i know i know, it's been for-fucking-ever. but i've been away. first, at home (mom's) for christmas, then in edinburgh, scotland for new year.

so off to mom's house we went, back in 2004. dinner with ingrid and erica, with karl sitting in as the substitute jan. she entrusted him with her most important group function: keeping the rest of us safe from getting hit by busses. he succeeded, you'll be happy to hear.

christmas was lovely, with lots of wonderful presents (for me: ipod from dad, new timbuk2 bag, crystal candlesticks, and new 400 count sheets from mom, red OPI nail polish, and a bag of specifically selected red candy and an authentic christmas morning english stocking (placed at the foot of the bed for children, to keep them occupied while mom and dad get a few more minutes of sleep) filled with nuts, candy, a magazine, and a toy, from karl. i also got new red leather gloves, lined with cashmere, a hand-knitted cell phone cozy from my dad, complete with first-timer dropped stitches, stripey socks with toes from my sister, and a pratchett book from karl (the wee free men).

so everything was lovely, until The Talk. christie and i had been exchanging emails before the holidays about a newspaper i have from the day FDR died. our grandmother saved it, along with one from d-day and one from the apollo moon landing, which were found when she died. long story short, i have the FDR one, and she wants it back. she accused me of "just taking" it from her, and i accused her of being nasty and manipulative. during a pre-dinner-guest talk, the whole family got involved while karl wisely hid up in my bedroom. christie accused mom and dad of favoring me over her our whole lives, and said the FDR thing was just the last straw, the last in a long line of injustices done to her (none of which she could remember, mind you), and that she was finally going to "stand up for herself". she passive-aggressively brought up my parents' marriage problems as a reason why they may have been ignoring her, the poor dear thing, while i was beating up on her. she brought up an occasion when i apprarently slapped her face with mom watching, and mom did nothing about it. she said i was so mean to her when we were children that her friends all thought of me as the most hated person ever. dad, who has no problem feeling guilty over stuff, felt guilty about supposedly "putting all [his] stuff on [me]" about his marriage problems, and giving me no outlet to deal with it except, presumably, being mean to my sister. i apologized for being mean to her when we were kids, to which she replied "why did you do it?" and i said "i don't know, christie, i was a KID." that was when dad chimed in with his theory of me needing an outlet. it was so not the time to say this, so i didn't, but i was thinking that no, that was not the reason i was mean to her. i was probably mean to her because (a) that's what big sisters do and (b) she was a brat (which is what little sisters do). to sum up: we were kids.

at this point in the unresolved discussion, our dinner guests knocked on the door. fabulous. christie snuck out the basement and went home, and i went upstairs to compose myself before joining them. and dinner was lovely. the guests were my dad's friend richard, who is welsh but you wouldn't know it from his posh oxbridge accent, and his son christian, who grew up in america but is doing his last 2 years of high school at harrow in london.

karl and i headed off to edinburgh a couple of days after christmas. though we went in rather a round-a-bout way. flew from DC to chicago, then to london heathrow. got picked up by friends, and whisked to swindon for the night. from swindon we drove up to edinburgh, stopping in sheffield to say hello to karl's parents and exchange christmas gifts and in newcastle to pick up david. 8 hours and a $74 tank of gas (actually, only 2/3 of a tank) after starting off, we arrived at our flat in edinburgh.

the flat was lovely, with 4 bedrooms and an open-plan living/dining/kitchen. there was a heated indoor pool downstairs, but we hadn't been told, so we didn't have suits. we drove up the last 2 hours from newcastle in david's imported-directly-from-japan subaru impreza (it even still has the japanese radio, which only carries stations in the very low range of our FM dial). driving in that car, even wedged in the back seat, is like being in a video game. turbo turbo turbo wheeeeeee!

we spent most of our time hanging out, drinking and playing either xbox or poker. lots and lots of burnout 3, which is kickass, and either texas hold 'em or 21. on the last night, we played for money (�5) and when we finally gave up and went to bed, i was up �2.55, so the fact that i was forced to clean out karl was worth it.

each morning i got up at 8.30 to go out and see some sights. you gotta get up early in edinburgh in the winter, since the sun starts setting about 3pm. each time, i told karl that he could sleep in, that he didn't have to go with me, since he stayed up til 4am or so drinking (bailey's) and driving (playing burnout 3). but each day, he hauled his sorry ass out of bed and joined me in the cold scottish morning, bless his heart. on new year's eve we saw the palace of holyroodhouse, the queen's official residence in scotland (which, as far as i know, she regularly shuns in favor of balmoral). we saw it with jan and jon, who just happened to coincidentally be in edinburgh for new year's too! they had gotten up even earlier that morning to climb up arthur's seat, a hill/crag/ex-volcano east of the old town. on arthur's seat, jon had offered jan an altoid, which he always does even though she always declines, and then when she declined (as she always does), he said "ok, well do you you want to marry me instead?" and HOW SWEET IS THAT? so she put on the bigass diamond ring that he gave her and now they're gettin' married! whoo! i think this means that jan will end the parent sweepstakes on which of the 4 of us (i, j, e, and me) will get married first. apparently, ingrid's parents had a pool going, and they had bet on me, which appeared to have been a wise choice, as i got all engaged and stuff back when i was 23, but then i decided not to get actually *married*, so the sweepstakes was looking down, and now jan is the new favorite for a walk down the aisle, so i'm off the hook.

