Christmas In Maryland: The Deleted Scenes

The title of this blog post pretty accurately sums up my Christmas in Maryland. Here's the breakdown:

Christmas Eve:
Mary Katherine braves the monsoon & comes to pick me up & drive me to my parents' house in Smyrna. She comes bearing Starbucks & we visit for awhile & swap gifts (she got me the CUTEST Anthropologie apron -thanks, MK!). She drops me off in Smyrna & heads to M'boro to spend Christmas with her family. Later that night my immediate family eats dinner & opens gifts. My parents got me the 3rd & 4th books in the Twilight series, fueling my teen vampire addiction. I got a lot of great stuff. It was a really good Christmas.

Christmas Day:
I wake up Christmas Day & fly to Maryland. My annual Christmas Day pilgrimage to Maryland is usually complete hell. I should have known by how smoothly my flight went that something bad was waiting for me in Maryland. John picks me up from the airport & we drive straight to his Great-Aunt Ginny's house in Catonsville. I always enjoy going to Aunt Ginny's because she makes this amazing seafood casserole. As usual, the food is awesome. What isn't awesome is John's crazy f*cking Uncle Jim, who apparently is a full-fledged racist. The majority of John's family is Republican. So is mine, big deal. Well, it was a big deal because crazy f*cking Uncle Jim proceeded to mouth off about Obama during the entire Christmas dinner. So while we're eating our scrumptious seafood casserole off of Aunt Ginny's fine china, crazy f*cking Uncle Jim is saying things like, "Monkey-man Obama", which prompts John's Nana to join in on the fun. Nana is 84, but has the political acumen of a 7 year old. So Nana says, "I heard they're not even going to swear him in on the Bible!". This is the first of what will prove to be many priceless quotes from Nana over the next 48 hours.

Friday:
John & I get up & drive into Georgetown so I can do a little post-Christmas shopping. I only hit H&M & Urban Outfitters, but I'm pretty pleased with my purchases. We leave Georgetown & head to Glen Burnie to visit John's good friend Grant & his wife Natasha. We were only able to stay for a few minutes because we had to go pick up Sally from the airport. With Sally in tow, we head back to their Dad's house. We open our presents with Sally, then head to Annapolis to visit with John's grandparents. Nana, being at her limit with John's dad, decides to come with us. We get to John's grandparents' house & Nana says as she's walking up to the house, "It's awful dark out here. I hope I don't fall." She fell about 1 second later. It was awful. She cut her brow bone, broke her glasses & bruised her arm & knee. Nana takes blood thinners, so she bled a lot. A LOT. It was scary. Luckily, John's Aunt Joyce was there. Joyce is a nurse & had a first aid kit in her car. She had Nana fixed up in no time. So we visit for awhile & open presents. It was a good time. We take Nana home & then me, John & Sally went to the local Crofton bar/restaurant Jasper's to eat a late dinner & have a couple of drinks.

Saturday:
Nana wakes up with a shiner. It's possibly the worst black eye I've ever seen. John's other Great-Aunt, Mary Lou, was having Christmas dinner at her house in Elkridge at 1:30pm, so John's dad takes us by his friends' Buddy & Nica's house beforehand. Buddy & Nica are family friends & we usually see them while we're there. They're really nice, although apparently Buddy drank the same Kool-aid crazy f*cking Uncle Jim did. As every conversation did while we were in Maryland, this one also quickly turned to Obama. Buddy states that he doesn't like him because he's from the South & has always been racist & gets more so with age. Humph. I like Buddy, so I let it slide, especially since his very nice wife is feeding me gourmet coffee & homemade pie. But Nana, oh Nana... Nana says, "He's the Anti-Christ. I read it in Newsweek". Aside from the faint sound of John chuckling behind me, you could have heard a pin drop. I think we left shortly after that.

John & Sally had both warned me extensively about how miserable Mary Lou's was going to be. Apparently the food is weird & the family is even weirder. The food was definitely weird, except for this awesome crab soup she makes. It was seriously one of the best things I've ever eaten. I will preface this by saying that everyone there was very nice.... But yeah, definitely weird. And then, of course, there's crazy f*cking Uncle Jim walking around, spouting bullshit & generally making everyone uncomfortable.

Apparently one year John's dad turned all the Santa figurines in Mary Lou's house backwards & she made him leave. We got there at 1:30. Around 3:30/4:00 I was begging John's dad to do something to get us kicked out. The anti-Obama rhetoric had hit an all-time high & I had taken all I could take without losing my cool & embarrassing John. I went outside & stayed outside until it was time to leave. Aside from the crab soup, it was a pretty miserable day.

From Mary Lou's, John & I head back to Grant & Natasha's house in Glen Burnie. There was a party later & everyone was meeting there to hang-out beforehand. A lot of John's friends from high school were there. We played some games, drank a little, ate a little. It was actually the highlight of the trip. We had to get up early the next day to drive home, so we left when everyone else went to the party. Lame, I know.

Sunday:
Woke up. Drove home.

Monday:
Woke up sick. Stayed home from work.

Tuesday:
Still sick. Stayed home from work again.

Wednesday/New Year's Eve:
Time will tell......

Pics here:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/16828091@N04/sets/72157611834116982/