Guess which one of these real life events from this morning make me say, “F@ckF@ckF@ckF@ckF@ckF@ckF@ckF@ck!” repeatedly:

A) Meeting with my new tax attorney because my moron of an ex blew off the IRS and they are going to come after me right when I’m trying to buy a clinic

Or

B) Getting a phone call that we are going to have Z for Christmas

Yep, B.

Some background – My brother and I were probably on the only kids on earth who tried repeatedly to get Christmas cancelled. Even then we knew our mother did it way over the top. In case there was doubt my childhood best friend would beat me up after Christmas out of jealousy. These combined to make me pretty nonmaterialistic which is a good outcome to have. My ex, my sister in law, and the SO have all been horrified by my mother’s take on Christmas. What they don’t appreciate is that decades of telling her that she needs to scale back has resulted in less gift giving but we’ve all been worried about what would happen when there is a kid added to the mix. Last year we told her firmly to restrain herself for Z (who want even there in person). We brought her bags full of presents home to dole out as we felt fit. She still hasn’t gotten them all.

I felt ok though because I couldn’t envision a situation when I’d ever willingly take the kid to a family Christmas and I didn’t have to due to scheduling issues with her mother. Until today. Crap. My immediate thought was, “We’ll just stay home.” But the SO wants to go. He told me to tell my mother that it would be nice to have a family dinner and play games and not have towering skyscrapers of presents. I told him that I was stunned speechless by his cluelessness. He laughed and told me to lay down the law with my mother. He’s gone nuts in his brain.

This discussion probably sounds nuts to people but my mother will go majorly passive aggressive if I try to tell her that we want to limit the number of presents she receives. She’ll see it as an attack on her. This is going to be a joy. I’d much rather face down the IRS…