I've already celebrated Christmas, and its not even December 1st

David, the kids and I just concluded a jam-packed, whirlwind weekend of city Christmas events. Consequently, we will not be doing ANYTHING remotely Yuletide-ish for the next four weeks until Christmas Day actually hits. I've already done Christmas, basically. Done and done. Lest you think I'm premature, I'd like to point out that I waited until after Thanksgiving at least, which is more than I can say for the stores which have been playing Christmas music since HALLOWEEN.

The Christmas extravaganza began the day after Thanksgiving when the kids went to see the Rockettes with my sister. This is not part of our normal repertoire, mainly because it costs so much damn money. But this year, I found a half-price Groupon and my mother, who can't resist a great deal, agreed to foot the bill. The only catch was you had to see the show before the end of November. No problem for us, I thought -- it just kicks off the holiday season.

After Radio City, we walked down Fifth Avenue, checked ut the windows and stumbled right past the Plaza. Now, who can walk past the Plaza without taking a stroll inside? Five dozen pictures of the kids in front of the Plaza Christmas trees followed. These would have been perfect for my Christmas card this year had I not ALREADY MADE THE CHRISTMAS CARDS. Yes, people, I did my annual Christmas-card-photo-shoot two weeks ago, on a resplendent 60 degree Sunday morning, when the kids could go outside with no coats and when I could order the cards for half price off, courtesy of yet another Groupon. (Are you seeing a trend here? My life is dictated by daily deals). The Plaza was cool, though man, is that shit commercial now. Shops and shops as far as the eye can see. Its basically the Plaza Mall, but hey, I'm not complaining. they have delightful restrooms which are free to the public.

The next day, we took on the main event of the Christmas Season: Santaland. I probably have a half-dozen entries about Santaland, and if you check them out, you may glean valuable information about how to avoid the crowds and get in and out of Macy's with your sanity intact. But this year we OUTDID ourselves, sailing through Santaland in FIFTEEN MINUTES. We took my grandmother, who hasn't been to see Santa in literally three decades, and I told her to brace herself for some standing around on line. But when we arrived on the eighth floor, the entrance to Santaland was eerily abandoned. We walked right on to the train. In fact, David had dropped us off at the entrance to Macys and gone off on on his own to find parking, since there's always at least a 30 minute wait before you even enter the train. But though he found a parking spot immediately and raced up the escalators to meet us, we had already reached the front of the line and were waiting for him at the entrance to the private Santa chamber when he arrived. It was almost TOO fast -- we didn't even have time to marvel at the train display or the mechanized ballet bears.

A quick trip to my parents' place in New Jersey secured us our Christmas tree and decorations and once we had those in our possession, it seemed silly not to just put them up. Christmas music was played, and tree was trimmed, on Sunday afternoon.

So yeah, we're done with Christmas. Santa can take it from here.