matt_zimmer | Happy New Year!

I had a good Christmas. My dad had a bit of a health scare in December but he's had a successful aorta surgery and is expected to make a full recovery. He is doing much better. I just had New Year's dinner with him and my mom tonight. It was good.

My nieces are at the age where they are working my last nerve. I'm trying to be patient but the screeching really stresses me out. I don't know what to do. I feel horrible thinking this but sometimes seeing them ruins nice occasions for me. I feel guilty for thinking that. Am I a horrible person?

Did good in the present department which is good because my birthday wasn't as present heavy as some years. For plushies I got the three Brave bear triplets (Hamish, Harris, and Hubert), Oswald The Lucky Rabbit, Talking Fred Flintstone, Talking Captain Caveman, The Grinch and Max from Build-a-Bear Workshop, a monkey, a giraffe, a polar bear, and Chuckie from Rugrats. I also got Richard Scarry's Busytown Town Hall playset and my sister gave me a gift card I used to buy season four of Enterprise. I also got two ornaments, one of a snowman and the other of Elmo on a rocking chair. My sister also got me a calender of pictures of my nieces and my niece painted me a picture. Melissa says she is going to get me a Hello Kitty calender after the new years sales so I look forward to that too.

I got my dad a Subway sandwich card, my mom three plushes and a Barnes and Noble gift card, my friend a plushie Sparky from Frankenweenie and the Velveteen Rabbit (it's also her birthday so she gets double presents), Melissa a plushie dinosaur, and my sister and her family an Aardman DVD collection consisting of Wallace and Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabiit / Chicken Run, Wallace And Gromit's World Of Invention, Shaun The Sheep: Season 1, Shaun The Sheep Season Two, Flushed Away, The Pirates: Band of Misfits, and Arthur Christmas.

It was a good Christmas. Now to do my annual New Year's LJ lists!