I STILL DON'T HAVE ANY PLANS (LAME OR OTHERWISE) FOR NEW YEAR'S EVE!!!!!!!!!

Yo, dude! Is this being deducted from my fifteen minute total?

I cowered under my covers like a little girl.

Ever wondered what Santa was doing on December 26?

I had almost two years to see her in action, and it was truly astonishing.

The first time it was just before Valentine’s Day. By the time I had moved in, the decorations were already up for the occasion: A flag with pink and red hearts hanging from a flagpole next to the front door, pink and red heart-shaped balloons bobbing from the porch railings, and – to further top off the understated elegance – another flag-like cloth in more or less the same theme of hearts and still MORE hearts, draped down the length of the front door.

I thought that was it, until I noticed a peculiar reddish glow outside when I looked out my window one night. Suspecting a fire or – at the very least – the landing of an unidentified flying object (this IS the United States after all), I rushed outside.

To my further amazement and slight horror, I saw what it was: strings of red and pink lights – similar to Christmas lights, but only in heart shapes – were strung along the fence and around the porch. In all the windows, a succession of Cupids outlined in the same kind of lights, blinked on and off, furiously alternating between red, pink and white.

Perhaps it all wouldn’t have been THAT bad, had it not been for the fact that it had just turned January and the day of St. Valentine was still more than a month away.

Believe it or not, but I eventually got used to it.

By the end of Valentine’s Day, though, I was shocked anew. The Valentine’s adornments that I had reluctantly learned to live with, were conspicuous in their absence.

Unfortunately, this didn’t mean that the little garden was back in its ‘natural’ and quintessentially Baltimore state of gnomes and plastic flowers (really, the kind with little propeller-like leaves that is set off spinning in a blur of bold colours at the nudge of even the most gentle breeze).

Instead, all the Valentine’s decorations had been skilfully replaced and Easter bunnies of all shapes and sizes had invaded the garden.

By the time the red, white and blue flags, streamers and lights went up for a very patriotic Independence day on the fourth of July – before the sun had even sunk on Easter Sunday, mind you – I finally reached a profound conclusion. I realised that the woman was an obsessed decorator and that she simply HAD to be the first one to have her decorations up for the next holiday.

One of the younger neighbours tried to beat her to the punch (for Thanksgiving, I think, for which the decorations come out about a week after a flag with a yellow and brown leave motif announced the start of autumn. Oh, did I forget to mention the seasonal decorations?), but she must have had a secret informer, because she returned home early from work that day and (perhaps out of revenge, I suspect, but can’t be sure) out-decorated the entire neighbourhood with turkey flags, stuffed toy turkeys along the stone path through her garden and a larger-than-life scarecrow.

And yes, of course she was first again. But in the defence of the young neighbour who had tried to beat her: she was only 11 years old, while the Nazi Decorator had the edge of experience at about 35.

But if I had thought that she was overdoing it the rest of the year, I was in for a serious surprise. You see, I was to learn that the epitome of her decorating …um…talents are saved up to come to its full glory only for the Holiday of all Holidays: Christmas.

But before I get to that, let me tell you about the seasonal decorations. Regardless of what the weather was like, on every official calendar day that marks the start of a new season, her old decorations were promptly taken down and the new ones went up in its place.

That same year I was horrified to see her take the same stance regarding the few natural flowers in her garden.

On a beautiful, warm October day, she was out in her garden, viciously ripping out all the perfectly alive natural flowers in sight.

(And no, it wasn’t weeds, it was real flowers.)

Shocked beyond belief, I asked the 11-year old what was going on.

"Oh, don’t you know? Today is the first official day of fall."

"But it’s still so warm!" I exclaimed.

She merely shrugged, and sympathetically patted me on the shoulder as if to say: "You’ll get used to it one day."

And yes, of course the flowers were replanted with military precision on the first official day of spring, whether it was still minus forty degrees outside or not.

Back to Christmas.

The Thanksgiving turkey wasn’t even cold yet when she went outside and started ripping off the decorations.

That night, when we emerged from the house again to see off a friend, Christmas had arrived in all its glory.

I don’t even know where to START describing all the decorations she had up: stuffed Santas, reindeer made out of wire, blinding Christmas lights everywhere, the ever-present flag, and the best: A life-size nativity scene with all the figures (multiracial, I must add, so at least she was politically correct) made out of plastic. At night they lit up as well, and with that special effect they did seem like glowing idols.

Later that Thanksgiving weekend, we had a terrible storm that ripped through the area, complete with rain and howling wind gusts.

When we left our house on the first sunny morning, I looked over at the Nazi Decorator's Christmas palace. At first I thought she had taken the nativity down, but then I looked closer. Mary, holding the baby Jesus, the three wise men, the donkey and the sheep all lay facedown in the bare and muddy flowerbed.

Only Joseph was still standing – or rather, leaning – and also just barely, because he was merely held up by the porch railing.

I had to wonder: was it Divine Intervention?

Well, whether it was or not, the nativity was promptly resurrected. This time, she had securely tied them to the porch railings with rope, where they remained hostage until sunset on Christmas day.

