Hey there everyone. Before I get into the fun of my 8 days of Hanuka and Christmas and New Years, and the hard time, I need to talk about the weekend before. I took the Friday off because I had vacation time to use, so I went to see Doctor Strange. I didn't realize it was also opening day to Rogue One, so the theater was pretty crowded. There were guys in storm trooper costumes, and a REALLY long line. But that was just to Star Wars. Doctor Strange was empty. I was the only one there. I probably could have moved to a better seat (it was assigned seating), but since I had the manager tell me I had to turn off my 3DS when the movie started, "even though [I] was the only one there," I decided I'll live with my seat. Watch my review here.
It was a good movie.
My bother also came in that week, so that was fun.
OK, now for the real start to the festivities. If you're new, I'm Catholic, and so is everyone in my family. However, seeing that the miracle of the oil burning for 8 days is in the Old Testament and there isn't anything in the New Testament saying I can't celebrate it, I celebrated my own form of Hanuka. I didn't do all the traditional foods like latkes, or light candles seeing that I don't have a menorah, and I didn't have to gather all my family because everyone was there for Christmas, but I did with everyone happy Hanuka with the appropriate day. It worked really well because it was at the same time as Christmas and all my family's usual festivities this year.
On the first day of Hanuka, Christmas Eve, we did the gift exchange with my grandparents on my mom's side, like we do every year. We went to McDonald's like we do every year. When we were little we went to McDonald's because that was "when Santa would deliver the presents." Now it's just "because tradition." I got a shirt, Kirby Planet Robot, TMNT Mutants in Manhattan, candy, and money. With the games I was all "it's just what I wanted, how did you know?" as a joke. My grandma was legitimately curious and asked "yes, how DID you know?" I bought black Friday and mom paid me for them. I gave my grandpa a movie gift card, because he likes to go to the movies with me. After doing Christmas Eve with them, we went to church. It was a good mass, and I wished the greeter a Happy Hanuka.
Now for Christmas Day. We went to my aunt's to see my grandpa on my dad's side. We went there REALLY early because we were going to skype with my cousin in Japan, so my grandpa can see his grandson and great grandson. The thing is though, there's a 10 hour difference, so we have to schedule far in advance. We had to get up at 6 AM to get there at 7 AM, so it would be 9 PM there. It was fun seeing them again. We did some gift exchange with them, and my gift to them was a DVD of the great grandson/nephew. My cousin sent me videos of his son, and I edited them together to burn to a DVD. They really like getting them. Since we got up so early, all of us took naps, and slept where we fell basically. I brought my laptop, and when everyone else was napping, I watched the preview of The Mick. Watch my thoughts here.
It has potential.
We didn't do our family exchange because be were all so tired when we got home, so we did it on the day after Christmas. I also didn't do my tradition of watching at least 1 airing of A Christmas Story on TBS, because it just didn't work out. Oh well.
So on the 3rd day of Hanuka, we exchanged Christmas gifts. I got Recore, candy, chips, a homer bucket, money, and a Pikachu blanket. It was fun. Now this is when it gets hard. My oldest friend's dad had some health problems, and they became really bad a week prior. We went to the hospital to be supportive. The day prior we went to the airport to pick-up the mom's sister, and that was kind of fun because our mom "did it all by her self," and only brought my brother and I just in case. After the hospital we went to see Sing with my grandpa, because "lets use the gift card while everyone is in, and then we can drive around the neighborhood to see the lights, they can see our tree, and go out to dinner. We went to the theater the gift card was to, but my grandpa made a mistake. See, the gift card I gave him was to AMC, but he also got a gift card from his neighbor to one of his local theater chains. When we got there he pulled out the other gift card.
I asked him "where's the gift card I gave you?"
He said "you didn't give me a gift card!"
I said "yes I did! There was popcorn and an empty pop can. That was to this theater. That gift card is to the theater by your house."
He said "oh yeah, that one's up stairs. Well use this one from the neighbor."
I said "I can't, that's to a different chain. That gift card was the reason we had you come all the way out here."
Oh they can be some work. Oh well, we'll just go another time. We went to see Sing by Illumination. Watch my review here.
Another good movie.
After the movie, we went to dinner at a local restaurant, and all of us had breakfast. It was good. Afterwards we drove around some to see the lights. After that we visited in our living room. That is also when we got the call that we lost my friend's dad. That was sad.
On the 4th day of Hanuka I recorded the Sing review and got my parents gift cards. Bath and Bodyworks for mom and Home Depot for dad. When delivering I sang "on the 4th day of Hanuka, your son gave to you, a gift card valued 18 plus 2." The rest of the day was pretty normal. I watched movies on Crackle before they expired, as I did throughout the week. I think I watched Bucky Larson Born to be a Star. I know I watched it one of the days. REALLY bad movie, and very curious how it managed to get made. I also went to see Moana with Mskate. The first theater we went to sold out as we were standing in line, so we went to a theater that was 40 minutes away, to see a show that started in 30 minutes. We made a little adventure out of it. Watch my review [when I upload it].
After the movie we went to see my mom, because mom always asks me questions about mskate that I don't know the answer to. Well, mom always asks me questions like "how is her master's program going?" But we don't talk about things like that, we talk about stories like "my mom found a dime in a brownie at a fancy restaurant." So I just said "here she is, ask her yourself."
