.

And if I smile when I tell you that, you can be sure I’m faking it.

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