Do Black Patent Leather Shoes......

Really exist? I thought I had things pretty well under control as far as Christmas was concerned. I had finally finished all the decorating in my house and had even finished most of the shopping I thought I had to do. Life was good. I only had a few things left to find, but they seemed easy. What could go wrong?

Yesterday I got a call from my mom in a panic. After forty four years, she had decided to get an artificial Christmas tree. She had picked out a pre-lit number with some crazy flocking that gave it the look of a snow covered pine. How festive. She had asked me last week if I would come and help her put it up, assuring me that the woman at the store had told her it was very easy. Yesterday she called and told me not to come because she and one of my brothers had opened the box, took out the stand and one section of the tree and had come to the conclusion that the tree was broken and the stand was missing parts. As you can imagine, I was dubious since the tree was in a factory sealed box. "I'll come take a look." Then my mom unleashed some guilt that only a mother can conjure. "Well, if you're too busy, I'll try to get it in the car myself." While watching her try to load a now expanding tree into her car would have made for some Christmas merriment, I went over. It took me about thirty eight seconds to determine that the tree and the stand were both in fine order. It wasn't until the tree was fully assembled that my mom stopped questioning me. I had to literally pick the tree up and shake it to prove to her that it wasn't coming out of the stand.

The funniest part of the whole episode was that my mom thought the tree would come right out of the box and look like the one on the showroom floor. I got it together and she looked as if I had just plopped Charlie browns tree in her living room. I explained to her that we had to shape it and she got irate saying that the woman hadn't told her that. I guess she thought an artificial tree was like an umbrella that she would just pop open. Yes, I shaped her tree and when I left, she seemed happy. That's me, spreading the joy.

Today I thought I would do "Wife" a favor and pick up a pair of shoes for "Daughter". I was out running errands anyway (more on that tomorrow) and figured I would help her out. There I go, spreading the joy again. "Daughter" needs a pair of black patent leather shoes to go with some holiday outfits. It should be easy right? I've been running around for three hours and have gone to about 57 stores. No luck. Thankfully Christmas is still two weeks away, so I have 14 days of searching to look forward to. I can't wait until "Daughter's" feet stop growing, then we won't have to go through this every year for shoes she'll wear a couple of times. Later...Brian