Wednesday December 8th "Holiday cheer"

Christmas is in full swing and plenty of preparations are being made as we face a busy holiday schedule. We have the tree to buy, the now annual trip to Jabugo to purchase holiday meats, three cenas de Navidad to attend, plus shopping, mailing and of course the family events. Parents will be in town starting this Saturday to find an apartment for an extended stay in 2005. We plan to have an early Christmas dinner and celebration while they are in Seville. Then we have the dinner on the 24th which should be an extremely large meal. The next day we pay the consequences of being between two cultures and attend the traditional Christmas day turkey dinner at my sister's house. We should have a few days of rest before my birthday, then the celebration for New Year's Eve (including another meal of ungodly quantities), a day or two off to rest and then another meal likely in Umbrete held by more family. Then comes the 6th and Reyes, which we plan to spend inside our house relaxing. So there is enough eating and gathering to make us fat and tired.

Unfortunately these aren't the only plans. We have to shop in the center of Sevilla for gifts, which is a chore during what looks like to be the busiest holiday season in a long time. And it's quite tiring being on foot and negotiating large crowds. Then our cenas de Navidad, which are work dinners to celebrate the holidays, will take up three nights plus a large portion of our stomachs. The trip to Jabugo should hopefully be a nice change through all of this. And of course we have to work, too. And then there is the Sevilla-Betis game, which will be similar to a regional holiday for us.