Chaos Attraction

Surprise Gifting

2019-12-24, 11:44 a.m.

Note: this covers the events of 12/22/2019.

I didn’t feel like doing shit on Sunday morning. I lounged around in bed, and ended up having a fight with Mom when she called and told me off for not having faith in her stopping hoarding and for saying so in public.* “I’ve been in a funk,” she said. I said does she have any kind of plan for stopping being in a funk and she said no, but she’d figure it out. She’s been hoarding for 14 years. Mostly she’s just wanky because Roger said “We’ll have been together for three years in June and I’ve still never seen the inside of your house. What’s up with that?”

* Honest to god, I don’t care about keeping this a secret any more. I’ve had enough. I won’t tell Roger directly, but that’s about it.

The holidays with Mom haven’t even started yet and I’m annoyed with her and planning on leaving after a few days.

I did eventually leave the house to get more Yoda making supplies and Chinese food for potluck, and then went early to the party to do setup with Cameron and Cody (and whatever others came in after).


The cast party was a blast. Enormous numbers of people and food (though I was sad that William and Alexis weren’t there, along with Trent and Marc). Elizabeth came back from college to see everyone.

I was hanging out with Cameron a good amount, which was amusing. She is very quotable. For example:

Cameron is mildly allergic to strawberries, but isn’t affected enough according to her to forego eating them all the time. She said that every time Scott hears there’s strawberries in something he warns her not to eat it, to which she said, “Stay in your lane, Scott.” (To be fair, I’ve heard enough shit about allergies getting worse that he may have a point...and obviously it’s a different thing for him than her.)

“It’s Jennifer’s show, we’re just here,” after she saw my Christmas tree apron that I busted out for this party.

She said that I’m good and I said I know she’s not into hugging but would want to hug her at that point and she was all, “Jedi hugs?” (Note: we hugged at the end anyway.)

Carol was talking about getting a unicorn hat that she wanted to wear to bridge club, but the ladies at bridge club aren’t fun. “Life is short. Wear the hat.”

When she said she and her mother were talking about The Merchant of Venice (not her favorite), she said she couldn’t remember the name of Portia’s husband and I was all “Bassanio,” and she was all, “no, it’s Antonio,” and I was all “no, that’s the merchant,” followed by, “I can’t believe I outShakespeared you!”

“It’s hard to kill people with potatoes.” (Scott suggested a potato gun to this.)

Cameron’s dad is named J. Literally only the letter J, which he changed it to. Is there a period or no period? “It depends on if he’s abbreviating it.”

Cameron on her assistant directing: “Nobody died.”

“Cake is the reason for the season.” (She was impatient about eating that strawberry cake.)

As the kids were getting goody bags from Anita: “All the good little boys and girls are getting presents. But not me, because I’m evil.”

(I sadly can’t recall what was said about joy, but we were snarking about that again.)

And once again, someone said to her that she and Scott had such chemistry onstage, were they together in real life? “We’re just really good friends.”


Robert and Cameron have birthdays in January, two days apart, so they were talking about doing an escape room for their birthday, but they will have to see about their rehearsal schedule. Which leads me to the gossip I heard on the 10 minute play festival: Cameron was also asked for a headshot, so of course those two are the astronauts in love even if it hasn’t been announced yet. (Of course.) However, the rumor is that the playwrights have to somehow request who they want and then Jim and Ana do...whatever shuffling about, so that’s why nobody’s heard yet. Some folks may get in multiple shows, or not. I heard there was a small number of auditioners on the second night (about the same as the first night) but since there are four female parts and at least seven women auditioned that I know of (me, Cameron, Ana, Laurel, Janene, Gail, that other girl who didn’t want to go to rehearsals who I’m told is named Linnea and not Catherine), I really don’t think I’d be one of the four, especially since Cameron and Linnea are already booked. Sigh. Oh well.


Even though we technically didn’t have anyone Jewish there tonight (which is to say Linda is out of town), we had the remaining Jewish characters in the play light a candle and say the blessing before dinner. The candles burned down ridiculously fast, from what I saw.

At dinner, we met the father of the baby that Anita could not get to be in The Best Christmas Pageant Ever. I pointed out that that’s actually very appropriate for that show because in the show, nobody wanted to let their baby be held by Herdmans. The dad said that when he saw how people were throwing the baby doll around...

Anita gave out a gift to baby Lena, an “A Star Is Born” ornament and a letter for the future. “She’s already a diva,” said Dona.


So the inevitable gift swap game, as played here with like 40+ people or whatever it was, is done somewhat differently here.

(a) Everyone is handed a gift.
(b) Anita reads from “Twas The Night Before Christmas” and you are supposed to pass your gifts to the right EVERY TIME you hear the word “the” read aloud. So that’s a lot of passing.
(c) After the poem is done, then the game starts with the usual “open what you got or steal” option, but if you steal, you trade gifts with the other person.

