Gifts, Coming and Going

First off, I took part in a secret Santa swap this year (Secret SANta, actually, #SecretSANtaSwap2023), and I have to show you what a fun package I received! 

It started with the box, even:

Which was also fun on the inside, and had cute cat-Santa tissue paper! 

(I clearly need to up my game next year, I never even thought of this level, but it was so fun to get.)

A nice big mug with my initial, fun things to try, and cat toys for Maggie!

And I'll put the pretty spools-of-thread-tree ornament up along with the other ornaments I've bought recently.

We're not decorating for Christmas this year--we've had Too Much Going On--but a few ornaments, a few cards, and they'll make me smile.

Plus Christmas candy:

There is absolutely nothing intrinsically Christmassy about this candy, but we always used to make it at Christmastime, so it feels that way to me. They're kind off odd-looking, I know*, but when you melt chocolate and butterscotch chips together, and then put in cashews and chow mein** noodles, well, it is delicious!

*I used to make them for potlucks and I called them "haystacks" because they do kind of look that way, and calling them Christmas candy seemed to make people expect peppermint to be involved.
**Spellcheck really wants that to be "mien" but it isn't--I checked the package to be sure! But now both look wrong to me.

In other gift news, here are a few festive things I bought myself (that are not yarn). I was in the hardware store, of all places, and had a coupon to use if I spent over a certain amount, so I got this necklace to use it.

It lights up! It makes me feel that we aren't entirely grinching the holiday season. I'm going to wear it to an ornament exchange that I'm going to on Monday. And I plan to wear it over the Christmas weekend.

And I'll also wear this bracelet, which is a bit more "holiday-themed jewelry that one could wear to a grown-up situation" and less "lights up."

Isn't that pretty? 

Now, I need to get to finishing/wrapping/boxing some presents. I'm going to be listening to this song, and there's a backstory.

(If that doesn't play, it's Boney M. - Mary's Boy Child.)

So, my first three years of high school, my Dad drove me (it was very much not on his way to work, but my parents chose the school they did, so). Dad was, like me, not a morning person, so we generally weren't talking*, but listening to the radio. 

*I remember one time, he told me that the roads were the most slippery when the rain just started, before it soaked in, so be more careful then. Seriously. That's how little we talked on these drives, that I remember that specifically.

He liked WBZ, which was mostly news, traffic, etc., but the host of Maynard in the Morning, Dave Maynard, also played a song now and again. And one day, for reasons that escape me if I ever knew, at every song break, he played this song. Over and over! I liked it then, and for some reason it came into my head this week, and I found it online.

And no, I won't be listening to it continuously for an hour or anything. But a few times.