Holidays thus far...

It certainly has been a while.
Holidays have been...and been...and they're still be-ing. In fact, they will be be-ing for quite some time, which is a slightly daunting prospect when I think about it, seeing as I have been doing next to nothing for the past....while. (I haven't been counting days...in fact, I couldn't even tell you what day it is, let alone the date)

I, so far these holidays, have started, and finished, watching: Claymore, Elfen Lied, Kimi ga Nozomu Eien, Air and Trigun. This is because these holidays thus far, I haven't slept at a time preceding the letters: "PM", and I haven't woken up at an hour with only one digit, unless that digit is a one. I feel fine, but I know that it's not healthy nor smart...but what else am I to do?

The PC is on it's deathbed. The registry was so clogged up we couldn't run anything, and after a re-installation of Windows, we realised that there must also be a hardware fault, since the thing still crashes every half-hour. I went through some more details of getting my own computer, and nearly had a heart attack upon seeing the lowermost cell in my spreadsheet, telling me that I needed almost another thousand dollars before my purchase became realistic. So I've now decided to go job-hunting after new-years.

Speaking of deathbeds, I woke up two mornings ago to find my awesome fish, Glaedr (Who some will know from a very old blog post in my first blog, and others will know is the name of Oromis' dragon in Christopher Paolini's Eldest), laying on the floor of his bowl, coloured a pale gray, with black fins and empty eyes. He was still alive. After tearing my mother away from her joke emails, I hurriedly googled his symptoms, which came up with nothing. Not phased, I then brought up a list of common pet-fish diseases. After quickly scanning a list of about 50 ailments, I came up with the one that fit: Velvet Disease. A bacterial skin infection, I learned that it is far easier to spot on darker coloured fish, harder on lighter coloured fish, and very difficult to spot until it is very advanced on patterned fish. (For those who don't know, Glaedr is a paradise fish - he is gold with vertical, blue stripes) I wasn't too sure, but judging by his condition, I decided that the infection was pretty advanced. Turning back to the monitor, I quickly perused the course of action I should take. It seemed I needed to quickly remove him from his current bowl, and put him into a clean one, with water at a temperature of 31-34 degrees celcius, with two grams of salt p/litre dissolved in. He then needed to be kept in a dark environment. This was speedily arranged, and before long, Glaedr was laying on the bottom of his lovely new, salty, warm, freshly-cleaned mixing bowl. I closed the pantry-door and went to play some piano. Some time later, I checked back on him. To my surprise, he was perfectly fine. I'm watching him closely now, and from what I can see, he might be developing a secondary infection. I'm going to check in the morning...or...later this morning. :/

I just realised...again. Christmas. This year has gone by so mind-numbingly fast, I simply cannot hold the thought that it's going to be christmas in...tomorrow. Even as I type it now, I can scarcely believe it. It's not even as if there has been as much commercialisation this year. I'm used to seeing every store snapping up the fresh opportunities the yuletide season can bring, every advertisement blaring out some jingle or the other, stores hung about with tinsel. Not so this year. There has been a lot, just nothing even nearly approaching that of previous years.
Perhaps the entire season is just beginning to lose its sense of wonder for me.
I can't say I'm particularly exited. In fact, I wouldn't say I'm at all exited. It will be nice to see a few relatives I haven't seen in a while, and it's always good to obtain things you didn't pay for, but beyond that, I see no value for Christmas. I'm a deeply unreligious person, to the point where I am morally opposed to joining a religion at all. The very concept seems wrong to me. On the flipside, however, I am also opposed to the traditional "Happy Holidays", "Santa and His Reindeer", "Christmas Tree" American-Christmas that seems to have infected the rest of the world. The way of going about the season as though we are all children, and all that matters at Christmas is the food, presents and happiness. It's supposed to be a religious holiday. Either you're in, or you're out. It's at this point that I begin sounding slightly hypocritical, since I have already mentioned that I'm against religion, but I would have to concur, saying that I try to avoid getting involved in the holiday as much as possible. I buy gifts for my immediate family, I accept gifts given to me with thanks, I participate in the traditional Christmas lunch we have each year, but beyond that, I stay pretty much out of it. I wonder if I'll be getting any visits from spirits tomorrow evening.