In other words, if aliens ever tried making first contact with us during the month of December they may think us nuttier than a chipmunks pantry and high-tail it to the next galactic sector.
Oh, and to top it all off we murder a bunch of trees and bedazzle their remains in our living rooms for everyone to ogle and cats to annihilate.
For us, its joy. From the trees perspective - it's like an annual occurrence of the bubonic plague and leaves the survivors lonelier than a bachelor octopus.
Essentially what I am saying is, like most individuals in our culture, I find December to be insanely busy and it leaves me over-socialized, over-sugared, and literally resisting the urge to murder the next person who tries to sing a carol or bring Christmas cheer to me by the time the 25th even rolls around. My favorite part of Christmas is seeing my family and Christmas Eve service at church. I would be quite happy if all other holiday related activities - especially carols and presents and mindless materialism - ceased. However, I begrudgingly shop, wrap, and sing because society tells me I'd be a scrooge if I didn't have the burning desire to do so with a ridiculous smile on my face whilst snorting candy cane dust and emanating the scent of cloves from every known body orifice.
Consequently, I quite easily relate to a lot of your classic Christmas villains.
While some of you may be irritated at me for that rant and about to call me out for being an angry green hermit out to torment Cindy Lou-Who, I feel it was necessary to show just how happy I was that OTHER things happened in December aside from Christmas.
First and foremost, I raced again! It was in a splendid event known as an aquathlon. A favorite of my mother, as she fears for my very life every time I mount a bike. I fear one of these days during a triathlon I am going to mount my bike out of T1 and my poor mother will faint from an anxiety attack like a goat that just heard a Taylor Swift song.
An aquathlon has the lovely appeal of going right from the swim to the run and exists because every combination of sport ever must occur in a race these days as mandated by the super fit humanoid overlords from alternate universe Earth 45.6. This particular aquathlon that I found myself in somehow* was the start of the Provincial ETA Winter Aquathlon Series and was the first of four races.
*I think I'm starting to sign up for races in my sleep now, judging by the fact my credit card bill always seems to be higher than I think its going to be.
This year, I will be competing in the Elite category for the entire series. I feel that is worth mentioning because saying I got last place in the Elite category sounds much better than saying I simply got last place. In other words, I only suck when compared to the super-humans I look up to and train with.
The race went quite well. I ran the correct number of laps during the 2km run, and only swallowed 1.2658976 gallons of water during the frenzy that is the ~400m swim. Also I put my shoes on the correct feet and remembered to take my swim cap off. Both positives. Don't run with swim caps on, they get hot. Plus everyone will give you this look at the finish line.
The swim was rough, as any open-water style swim in a pool with a variety of other super fast athletes diving in at once will be. But I managed to swim relatively smooth and only got punched a few times. I accidentally slapped a few butts while trying to swim in the pack and catch water, but I escaped the race without any sexual harassment suits.
The run felt better, for a track run, than I have felt on a track in years. Although counting to 10 laps is hard and I had to lift a finger every time one went by so I wouldn't lose track. Here I am on lap 7.
I finished happy and satisfied and not a very distant last.
That was my only race in December. Aside from the holidays, only a few other things of note occurred in the final days of 2013.
First of all, I made the mistake of volunteering for signage duties in preparation for hosting Worlds here in late summer. Why we had to hang the race signs in the middle of winter around a frozen hole in the ground where the swim will take place is beyond me, but nevertheless I found myself dressed in more fuzz than one of Miley Cyrus's party bears to hang banners using frozen zip-ties in -40 degrees Celsius.
I don't think I have to reiterate how cold that was. My team-mate and I took several hours to warm up afterwards by snuggling under blankets laughing at Stewie lines from Family Guy and snorting tea out our facial breathing apparatuses.
The cold doesn't seem to deter us, though, as despite the frigid conditions we still ran outside. This leads to the rather unique Albertan event known as the "frozen eyelashes face-off" whereby whoever has the biggest white lashes at the end of a practice wins the honor of being the most attractive cold loving crazy person.
I also was able to take some time off work around the holidays to go to Jasper, which is beautiful anytime of year but especially in winter.
XC skiing there is like frolicking in an Elvin wonderland covered in icing sugar after an apocalypse wiped out all signs of civilization and other beings. Natural, picturesque, and utterly peaceful - if you like the mountains, you must XC ski in them. I've been going there since I was a kid. Even trails I've done time after time still strike me with a child-like sense of awe and wonder when I'm on them.
I also went on an ice walk in Maligne Canyon and saw a neat waterfall.
I felt like bursting into musical numbers from Frozen the entire time. It was a difficult urge to resist, and my reasoning for looking ridiculous in the photos.
And that was, essentially, my December.
I also ate food, watched a few cat videos, and danced in my underwear.
Cheerio Mates!
- Bry-Bry
