Christmas is an interesting season, and it seems the whole culture decides to take a left turn and be connected to our roots during it: an oddity in out change-obsessed times. We’re not much for tradition, and then comes Christmas. Suddenly we get out a tree, exchange gifts, put up lights, and act like absurd fantasies such as Santa Claus actually have some relevance.

And we take our children to see the Nutcracker.

Oddly, my boss felt compelled to give everyone at work tickets to see it (though really, only those with vested interests like children or girlfriends went to see it: the “tough men” types stayed home and watched movies with a lot of senseless explosions while drinking watered-down domestic beer). So we did. I took Mary. Everyone took someone, even Matt. Even Matt. Let me repeat: even Matt.

Some thoughts on the Nutcracker. First, I wonder what the target audience was when it was first written and performed. Was it children back then as well? Or did it evolve into that over time as people gradually became aware of how absurd it could be made, and how laughable? Second, I really fail to enjoy the art form in anything more than a completely eye-candy sense: the dancing is beautiful, but superficial. Tryin to tell an actual story or make an actual point with ballet is like sending smoke signals with a lace hanky. It may look pretty, but it’s especially ineffective. Maybe the art is just lost on me, and once upon a time there was a mass of uppercrust people who could instinctively interpret dance; if that was ever the case, it’s long gone.

On another note, I would like very much to see a post-rock/ballet integration of some sort, where the pure physicallity of something like Godspeed You Black Emperor! or the like could be melded with the art form of ballet. I know this has already been tried at least once (with Radiohead and Sigur Ros, resulting in the album Ba Ba Ti Ki Di Do or some such Sigur Ros-ish nonsense), but I mean an actual ballet with an actual connection between the dancing and the music, and an actual score that’s been written out earlier, so the ballet is reproducible.

After the ballet, me and Mary hung out in Toronto — where the Starbucks all close at 10pm, I might add, and on a Friday night; is that not insane? — considering we had somewhere close to five hours to kill: but I’ll explain that later.

We walked around TO for a while, and finally came to the building that the Marche restaurant is in — a joint I really want to eat at some time — which is, I think, a bank building of some sort. Whatever it was, it was brilliant: basically an enclosed street with the original facade of some of the shorter and older building facing the inside of the walkway. We sat down on some beautiful leather sofas and read the Globe and Mail, and talked about future plans and life directions and the like.

I officially want to live in Toronto.

We picked Mary’s parents up at the airport at around 2:30am (the reason we had time to kill in Toronto) as they stepped off the plane, fresh from a warm and somewhat rainy vacation to the Dominican Republic. And no, they didn’t get malaria. Thanks for asking. I eventually fell asleep on her lap in the terminal. I think people were looking at me strangely, but I didn’t mind: I was, after all, asleep. And I’ll sleep anywhere I want to in a terminal, thank you. Except on the baggage handling thingy. I won’t sleep on there.

But fear not, the weekend is not done yet. I shall add to this later.

Since the above sentence, some twelve hours have passed. I’m still at work — I’m just not doing any work, and also not getting paid. It would be nice if I could not do any work and still get payed for it, but that dream still doesn’t look much like it’s materializing for me.

So I took Mary home, and her parents drove the car. I arrived back at around 4 in the morning, but thankfully I’m used to that sort of sleeping schedule, and adjusted with all the aplomb of a chameleon against a kilt.

Saturday was opening of presents and eating of food and shopping of malls and the such and the like, all things that we did. By the way, I hate Christmas time only because of the consumers and because of Santa. Both should be incarcerated.

I got a fish, some books, a belt, a bamboo shoot, and Mary gave me almost the exact replica of the ring I bought for her so very long ago, except that it’s some sort of goldlike material instead of pure solid silver. It’s already scratched up thanks to being at work today. But such is life, and things will gradually accumulate a variety of injuries in the course of the day.

Sunday was good, with church, the old age service, church, going to see Mary’s ailing grandfather, beating Mary at Go (again!), until she finally attempted a gigantic illegal move by taking all my pieces off the board, proving once and for all that I am highly deficient when explaining a game to someone.

Oddly enough, on the Rumour Forum, Adrienne has been indicted for being a poor loser over and over again: girls in general seem to have a reputation for being poor losers. Just let me say that if Mary had no saving graces (which she does), that she’s not a poor loser would be in and of itself enough for me.

Okay, so that was a bit thick, but you get the idea. And if you’re sick of hearing about my girlfriend, maybe you should go somewhere where there are no girls, like Slashdot.org.

In other news, this morning was the coldest morning I have ever had the displeasure to step outside in. I got into the car and began to wonder all sorts of things, like how heated seats are a wonderful inventions, as are the heated mirrors, but one wonders why they don’t have some way of heating a steering wheel: that is, after all where I put my tiny frozen little hands first thing in the morning.

Could I be a feature designer for luxury vehicles? I think so. See, I know this much: people don’t know what they want. You need to show them what they need or want before they need or want it. Maybe no one has ever asked for heated steering wheels on car surveys before, and maybe the person that raised this idea got shot down at the design meeting, but really, it’s something to consider, especially in these days of mass comoditization of the automobile market. Not to mention that having an incentive to buy a certain car over another car, an incentive that doesn’t necessarily involve money, is always a good thing. It’s the details, people. I mean, hydraulics systems and electronics are so commonplace now, one would expect that most cars would have some sort of electronically adjusting seats by now, right? But no; some cars still come with things like no air conditioning and hand-crank windows. These things should have all but disappeared by now.

And I will stop ranting about cars now. I will go to my very cold car and become very cold while trying to drive home without sticking myself to the various surfaces of my vehicle.

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