Believe it or not, but it could have been worse.

A man who lives in the northern suburbs of Baltimore made the evening news recently for his decorations and for how he managed to do it. And believe me, making the Baltimore evening news because of your Christmas decorations takes some doing in this town!

You see, he lives in the woods and he decorated all the huge trees around his house with Christmas lights.

He managed to string the lights by... you'd better sit down for this one... shooting it up into the branches with a bow and arrow.

In the dark.

He proudly demonstrated this to the camera crews and breathless television reporters. While he was taking aim, he said cheerfully: "I haven't killed anyone... yet."

See? I really should count my blessings, because no one in my neighbourhood has gone to such drastic decorating lengths... yet.

So as I've already begun to tell you, my tradition of making cards began when I was but a wee pumpkin.

Okay, who am I trying to delude here? I was NEVER "wee."

I derived my 'artistic' inspiration for my Christmas card cover art from my immediate surroundings. And since I couldn't for the life of me manage to get the dogs to be cooperative Christmas card models with tinsel wrapped around their noses, or even get them to remain stationary long enough to actually become part of the holiday stationery (one would think that the possibility of infamy would be enticing enough for any canine, but alas), I had to look elsewhere.

And it was that continued quest for inspiration in our house that led me to the Chosen Object which ended up being the controversial cover art that year (it was circa 1983, in case you were wondering. I was about nine years old).

I found it in my one sister's bedroom (which was off-limits to me, but since she was away at boarding school I decided to risk it), and knew as soon as I laid eyes on it that I had found the object that was to be my 1983 Christmas card cover art.

I broke another one of the cardinal Laws of Intimidation Inflicted by Older Siblings when I proceeded to remove the festive-looking object from my sister's room.

Oh, what great lengths a wannabe artist will go to for inspiration!

Anyway, so I took the object to my room where I spent hours painstakingly drawing it onto folded card stock.

I usually gave the first card to my parents right after making it, but that year, in an attempt to up the surprise factor a bit, I decided to keep them in suspense. So I finished making all the other identical cards, sealed and addressed the envelopes and asked my mom to take me to the post office on her next trip into town. (We lived on a farm.)

It just so happened that she needed to buy something that same afternoon, so she drove me into town and I took great delight in feeding all the envelopes (and there were quite a few, for I sent homemade cards to all of my aunts and uncles and cousins and grandparents) through the slot of the post office mailbox.

When we got home later that day, I presented my mom with her and my dad's envelope.

She opened it with a huge smile and took the card from the envelope. She looked at it, and that's when her face went pale and then crimson.

"Is... is... How? Where did you find this picture?" My mother could hardly speak.

"I drew it, Mommy!" I said, very proud of the fact that a card made by me with my very own hands had evoked such emotion in my mom. It was plain to see that she was so moved, she was almost speechless!

"Is... Has... Is this the picture you drew on all of the cards? The cards that we mailed earlier today?"

"Yes, Mom. You know that I draw the same picture for everyone every year." I was growing impatient, because I didn't want her to ask me silly questions anymore. I was keenly awaiting her praise. It was time for her to make a fuss over the pretty picture I had drawn and for her to give it a special place among all the other Christmas cards that were already on display on the piano. It was my favourite part of our yearly ritual.

But my mom just stood there, as frozen as an ice sculpture. (Which is remarkable when you consider that Christmas in South Africa takes place during the scorching summer.)

At last she spoke again: "Where did you draw it from? Did you trace it?" Oy, still with the silly questions...

"It's a candle I found in Big Sister's room."

"Why didn't you draw an angel like last year?"

"Because that was LAST YEAR, Ma." I was REALLY getting impatient now. "Besides, I liked this better."

A candle on a Christmas card is a perfectly respectable picture, isn't it? It so beautifully and aptly convey the holiday message of hope and peace. Doesn't it?

My mom didn't think so. And, although the rest of the family's reaction to my Christmas card "art" never reached my ears, I suspect that my 1983 Christmas card never went on display in any of its recipients' homes.

After all, it never made it onto our piano with the rest of the cards. Of course I was very upset at first, but after discussing the matter at some length (but on a strictly need-to-know basis), I eventually conceded that my mom had a valid point:

No matter how festive you think it might be, a picture of a candle shaped like a grinning red devil with the words "Horny Little Devil" engraved onto its bulbous stomach in big yellow letters, really has no business of being on a Christmas card.

P.S. I never saw that satanic candle again. I later found out that my sis - who as a young teen was as oblivious to the meaning of the engraved pun as I was - had bought the candle for herself, because it matched the red decor of her room.

"Whenever you have an ear infection and you wish to achieve optimum drainage, you're supposed to hang upside down."

"Like a bat?" I asked.

"You could say that."

(I think he was trying to break it to me gently.)

So, here I've been since then, suspended by my ankles from the ceiling fan.

