MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!!

I am an utter failure when it comes to wrapping presents. I have never been good at it, and now that I'm 29 years old, I think I have to face the fact that gift-wrapping is something I will probably never master. I remember back when I was in college, when I worked for a stationery store, and this woman came in and asked for help picking out a present for her child's schoolteacher. When we got up to the register, she said the dreaded words, "Would you be able to giftwrap that for me?"

As I finished it up, I apologized to her for the fact that it was not done in anything remotely approaching an expert fashion, although in my defense I really did try. Her response was something like this: "Oh that's alright. It'll be fine, because it'll look like my 8-year-old wrapped it."

Hmmm.

So I'm awful at wrapping, but I am absolutely phenomenal at UNwrapping. And I simply love getting presents. To this day, I am like an impatient child on Christmas morning, begging everyone to hurry up with breakfast and whatever else they are doing so we can OPEN THE PRESENTS. I have become a bit of a joke in my family over the years, because of this tendency. They all think I am terribly amusing when I start whining at them, "Come on, you guys! I want to open my presents!" On my side, I don't understand why they aren't more excited to open theirs!

But last night I got a pretty awesome present, and a total surprise too. I came home from work, and everyone was in the dining room, when my youngest brother walked in on the phone with the woundedbug in morocco (another brother). Woundedbug was the only one not with us this year. So Timer put me on the phone with him, and we were chatting away, when suddenly into the room walks...woundedbug!!!!! I screamed and squealed like a twelve-year-old, and my sister the world traveller got it all on the video camera. It was great! Apparently my dad got him a ticket home at the last minute.

So for the first time in two years, my whole family is together at Christmas time. And that, my friends, is a Christmas present in itself.

Note: this will be the last frogg files of 2004. The frogg is off to the "toasty-warm" (yeah right, kenny) midwest til the end of the year, and will recommence with the daily posts after January 1. Merry Christmas and happy New Year to all of you! See you in 2005...