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We had a really nice christmas with our families and our turkey, gravy, and stuffing all turned out delicious. Since then we have pretty much done nothing and it's been great.

This week is all about being lazy and reclusive. We ventured out Sunday night to see The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus but otherwise have been sleeping in, watching soccer and movies, playing video games, eating, and napping. It's a total luxury to be able to switch off and do nothing. It was a tough Fall and work's going to be very busy again come January so I'm glad to be able to recharge my batteries this week.

Whew, it's been a busy bunch of days. Well, except for Monday when we stayed in and napped and watched old episodes of Beavis and Butthead. But otherwise, super busy. We've also been charged with making the turkey and stuffing for christmas dinner, which will be a first. I'm taking on the stuffing and leaving the turkey to Arun. I'll let you know how it turns out.

Wishing you a wonderful holiday with those you love!

I'm back at work this week and the summer slowdown is officially over. It's suddenly nuts again. Ugh.

I really enjoyed our week off though. It was a good mix of getting things done (or partially done, anyway), relaxing, and hanging out with friends and family. We watched a bunch of movies, both at home (Harold Lloyd movies we recorded on TCM the other week) and in the theatre (the new Harry Potter [enh] and District 9 [go see it!]).

We also went to see the papal art exhibit at the National Gallery and found it pretty boring. But then again, we should have known anything pope-related wouldn't exactly be our cup of tea. The most fun I had in the exhibit was giggling over Pope Sixus V's name and some story that went along with a painting about this guy who was going to be the eighth man to marry some lady, whose previous seven husbands all died on their wedding night. An angel appeared to him and advised him to cut up some fish bits to ward off the demons, which apparently worked and they lived happily ever after. Seriously. That's the story. Why after, like, the third guy wouldn't people clue in and, you know, stop marrying her? Maybe she was a super hot demon lady? I don't know.

In other news, Starla met my 3 month-old nephew over the weekend. She'd never seen a baby before so we weren't sure how she would react. Normally she avoids people or she'll slowly slink up to sniff them and then suddenly take a swipe at them and run away. She was much more interested in baby G than she is most visitors, maybe because he was at ground level a lot of the time, so the couple of times she started to slink up to him and sniff him we were pretty quick to shoosh her away before she could swipe. Disaster averted.

Hey, guess what? I'm on vacation! And—even better—Arun's on vacation too! We kicked things off with a trip to Montreal on Friday to celebrate Arun's birthday.

The whole thing nearly went very, very wrong Friday morning. As in, I almost killed Starla. We were rushing around trying to get ourselves ready to catch the train and literally as we were walking towards the door to go Arun said, "where's Starla?" and thank god he did because he found her locked out on the balcony. I had gone out a few minutes earlier to water the plants out there (for once) and she must have snuck out behind me. I totally didn't see her. She would have died out there in the sun without water all day. I can't even begin to explain how awful I felt.

We were already cutting it close to get to the train station before the Starla Incident and just made our train. Running was involved.

Thankfully things got better from there on out. So. Much. Better. We stayed at Hôtel le Germain and wow, was it ever nice. It reminded me of the hotel we stayed in in Madrid. It was really modern and well designed but still comfortable.

We did some shopping (ok, I did the vast, vast majority of the shopping*) and lots of walking around and went out for a really nice dinner. After a stressful start, it turned out to be a lovely little getaway for the both of us. We were only gone for about 36 hours but it felt longer (in the best way).

*Among my many purchases: a new pair of glasses! It's going to be at least a few weeks before I have them because I have to get my eyes checked first. And, of course, we forgot to take a picture of me in them at the store so for now you'll just have to trust me when I tell you they are awesome.

It was a two movie weekend—we saw Up and Whatever Works (the new Woody Allen movie). I'm sure you've all seen Up by now so you don't need me to tell you how great it was. Whatever Works was really good, too. If you're even remotely partial to Woody Allen movies, I suggest you go see it.

Aside from having to go to a meeting tomorrow, I'll be continuing my vacation this week. Arun's still working so it'll be a pretty quiet week. I'll be reading (reading, reading), doing some baking, and going to the gym and yoga to work off the baked goods.

My other vacation project is to get back in the habit of taking photos again. I used to stop and take photos of whatever happened to catch my eye all the time (and that worked out pretty well) but somewhere over the course of the winter I stopped because it was usually too cold and haven't picked it up again. I still see things that catch my eye and think "that would make a cool photo" but don't actually stop and take the picture, despite the fact that my trusty little camera is always in my purse. It's inexcusable, really, so this week I will make the effort to reinstate my old routine. I just hope I haven't lost my touch.

It's been a really nice week, with the perfect balance of family, friends, food, and relaxing. We've done lots of reading and cooking and video game playing and watched a marathon of Buildings that Shaped Britain, which was more interesting than it sounds. All of it has been very therapeutic and is only making me wish I didn't have to go back to work on Friday.

We've started working on our best of 2008 podcast(s) and if all goes well I should have something to post on the weekend.

Hope you have a lovely new year's eve. See you in 2009!

As predicted, it's been a busy few days with lots of baking, shopping, and wrapping to do but in the end it all got done. Now to enjoy it.

Hope you have a wonderful holiday!