So that was nuts.

I will attempt to transcribe my notes off my phone from this, God help me and that’s why this entry is late.

Robert was #1, I was #2 and swapped the crappiest wrapped gift (eventually revealed, dead last, to be a Sonic gift card) for the biggest bag in the room. “Size does matter,” Scott said. It was a movie night kit, which eventually got stolen from me and I replaced it with... a second movie night kit (irony), this time it being the one Scott brought. It also came with a mug that said “I saw that. -Karma.” I am glad I photographed it because that one was stolen from me at the end of the game, so I ended up with a spirograph kit. I’m happy about that because I got a toy and I consider it good if I come out with a toy or at least something I don’t hate, though was a bit sad to lose stuff from Scott...but uh, never mind on that, see below :p

This game did not go the best for Scott, as he got a blanket he liked and lost that early on (there were like 4 blankets in the game and all got stolen a ton). At some point he ended up with chocolates, and someone was all, “Don’t eat Santa.” “Well, I can’t,” he said. Cameron politely stole it from him. For most of the night he ended up with a set of tiny novelty headbands and a shirt that were sizewise .intended for kids for most of the game, which he kept conspicuously trying to advertise to get rid of. Finally at the very end of the game a tiny child (Laydon) walked up and swapped him for the book he’d gotten, so there’s that.

There was a water balloon launcher, which I don’t think was fought over in the way it should have been.

Robert may have made a joke about bringing a white elephant, but he did not actually bring one. Jason, however, made one off a 3D printer and that one got stolen a few times. It was cute.

Bridget ended up with a neck pillow for a while. We had considered using one for knocking up Mary in the show, so I suggested she could also use it to knock up a small child. Elizabeth eventually stole it for her long plane ride back to college.

There was a giant sucker that was fought over.

There was a pack of BeanBoozleds that had to be explained.

Laydon broke the game when he stole one gift, passed it to Arlo, then took Arlo’s gift. Nobody felt like they could say a thing. Laydon pretty much did what he wanted in this, including the extremely last minute gift swap with Scott.

Quotes:

(As Scott tries to pimp the headbands in Anita’s direction)
“Tempting, Scott.” -Anita
“You also get Scott.” -Robert
“I don’t know if I could handle that.” -Anita

“Okay, please don’t steal from her, that was too cute and sad.” -Scott on Amelia’s reaction at some point.
Later: “YOU MONSTER!” -was said by someone as Amelia lost her gift.

“If there was a controversy, I probably was involved with it.” -Jason (I think).

“Izzy, we’re siblings.” -Scott after Izzy also got novelty headbands.

“I got a giant bag of trash!” -Cody, manning the trash bag
“More newspaper!” -Cody

As we watch someone open a suspiciously bottle looking package:
“It’s probably a bottle of gin.” -Dona
“That’s what I thought too.” -me
It was a stuffed merman.
“King Triton, what happened to you?” -Scott

“I’m sorry, but I want a big lollipop.” -Jayden

Everyone lost track of how many times Jesse was stolen from. I asked him and Dona if they knew and they lost track after four, but I suspect it was like 8 or 9 times.
“I’m gonna steal from a baby.” -Jesse
“There are boundaries.” -Anita

Those who were super obviously unhappy with their stuff for a while:
* Bianca, who ended up with Old Spice until a guy stole it, everyone cheered. She later ended up with poop slippers, which I think she got stuck with.
* Ava, who ended up with the unicorn I brought and was obviously unhappy about this and waving it about like Scott trying to get rid of it, until Dona stole it. Yay Dona for being awesome.
* Josie, getting felted soap, an object that confused the guys around me. “There’s some felt soap that looks like it’s trying to change hands.” Cody, I think she eventually got that swapped away.


After the game was over, there was dessert. I tried Scott’s peanut butter Rice Krispie treats and they were absolutely delicious, btw (ate three, got four more for later), as God would have intended such an object to taste instead of all the previous attempts.

Then uh...it turns out the guys brought presents for us. Cameron and I were totally clueless and gobsmacked on that, since we had none and I was all “I asked Sarah if anyone did presents here and she said no!” (To which both guys were all, “which Sarah?” “The redhead one!”) Anyway, they politely did not comment on my idiocy, though Scott was all, “well, I do.”

Both guys got me gift certificates to the yarn shop, though Scott’s was....large, I’m gonna say. Like, damn. He also got me a very large conspicuous Christmas card and a “llama no drama” mug, to which I was all, “this matches the llama no drama sticker I have up in my house!” I sent him a photo of this later and he said “perfect!” to that.

Anyway, I am flattered and super shamed/embarrassed on my own end. I thought about it but was all, I don’t want to be weird...and was anyway. Sigh.

And that’s the end of friends, theater, and whatever the heck is going on with Scott for 2019, y’all. Sadly, this means my entries for the rest of the year may be a bit dull by comparison with no well, drama. Literally


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