You'll shoot your eye out!

Holiday highlights:

1. Watchng all 24 hours of "A Christmas Story" marathon. Fa ra ra ra ra!

2. My new TomTom, from my sister and brother-in-law. I love it! I've been wanting one of these GPS devices ever since I saw my sister's Garmin work its magic: we were right outside of Pittsburgh on a roadtrip, and when dinnertime rolled around, we both got a craving for sushi. Being unfamiliar with our surroundings was not a problem: we had the Garmin look up sushi restaurants within a certain radius of our current location, programmed it in, and it led us straight there like a pair of locals on back roads we wouldn't otherwise find. It was great.

I also take a lot of roadtrips with friends and to visit friends, and combined with the fact that I have no sense of direction and always get lost, the TomTom is made for people like me. This will be especially useful for my occasional trips to Philadelphia because the part where Wilmington and Philadelphia split never fails to confuse the hell out of me. The signage is awful there. But with my TomTom, no more looking stuff up on Mapquest and no more squinting at a printout of the directions while driving. I'm on my way, baby!

Thanks, sis! You're the best!

3. One of my friends has this awesome recipe for a dessert she calls fruit pizza. I made it for my family for an early Christmas dinner.

4. Our unique mix of Jewish/Catholic traditions for Christmas Eve: Chinese food takeout for dinner (Jewish) followed by Midnight Mass (Catholic).

5. Christmas night at the movies with a few hundred other people. Evidently everyone else had the same idea we had. We saw I Am Legend, which was alternately creepy, sad, riveting, and disappointing. There was also this part that was hard for me to watch, as all animal lovers and pet owners will no doubt find hard to watch as well.

6. Finaly, this magpie's Christmas gifts from Mr Hazel: a bracelet with little diamonds and a pair of amethyst earrings. Sparkly!

I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas as well!