new year's eve night, we hung out at frankenstein's pub in the old town til we got kicked out because someone had thought ahead and reserved our table, drinking yummy fruity drinks (�12/pitcher, whoo!), taking fuzzy digipics of each other, and trying to guess how old the hot bartender was until i just went up an asked her (she's 23). after drinks and a break back home at the flat, we headed down to princes street for hogmanay, scotland's new year's party. blondie played before midnight, wearing a hideous tartan ensemble. the scissor sisters played after midnight, wearing a scottish flag-cum-dress (for her) and tartan overalls (for him). they kicked blondie's ass. between the before midnight and after midnight musical acts, there was (a) no countdown to midnight, (b) some bagpiping, and (c) fireworks that were great, but really short. like 5 minutes. COME ON EDINBURGH, GIVE ME SOME LOVE. AND A COUNTDOWN TO THE NEW YEAR FOR CRYING OUT LOUD. and this is after last year's hogmanay was cancelled due to rain. like they couldn't have forseen rain IN SCOTLAND and planned around it. the thinking hats must have blown off in the wind. so we were kind of hoping for 2 years' worth of fireworks but alas it was not to be. david got kissed by a strange (but hot) girl, i avoided the guy in front of me who was looking at me as if he hoped for a new year's kiss (um, sorry bud, but while that may be a hogmanay tradition, you ain't no brad pitt), and we all drank a communal 2-liter malibu and coke.

back home in the flat, david loaned me one of his 7 mobile phones to call my parents, who were back in america and back in 2004. i know it's just an arbitrary date and time, but it was a little bit freaky to be speaking to last year.

we did our usual staying up to all hours playing puyo pop fever (have you played it yet? on your xbox? because you have to. and you have to choose the onion character who says "onion, oniononion!" in a squeaky japanese onion voice whenever you make a chain, and now i have that voice in my head whenever i'm cooking with onions. "onion, oniononiononion, BOING!"), then got up early to head to berwick, england for a swim in the north sea (for some crazies, because HELLO IT'S THE NORTH SEA. THE. NORTH. SEA.) followed by the best onion (oniononion!) soup i've ever had, served on a beach or anywhere, and i'm very sad that it would have been totally inappropriate to ask for the recipe, given that i had never met any of these people before in my life, and here i was standing on a beach drinking their soup even though i had definitely not gone in the north sea.

shivering at the beach was followed by lunch at the house of the parents of the fiance of the brother of the friend of karl who invited us to edinburgh in the first place. the father, james, is at his best when cooking for a crowd (there were 25 of us). his daughter told us that he always cooks for at least 10, even when there's just 2 of them. so we ate and ate and ate, and drank and drank and drank (champagne! i love eating with rich people!) as the family friend duncan's appointed job seemed to be circulating the house with a never-ending supply of fizzy, refilling glasses whether they needed it or not (mine always did). the day was finished off with chestnuts roasted on an open fire (yes, i am serious) and what was a new taste for me, fizzy shiraz.

the next morning's excursion was meant to be to arthur's seat, to see the view of edinburgh, but it ended up being to salisbury crags, because the map in the book we had was completely inadequate for navigating the muddy paths and there were no signs. but salisbury crags were pretty darn good all on their own. it was quiet, except for the wind that karl was afraid might knock me off the edge. the soil up there was unlike anything i've ever walked on: it was squishy in a way that made it seem like there was air between the grass and the soil. we walked up in our inappropriate shoes, enjoying the soil and the grasses and the dogs bouncing around us. at the top we took advantage of brief moments of sunshine to take pictures of the castle, so far below, and to look at the firth of forth (the inlet that edinburgh sits on) in the distance. it would have been a good place to get proposed to--good job jon!

our last day, karl finally told me to shove it while he slept in, and i went with ant for a walk around the castle, hoping to get some good shots of it on the one really sunny day we had. the thing about edinburgh in the winter is that though it's mostly grey and rainy, and the sun doesn't stay up long at all, when it is up it's perfect for photos because it's low in the sky all day. even at "high" noon, the sun is barely above the horizon. so lovely slanty-sun pictures can be had even by those of us who aren't getting up at the crack of dawn! yay high latitudes!