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Christmas trees

 
 
Ariadne
18:30 / 04.12.04
I just saw Loomis walk past the study door with ladders - and realised what he was doing - getting the Christmas tree down for me! I'm a big kid about Christmas and have been meaning to put it up since the 1st.
So, I'm off to put the tree up. When do you put your tree up - if you do at all?
 
 
Cherielabombe
20:26 / 04.12.04
Yay! I love Christmas trees too!! I always feel a little like a gypsy in my current lifestyle so I'm not sure about a BIG tree but definitely will have at least a little one.

I'm always afraid I'm gonna "ruin it" and start to get bored of Christmas if I put the tree up too early. Over the years I've had a number of artificial trees, and once - this was before silver trees were back in vogue, mind - I bought a cheap-o $10 tree and then proceeded to spray-paint it silver. Boy did it stink! I had to burn christmas tree incense (the best incense ever - made from real fir leaves!) all the time to mask the smell, and even then I was afraid my apartment was going to blow up from the fumes. But it didn't, and I have to admit it was a pretty cool tree.

I'd really like to have a real tree, though, and I have toyed with the idea for this year. But I'm never in my flat long enough to justify the purpose. It'll probably be just a mini-tree for me.

By the way, what's a wean?
 
 
Ariadne
20:38 / 04.12.04
a wean is a child, in Scotland. Rhymes with swain.
(I've a funny feeling I've double posted, at least...)
 
 
Loomis
20:41 / 04.12.04
I wanted to get an inflatable tree but I got funny looks from Ms Ariadne. Mind, that was in my cynical days. For the first time ever I'm actually looking forward to xmas. That may be because for the first time I have a job where I get paid holidays from 24th Dec to 5th Jan inclusive. Hoofuckingray.
 
 
Lilly Nowhere Late
21:51 / 04.12.04
Could someone bring me a tree? And decorate it and the rest of my house? And burn some of that incense CLB was on about?
I don't have any spare time for this as we're opening our new salon next week and it's my busiest season ever and I'm knackered. I have a 3-year-old who would really appreciate it if Santa were real this year. Mommy doesn't have time...
 
 
Warewullf
17:19 / 06.12.04
We put ours up yesterday. Lovely new four-foot artificial fiber-optic one. (It's nicer than it sounds, swear!)

My parents will (hopefuly) have the traditional big-fuck-off-real-tree-with-spines-of-pain-and-sheddidess up when I go home for xmas.
 
 
mondo a-go-go
17:22 / 06.12.04
Lily, I would love to decorate your house in Xmas stylee. We don't have a proper tree at home, but I have been known to hang baubles and beads and tinsel off the houseplants.

And I did buy a couple of nice glass baubles from Liberty's today.
 
 
Kit-Cat Club
17:25 / 06.12.04
Oh dear, no tree in the flat this year, and I do love glass baubles (plastic ones never seem right). Perhaps I should keep my (denuded) orchid stems to hang baubles from (taking your idea there Anna, sorry...)
 
 
Cheap. Easy. Cruel.
18:08 / 06.12.04
I never have been one to put up a tree or decorate for Christmas, but I have just bought a new house! I have this big dining room that is as empty as can be and a friend of mine has offered me a 6' artificial one that looks pretty nice. So, I think I am going to take her up on the offer and put it up. Instead of a regular housewarming party with gifts for the house (which always feels like I am just standing there at the door with my hand out) I am going to have all of my family and friends bring an ornament that reminds them of me. That way, I will have a sentimental reason to put it up again next year.
 
 
STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK
18:13 / 06.12.04
I am going to have all of my family and friends bring an ornament that reminds them of me. That way, I will have a sentimental reason to put it up again next year.

That's a fucking killer idea.

...on second thoughts, my house is already decorated with beer cans, which I think is what people would probably give me were I to try it...

I'm looking forward to decorating. I love it. (And yeah, lilly, what Anna said. Gimme a call and I'll string some tinsel or whatever for you if you want... none too professional, I'm warning you, but I'd be more than happy to, cos I love Christmas decorations.)
 
 
Sean the frumious Bandersnatch
20:14 / 06.12.04
Yes, hooray for christmas trees. There's nothing quite like gathering around a great big Osiris penis with your family.

[Okay, that site doesn't actually say that it's an Osiris penis, but if you remember your mythology, the tree represents Osiris' genitils (fertility), which were eaten by fish. And I wasn't about to google "Osiris penis", all right?]
 
 
lekvar
21:14 / 06.12.04
This'll be the first year me and my new family get to celebrate Xmas at home instead of running all over the state like idiots. I was voting for a barbed-wire Xmas tree but I was out-voted by a majority of one, plus barbed-wire and babies don't always mix well. Now we just have to figure out where we're gonna put the tree-our apartment is aready filled to the gills with stuff.
 
 
■
22:23 / 06.12.04
There's no room in my flat for a tree. Can someone send me a diagram to make a papier-mache Osiris Penis? I have the glue all ready...
 
 
Mazarine
22:29 / 06.12.04
My Hannukah/Christmas tree is up- it's silver tinsel with blue and white lights and blue ornaments. To protect the cats, who would doubtless try to eat it, it is on the screened in porch, but visible from the living room window.
 
