Reviews of Christmas from Various Points of View

Hoover (the Labrador): Santa Claws was here! He left stockings full of stuff! My stocking had a huge, wonderful, tasty rawhide chew bone in it! I could smell it! I smelled it for hours, and I got all worn out from the smelling and zonked out on the couch. The humans took forever to get up and hand out the stockings, but when the oldest boy handed mine – I could tell it was mine because I could smell the goodies – to Dad, I followed it the whole way! Dad barely had it in his hand before I grabbed the chew bone, which was sticking up out of it, and worked it free. I showed everyone my marvelous, wonderful, fabulous bone! I was wagging so hard I could barely walk straight, and if the human I was showing it to didn’t admire it aloud, I walked by them over and over again until they said how wonderful it was! The liver treats were good, too. What’s a “Shed Ender”? (Wanna see my wonderful bone?) Beef smells at dinner.

Spawn: Duuuuuuude. Quake. Rome. Pants. Doom. Nintendo rocks! Got Dad a Fathead poster of his favorite NASCAR racer. Mom wouldn’t let us put it up in the living room, but it looks excellent across one entire wall of the basement. Jelly Belly jellybeans. Goddamned braces.

Bunny: A Computer of My Very Own! Wireless, High Speed Internet! Must Send Emails to Friends, Right Away! Oh, man, I can’t believe Santa brought me a laptop! I’ve been dreaming of one for ages. I always thought we were SO behind the times, and now I’ve finally got one! I’m never going to have to leave my room ever again! Now Mom will never have to fuss at me about being on the family computer too much, and I can stay on mine for as long as I want! OHMIGOSH! (much happy squealing) I know there’s not really a Santa Claus, I know it just has to be Mom and Dad, but I can never really catch them at it. They’re SO sneaky! I got chocolate-covered strawberries, too! My Own Computer!….

Doodle: I must now surrender to the local forces of love and goodness. For years I, as a cyborg, have been maintaining a distinct distance from my so-called parents and siblings. I have been waiting for others like me to appear and take me back to their planet. It has sometimes been hard to maintain a human façade. I was betrayed earlier this year by my organic exterior, which grew unexpectedly quickly, causing the maternal parental unit to supply me with drab male-appropriate fabric coverings for my lower limbs, in order to keep, as she puts it, “my ankles warm.” Ha. Cyborgs do not feel the cold. Yet she insists on covering my unit in fabric and knitwear. Nonetheless, this formerly pagan holiday has caused me to reevaluate my status here on this planet as potentially permanent. I was given many colorfully wrapped packages containing items that caused sensations of glee and, I must admit, outright happiness in my circuitry. It is not so bad here, as long as I continue to avoid the violent and only partially-sentient component of my chronological cohort. All of the mammals in the home were pleasant and kind to me today; they allowed me to fully indulge in my deep needs for contact with high-tech items and minature building materials. I feel….content. I must examine these emotions further during my leisure time before programmed instruction begins again.

Hawthorne: I got cheated out of a Grapple. I specifically asked for a Grapple, and I didn’t get one. I did get other lovely chew things, but Santa Claws did not bring me a Grapple. I will need to yell this many times today, so that Mom and Dad send Santa a nasty email. Perhaps I should chew on Mom’s kitchen pictures while I think about the best way to get Grapples in the future. (Mom note: They were out of Grapples at the grocery store, for Pete’s sake. Get away from those darned pictures, you little feathered handful!)

Hubs: HA! The Christmas Buffalo has been successfully hunted and captured! I am the warrior! Oooh, high tech crap. Things with parts and things that need batteries! And BEEF! I love beef. I love my wife’s beef. I love my wife when she cooks beef. I think I’ll lie down on the couch now and digest my beef. Where’s my dog? I need to scratch my dog while I fall asleep. Nobody eat my beef leftovers while I’m sleeping!

BoS: Well. There we go. Did the religious thing Chrismas Eve, which always makes me feel both melancholy and happy, watched Christmas movies and listened to happy holiday tuneage for the preceding week, got all the shopping, wrapping, receipt saving, cooking, etc. done. The kids were a huge help this year, making cookies, doing their best to be on good behavior – I think that their being teenagers makes them a little calmer. Stayed up until 2 am on the Eve, ostensibly playing Sims, but mostly waiting for the kids to finally go to sleep, and I could do the sneaky thing which none of them believe anymore, but we like to pretend. Hubs helped with the hauling (my back is not up to par yet) which was very nice of him. Got the elf positioned putting a last item in a stocking. Everyone was thrilled; there were no disappointed faces or noises this year. That was nice. Really scored big hits with Bunny and the Doodle. And Dad got a good meal in him and liked his small gifts. He’s so feeble and shaky now that he can barely feed himself and has to drink out of a sippy cup, but he ate like a horse, and with any luck, he gained a pound or two today. I hope he remembers tomorrow that he was here today. Spawn was excellent with Grandpa today – keeping him company while I was flitting off to finish cooking. Big points to Spawn. Good Christmas this year – everyone pitched in, everyone helped, nobody stressed out, no questionable incidents, and I am going to sleep like the dead.

“She lay on the couch, to the family gave a nod,
Stretched out her legs, and mumbled, ‘thank God’,
But we think she exclaimed, as she sighed one last sigh,
“ ‘Twas a nice Christmas for all; I’m just resting my eyes.”