On the 5th day of Hanuka we had a party with my mom's old college friends, like we do every year. The host rotates between the friends year to year, and this year it was our turn to host. That happened later in the day, so the day was getting ready. At the party I mostly played with one of the friend's son's step-daughter. OK, to clear things up, my mom's friends are all 1st generation, all their kids (me, the married son) are 2nd generation, and any of the kid's kids are 3rd generation. One of us from the 2nd generation got married and he gained a step-daughter making a 3rd generation. I played with 3rd generation. We mostly "played" Super Mario 3D World. I say "played" because she didn't want to play by the rules of the game, and didn't realize that we can't spend all the time in the one pond in a level, and that I don't have unlimited cat bells. We also played some Diddy Kong Racing after I pulled out one of my N64s. But then others from the 2nd generation wanted to play because they grew up with Diddy Kong Racing. Fun times. We also watched some of Jonah a Veggie Tales Movie, because the married 2nd generation is expecting and we gave them a Veggie Tales nativity. However, the 3rd generation daughter didn't know Veggie Tales, so we had to show her what everyone was so enthusiastic about.
On the 6th day of Hanuka I gave ZeldaMaster93 his gifts, from both our out of state friend and myself. Since he didn't add an address to his amazon wish list, and since ZeldaMaster93 lives just a couple streets down from me, the friend had to send the gift to me to deliver to ZM93. When I delivered the gifts, I put on an elf hat and gave him a little story. I said this in a goofy/santa voice.
"Hello there [ZeldaMaster93], Chris [our friend] Kringle said you were a good boy, and you deserve something special. However, he also said you were a little naughty, specifically that you didn't link an address to your amazon wish list. So as punishment, you have to deal with me [Pokematic] the annoying elf."
After giving him the manga volume from our friend, and the target gift card and Super Mario toothbrush, I sang him this. "On the 6th day of Hanuka, your friends gave to you, 1 Mario toothbrush, 1 gift card, and a maaangaaaa voooluuuuummmmmeeee."
I recorded the whole ordeal for our friend, and he just did his strait man reaction. I would show you the video, but it got corrupted. Oh well. ZeldaMaster93 wouldn't like it all that much if I shared it publicly anyways. I shared what I could privately with our friend, and he enjoyed it. My main gift was the gift card; I just gave him the toothbrush because years ago he got me a nyan cat plushy, and this was my version of that (he would like it, but it's also a gag gift).
After giving ZeldaMaster93 the gifts, we went to the visitation for my friend's dad. I saw a lot of people I haven't seen in years. It was a nice visitation. Since he didn't want anything formal, and loved hunting and partying, my brother wore flannel and I wore one of my island shirts.
On the 7th day of Hanuka it was the celebration of life. Everyone that had stories told stories. Since my family is very close to their family, my grandpa told a story. After the "formal" celebration of life ceremony, we had a luncheon/"dinnereon?" later that evening at his local eagles club. My family did a lot of the set-up. One of the pictures on the boards was from our kindergarten picnic. I showed one of our friends from kindergarten the picture and it brought back memories. It was a good celebration.
Now on the 8th day of Hanuka or New Years Eve, we went to an end of year party thrown by some of our camping friends. My godfather was there, and I wished him a happy Hanuka. He was a little confused, but I said "there's nothing in the New Testament that says I can't celebrate the miracle." He was like "well you got me there, happy Hanuka." It was a fun little party. I got to visit with everyone, and had some fun with my "godbrother" (godfather's son). We played Monopoly until he got board (he's 7 and Monopoly is a long game). We stayed until about 9PM, then everyone started to disperse. For New Years I was going to watch the ball drop, but I realized I hadn't showered yet, and I was tired and ready to go to bed at midnight. I showered and JUST missed the ball drop as I was getting out of the shower. Darn it. Oh well.
On New Years Day we had a party with my mom's best friend and her kids. We played the forbidden island and liars dice. My brother had 100 D6 dice because he's a tabletop geek, so getting 36 D6 for the 6 of us to play was easy. I wanted to play "96 dice, 1 life, liars dice," but everyone thought that was a bad idea. We did some gift exchange. I got trobelone, a Pikachu button down shirt, and the board game worst case scenario. I look forward to wearing the Pikachu shirt to work, because even though I work a professional job, everyone knows I'm a little eccentric and I do my job so well I've earned a little eccentric. Plus, it's no worse than the "highly visible man" I was for Halloween. The worst case scenario is a bit of a joke, because last year we played worst case scenario jr. (the kids version) and mom's friend asked "why aren't you playing the grown up version," and I said "because you didn't give it to me yet" (because she gave us the kids version). That was fun. Afterwards we took down my grandparent's Christmas tree, and I fixed on of their strands of lights. I have now run out of spare lights. The next time a strand breaks I'm stripping it for next time.
So now 2016 has come and gone, and we look towards 2017. Normally people would do some resolutions. Seeing that I haven't uploaded any of PSS lets palsy last year, I plan to upload at least the rest of the battlefront videos. I also have some vlogs and other videos I need to edit, so hopefully I can get those uploaded. I also want to get my TV logs uploaded within the week after initial airing. Why? Because I was STILL uploading previous season LMOE logs when the current season was airing. Otherwise, that's pretty much it. Well, this has been Pokematic, signing off, and bu-bye.
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