On the beauty of Christmas avoidance

The sun is shining in a fairly uninterrupted pattern, which is mind-blowing for Irish standards.  The weather is, in fact, so beautiful, that it tempted my Other Half out of our den and both himself and the Dog are off for a long walk.  It takes more than a few feeble December rays to drag me outside so instead I chose to stay warm and blog. 

The light is perfect for a photo shoot and I even have some prime snapping material - a package full of yarn arrived in mail yesterday (I love you, Mum!) and my stash grew by another sweater's worth.  Despite these obvious hints from Fate, I'm stubbornly ignoring my picture taking responsibilities, hoping instead that I can get away with offering you a random pic of my dog from the times when she was still a tiny puppy.

A ton of super-concentrated cuteness, wasn't she?  She's posing on one of my creations that REALLY deserves to be shown properly.  One day, I promise. 

I begin to worry that there are more dog pictures than yarn pictures here.  I am told that puppies are super popular in the Internetland so it might be OK.  Do let me know if I'm badly misguided and need to reform ASAP. 

I promised you a little elaboration on the non-existent Christmas theme, and even if I'm little late (I was supposed to post it yesterday, did anyone notice?), I'm going to deliver. 

In short - I don't bother with celebrating Christmas  (do you envy me now?  Pity me?  Feel outrage for my blatant disregard of cultural traditions?).  This means a couple of things:

1)  I enjoy blissfully stress-free Decembers

2)  I'm not broke in January (well, no more broke than usual)

3)  I sometimes need to fend off public Reactions to my heretical attitude

It's not that I have some deep grudge against the whole shebang, I just can't see any point in working my ass off to participate in something that's rather meaningless to me.  I'm not religious.  My family lives some 1500 km away.  I'm not very social (and come December, I am particularly grateful for this fact).  I don't have a standard 9 to 5 job.  I don't much care about doing things because everybody does. 

If I had children, things could be a little different.  I have tons of good childhood Christmas memories.  I got the presents, didn't have to go to school, got to eat all the food that someone else cooked, what's not to love?  If I ever stumble towards motherhood, I'll probably restart the tradition, just to produce the same memories for the sake of next generation. 

I the meantime?  I'm the only one who cooks around here, so I can eat Christmas fare any day I like.  I still get presents (yarn from Mum arriving just so in December would be too much of a coincidence, wouldn't it?).  My Other Half is even more intense in his Christmas bashing, having been scarred for life many years ago by annual pre-festive crazes - for the sake of distant relatives who thought it proper.  And come January, I'll be able to take all the money I didn't spent on lights, reindeer and other Yule crap and buy yarn.  Ha!

Heretic and proud!

PS.  Red aran sweater grew by another five statutory rounds since the last post.  It also got a name - Amaryllis - inspired by a beauty just a-flower on my window sill, exactly almost the colour of the yarn.  Today I'm wildly optimistic and I think I MIGHT avoid ripping by adding a couple of extra rows.  A Christmas miracle in coming?  Keep your fingers crossed with me.