MERRY CHRISTMAS Happy Boxing (boxing nuns?) Day

RantWoman's life so overflows with gratitudes, adventures, and occasions to celebrate that she proposes to observe the 12 days of Christmas, though probably without quite all the usual repetition.

Let us begin with Christmas day, though RantWoman owes the world a lovely digression about accessibility, Christmas Eve, Braille and Large print, and canele madness. RantWOman owes the world this digression, but other things take precedence.

First, we celebrate the path over the river and through the woods, by bus and light rail and more bus. The more bus required RantWoman to wait in front of a Columbia city theater showing...The Interview. (Yawn?) RantWoman thought of just walking to RantMom's. RantWoman thought of this but is still trying to unkink knees from a couple recent adverse interactions with gravity. Owww. Whine. RantWoman is really not used to this and is already making post-holiday get in better shape resolutions. Whine.

Next we revisit RantMom's Christmas tree. We, RantWoman and RantMom are very proud of the lights. We are also very grateful for the tinsel and the star. RantMom assures RantWoman that there are far too many cords visible for ordinary consumption. RantWoman is thrilled the lights work, for one thing because they fry RantWoman's pupil response and RantWoman has no  idea whether cords are visible or not.

Next we acknowledge the need for feasting. RantWoman actually consumes enough calories during the holidays that a giant latte and some popcorn and a ferry ride sounded like fun. This plan did not match RantMom's energy level. RantWoman fussed awhile about plan b and then rang up RantMOm. "I have chicken. I have squash, two kinds for roasting. I have cranberries."

RantMom had salad fixings. She has a longstanding passion for baking bread or rolls. She has peppermit ice cream and tea. Presto, more or less. At any rate plenty for the RantWomen to feast on.

Next we come to presents, though notoriously deficient in the run out into retail sort. For example. although RantWoman is delighted with some items of clothing, her very favorite present is a new netting scrubby!

Next, a dollop of soap opera and opportunities for nuclear family meltdown.
RantWoman and Little Sister, while we do not do habits of the sort shown here do have a comical pretend boxing routine that can almost always be counted on to crack Brother in Law up. Fortunately or unfortunately, depending, RantWoman has picked a fight with Little Sister and the Sisters Without Habits have not so far assembled for holiday boxing. This distresses RantMom more than it distresses the rantSisters.

Word.

In the meantime, some sister fighting stand-ins.

After the feasting, well actually, while the feasting was cooking, how did the RantWoman entertain ourselves? .

--Sending new electronic devices off into the lands of exotic language where RantWoman has to resort to clever trickes to restore device function in a language someone in the household understands? No, thank heaven. RantWoman had enough of this kind of adventure for Easter.

--Wading through thickets of telecomm provider gobbledygook to cut RantMom's total costs for cable plus DSl plus phone plus cell phone? Um, No, but RantWoman thinks it's probably worth looking into.

--Streaming some content off the itnernet? Um, no. RantMom has not mastered Netflix; Irrepressible Nephew and his parents were not around to share and besides, the computer is in one room, the TV is in another room. It's a spiffy flat screen TV but RantWoman has not even thought to inquire as to options for using it on any other content than what comes out of the cable box. RantWoman thinks RantMom might still have an old dvd player. RantWoman did not want to experiment on a holiday.

--Streaming content on either of the two Smart phones? Um. also no.

Instead, drum roll please, the RantWomen spent our hang out time together fussing with under-discovered features of our smartphones. RantWoman for instance has only recently mastered the art of 1. taking pictures, not just selfies either, and 2. emailing them upstream to further internet dissemination. If readers were sketchy about design and the legally blind before RantWoman learned to do pictures, look out world!

But the real student is RantMom, and after a fashion RantWoman. RantWoman deliberately bought an Android phone while RantMom and Little Sister have iPhones. RantWoman was hoping RantMom would find other channels for tutoring and tech support. SILLY RantWoman.

Anyway, the holiday accomplishments so far include:

--RantWoman sending some of her spiffy new e-photographs to RantMom and RantMom figuring out how to receive them

--RantWoman sending RantMom a text and both of us listening to RantMom's phone announce this vigorously but not provide RantMom sufficient clues to help her retrieve the text. Sigh. Oh well.

--RantWoman fussing enough to find the camera AND to shot a couple selfie videos but NOT finding anything that would make only photos, not videos.

--RantWoman showing RantMom how to make movies.

--RantMom by accident finding the button that points the camera at, say, the Christmas tree instead of at the iPhone handler but still not finding the option for only photos and videos.

--RantWoman adding a generous dollop of additional fiddling looking for the accessibility features. RantWoman is REALLY good and fussing through a lot of fog and blur. Probably if RantWoman actually wants to figure this out, she should not count on RantMom having anywhere near the same willingness just to fiddle with things that RantWoman has. Instead RantWoman should probably, as with generations of holiday blessings, just break down and Read the Directions!

The RantWomen are just such fun-loving babes!