I caught a glimpse of myself in the reflection of the computer screen, and my legs and body are so white (well, I'm a redhead, so I suppose it doesn't sound THAT different from any other time, except this time I'm sure I can actually see the outlines of some of my vital organs through this new translucence of my skin) while my face and head have swollen to twice it's normal (already impressive) size and are as red as a beet from having every single drop of my blood which is normally evenly distributed throughout my whole body collected right there in one place.

(My goodness that was a long sentence!)

I think my brain is benefitting from this position (even if my writing and punctuation clearly aren't), because since receiving this surge of blood into it, I've been able to think quite clearly.

Even though it feels as if my head wants to explode, which seems to be the only other side effect so far, which I suppose, along with the translucent bloodless body, isn't all that bad.

Also, from this angle, my legs look rather skinny. Which is a perk in itself, because when you're as white as I am, everything tends to look twice as big as it actually is in real life. (So please keep that in mind when you meet me in person one day and your first impression is a tempting: "My, but she is ENORMOUS." Remember that it's all just a big fat illusion.)

Anyway, so now, when people ask me what I'm doing, I can casually say: "Oh, I'm just hanging out," and mean it quite literally.

What's that? What? YOU WANT TO KNOW HOW MY EARS ARE?

Oh. That's right. That's what all of this was about in the first place.

Well... I suppose now they're full of blood, so it still sounds as if I'm listening to everything while being underwater.

But I heard on CSI (the other medical advisor I turn to for things not covered by the Time/Life A - Z Medical Encyclopedia and my lay doctor friends. Like whenever I wake up and feel as if I've been murdered the night before, you know?).

Anyway, as I was saying, I heard on CSI that blood is thicker than water, so that's probably why I can hear even less now than I was able to hear last week, during the height of my ear infection.

So no reason to be alarmed.

Right?

RIGHT?

If I end up going deaf in this one ear (which, according to the encyclopedia, is just a matter of time now), will I still need surround sound stereo systems? Or will the mono setting on the radio and one speaker be sufficient for a person who can only hear out of one ear?

And by the way (and yes, I realize that this is more than one question, don't nitpick!): what do you call a person who can only hear out of one ear? A half-deaf?

Or is calling someone 'deaf' unheard of nowadays?

Since creativity on the writing front seems to have forsaken me for good (Muse applications are still being accepted), I'm trying to figure out whether I have any creative bones left in my body.

And, by the way, that bone-chilling scream for help in the opening paragraph was brought on by the fact that I have finally lost the last bit of my mind, because in an ongoing fit of insanity, I went and signed up for NaNoWriMo, or, as I like to call it: YetSomethingElseToProcrastinate.

And no, the above opening paragraph isn't my attempt at writing a horror story for NaNoWriMo. Neither is it the amateurish reviews of the movies Mice sent me. In fact, I haven't even written that many words for NaNoWriMo yet, which means that I'm already thirty days and fifty thousand words behind schedule. And I've just realised that November only has thirty days. Which means that I've managed to ENTIRELY miss the deadline. (Because of course there was a time when I held fast to the procrastinator's belief that I'd be able to write the required fifty thousand words in 24 hours) So let's just pretend that I've signed up way early for next year's NaNoWriMo, shall we?

So since I don't want to end up a creativeless creature, all shriveled and wrinkly, sucked dry of all creative juices, I've decided to take up... photography.

And that opening paragraph is your clue that I turned out not to be much of a shutterbug either.

I should've known though. After all, we all know that I'm not very mentally or technologically sound.

But I thought to myself: "Surely things have changed by now. After all, the photography equipment catalogues claim that sophisticated yet user friendly advances have been made since those ancient times (circa late 1980s, early to mid 1990s) when archaic practices and humourous tools, like rolls of film and manual SLR cameras, were employed."

Yes, of course I always sound like that when I think to myself!

Seriously though. A few years ago it was perfectly acceptable NOT to be good at photography. Remember? And remember those worry free days when NOBODY knew how to to set the clock or timers on their VCR's? Not like these days when one is expected to be able to perform a gazillion tasks and to do it all with the speed and skill of a seasoned pro. It seems that the more technological the world becomes, the more difficult it becomes to function as a human being. Or is it just me? (Don't answer that!)

Anyway, as usual, I'm digressing.

I think it was more acceptable to be a lousy photographer a few years ago because of the equipment. (NOT that I'm trying to point fingers here, or anything. Alas, all I ever wanted to point was a camera; point it at something and get a decipherable picture out of the experience.)

Seriously though, remember those boxy cameras where the view-finder was in one corner at the back of the camera, and so, in order to capture your entire subject instead of just half of it, you had to make tricky calculations like estimating the desired angle by adding or subtracting a few degrees?

Consequently we have family albums filled with photographs of headless relatives.

Before attempting to conquer this old hobby of mine for the second time, I had the uncharacteristic foresight to realise that I was going to need some help. Which of course called for the purchasing of a few hundred (but who's counting when the buying is done in the sacred name of Higher Learning and Art?) new How-to books.

So here I am, drowning in jargon like depth-of-field, bit-mapped, pixels and aperture.

And I find myself rapidly losing focus...