so karl's parents are STILL HERE. yes, i know i've told you this before, but i wanted to rant again. they arrived on 18 dec, intending on staying for 10 days. i was here a couple days, then went home to my mom's for a week, returning on saturday the 27th to spend their last night with them, then see them off on sunday. but. then. stephen (aka the guy who can bite me hard) asks if they want to stay a few more days. they go back and forth about it (on the one hand they don't really have anything to do back home til the 5th when school starts again, on the other hand, they were planning on spending new year's with friends in london, then having a quiet 1/2 week at home) and decide to call the airline to see if it's even a possibility. turns out the earliest they can get their ticket changed to is the 7th. well, that's too late for them, so it seems (briefly) like that's that, and they'll have to go home on the 29th. but no. stephen, of his own accord, calls up other airlines to see about tickets, and buys them 2 one-way tickets on another airline for the 3rd. at $757 apiece. they now have 24 hours in which to decide whether to stay or not (24 hours to get a refund). so of course now they're probably feeling obligated to stay (since stephen has so generously spend $1500 on them), though of course they don't say that. add to this that stephen sprung this on them at a party while they were drinking, so their reasoning abilities weren't exactly unimpaired.

so as you already know, they decided to stay (big fucking surprise) and so the whole stay is 16 days. 16 DAYS. holy crap that's a long time. and of course they've DONE everything. they've been shopping (their favorite american activity, since stuff here is so much cheaper for them) in center city, in wayne, in west chester, in the lancaster outlets, and at k.of.p mall three times. they don't seem to want to do philly cultural things like the museums. we have looooong ago run out of stuff to do. so we sit around stephen's house doing abso-fucking-lutely nothing, letting the housework pile up at our house, while stephen and kristina are vacuum and tidy up. when stephen dictates, we all go out and do whatever it is that he's in the mood to do, whether we want to or not (like the other day when he wanted to go for a walk in the park. now, i'm all for a walk in the park, but he decided to drive all the way out to malvern/exton/whatever-the-fuck to some park that he knew out there. so we drove for 30 minutes to get to this little park that was fine, but nothing special, and certainly not worth a 30 minute drive when there are nicer parks (hello? valley forge?) much much closer. and i was wearing my heeled boots and it was a bit muddy in the park, so i was definitely not wearing the right shoes for the venture.

AAAARRRRRRGGGGH! the thing about stephen is that he always takes over control of the situation, without seeming to care what anyone else thinks of anything. i mean, this whole thing with buying new tickets for karl's parents--he didn't ask me and karl at all about this. and of course once he's bought these tickets it's not like karl can say "yeah, i don't want my parents to stay any longer" without sounding like the worst son ever. even though his parents certainly would've enjoyed him spending that $1500 on tickets for them to come back to the states for another week visit around easter or something. he's just imposed his choice on everyone. karl and i have been spending all our time with his family, not having any time to ourselves to decompress or relax or unload the freaking dishwasher or anything!

we spent new year's with stephen for the 3rd year in a row, and i've put my foot down about next year already. this year, we putzed around until about 6pm on new year's eve deciding what the hell to do. stephen didn't want to have a party because 2 years ago when they had a party (karl's parents were over then, too) he was less-than-thrilled with the fact that some people brought their young children. which, to be fair, is perhaps not the greatest thing to do, bring your young kids to a party that is by design late-night and drunken. but still. he's still sulking about it 2 YEARS LATER. perhaps the words "get over yourself" are in order. so anyway, he finally decides that we should go to the flying pig saloon in malvern because they have a band on and the cover is only $10. he's concerned about getting a table, so we all leave the house before 7pm. we arrive shortly after 7, and so are stuck there, sitting at a table, for 5 hours before it's midnight (then we sit there for 2 hours after that). 7 hours we sat there! the band didn't even come on til after 9.30.

then on new year's morning, we had all mentioned, and karl's parents like the idea, of going down to see the mummers parade. just as karl and i are getting up and showered (we spent the night out there) stephen is all "let's go for a walk" (another one of his park walks, i think). thank god karl finally says something and says "how about me and karen and mom and dad take a car and go see the parade, and you and kristina can go for a walk." when stephen protested, karl said "we can go for walk anytime, but the mummers parade is only on now." 'course, stephen couldn't argue with that. so the 4 of us got ready to go, and at the last minute, stephen decided he wanted to go. i'm not sure why, since he doesn't like the mummers, unless he only wanted to go so he could maintain control over the situation. we all are down there, finally having gotten close enough to the front to be able to see clearly when stephen says that he and kristina are going to head home. now, his mom and dad feel pressured to go too. karl offers that his parents can take the car that karl's been driving all week (recall: my car is still in the fucking shop), so can let stephen and kristina leave now and follow in the other car whenever they're ready (karl (bless him) had gotten us the night off by insisting that we had loads of stuff piled at our house and that he was out of socks and absolutely had to do laundry). but for whatever reason, it ended up that they all left then so they could leave us the car. even though we really didn't need it. but whatever. stephen imposes his will on another outing. fucker.

so last night was the first time karl and i had had by ourselves in our apartment with enough time to actually do something other than just go to bed since before christmas. i feel slightly refreshed from that, even though all we did was clean, do laundry, and have some pizza in front of the tv, and think i can manage some genuine cheer for the last couple days of his parents being here.

the thing that kills me, i think, is not his parents. i like them both very much (though his dad has some personality quirks i could do without, but doesn't everybody). the thing that kills me is stephen. i dislike him more and more with time. he embodies so many qualities that are abhorent in anyone, especially someone over the age of 11. he's a show-off (he's got the best model tv, the best car, the best camera, the best road bike, the best freaking riding lawnmower, and implies that anyone who has something different is inferior), he materialistic and image-conscious in that keep up with the Joneses kind of way, he's selfish, and he's sulky when he doesn't get his way (just the fact that i am using the phrase "get his way" about a 31 year old ought to say something).