 
STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK
22:31 / 06.12.04
I'm gonna put my cuddly Cthulhu doll on top of ours again this year (if mono lets me). He loves it up there.
 
 
Lilly Nowhere Late
06:34 / 07.12.04
Thanks Anna and Stoatie. I'll be expecting you over sometime soon. I think I will try to have a time set aside(prolly 15minutes or so with my schedule) on the evening of the 19th to get xmas spirit into our house. I'll give you food and wine if you show up.(or a take-out and Pink Lady)
 
 
Spaniel
06:43 / 07.12.04
I gotta a tree, it's luv a ly.
 
 
mondo a-go-go
15:08 / 14.12.04
A pink lady? Will she be someone I know? I thought you didn't like pink, Lilly.

I think I'm gonna put up baubles and things at home tomorrow. Prolly no tinsel, but of course the pink plastic snowflake that is about 45 years old cos it was my mum's when she was a kid...
 
 
Sekhmet
18:30 / 14.12.04
We got a tree! It's a pretty 7-foot, whachamacallit, a Fraser fir, I think. The house smells all woodsy now, and the cats are puking up tree needles everywhere. I anticipate many smashed ornaments on our newly tiled living room floor, too. Indoor cats go bonkers when you bring a tree inside the house, for some reason...

Now it's up with the pomander balls,
and garland and stockings
and bells and bows
and ribbons!

Huzzah!

 
 
modern maenad
20:23 / 14.12.04
A couple of years ago had a really great christmas eve - had some people round, and the 'job' for the evening was to make decorations (paper chains etc.) and decorate the house (we cheated and bought some glittery things too). It was a fab night, and by 11pm everthing was looking and feeling v. festive. We even toasted chestnuts on the fire.......
 
 
Mourne Kransky
21:55 / 14.12.04
Hate Christmas trees. Never much liked 'em but I think my boyfriend chucking me when I was half way through decorating the Christmas tree a few years back maybe caused some unpleasant associations.

Fortunately we are the Glitter Twins and the house is tastefully tinselled all year round. Only the angel in the fireplace gives the game away.
 
 
Haus Of Pain
17:35 / 15.12.04



If you are a bad boy at Christmas you have to spend it with these two old folk, he will pull down your trousers & she will make you satisfy her in a horrid way.

So be a good boy.

i repeat

GOOD BOY!
 
 
Mourne Kransky
18:28 / 15.12.04
Barbara Bush doesn't always look like Santa Claus, does she?

And, supposing there is a point to the Christmas tree, surely it's the rituals around it and the fact that it's your Christmas tree with the broken ornamental angel you've kept since you were a child and the taste statement that is your choice of tinsel colour and lighting effects.

What, then, is the point of a the Big Christmas Bush there? Where's the fun in that? Decorated by the British butler and watered by the Filipino maid?

Best tree I ever had was only about a foot tall but it was a happy little bit of Christmas cheer in a tawdry single room, one unpromising Christmas Day a few years back.
 
 
Cheap. Easy. Cruel.
20:00 / 15.12.04
I just got my tree put up the other day. I strung the lights all over the dining room floor to check for burned-out bulbs. This was an endless source of entertainment to my three month old kitten. Now that I have the lights on the tree, Mr. Twopence (Tup for short), seems to think it is his own personal jungle gym. I was planning on buying a few packs of cheap glass ball ornaments to put on the tree, but I don't fancy cleaning broken glass off the hardwood floors every day between now and the day after Christmas. Besides, what ornament could ever be cuter than a little black manx kitten peeking out at you?
 
 
King of Town
00:57 / 16.12.04
If anyone has tighter quarters than myself, I'm surprised. I don't have room for anything, but a pair of blue canvas breeches, a pair of suspenders(you must not forget the suspenders, Best Beloved), and a jack-knife. But, being a man of infinite-resource-and-sagacity, I've managed to cram in not only my full-size bed, desk, shelves,dresser, more shelves, and a fridge, but also a little christmas-tree shaped rosamary bush. I freely confess that the poor little bush is half-dead despite my best efforts (and in beautifully american style, I lay blame for its health on the store that sold it to me. the rest of their bushes were much worse looking than this one. It was only a matter of time...), but the living side is pointed towards the room and looks very christmasy with a bunch of white lights on it. Sadly it doesn't have a very strong scent except when you brush it and I'm afraid to do that in its current state. I partially make up for that with pine-scented car fresheners. after all, my room doesn't have much more cubic footage than a full-size SUV.
 
 
Lilly Nowhere Late
05:33 / 16.12.04
Hey King, if it's not too late, you could try packing some ice cubes around your poor Rosemary's base. Seems to help with revival sometimes. Or you could call in a baptist preacher and a group of country folk and have a real revival which wouldn't help at all.

I still have no tree. In fact, there may be one here somewhere but I've just not been home enough to notice. Frankie really wants one. Must make time for this. Must find time!
 
 
Lilly Nowhere Late
05:34 / 16.12.04
O yeah, I love pink ladies, btw.
 
 
King of Town
11:25 / 16.12.04
Wow Lilly. I'm surprised I didn't think of the ice-cubes because I had heard of that once. I'll have to try that. I guess I should harvest the dead dry twigs and put them in a jar for the kitchen though no? or is it better to harvest fresh ones and dry them in the oven?
 
  
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