We arrived in Bend Oregon 3 days before Christmas. It meant that everyone was a little tired and groggy from the travel and some of us were not healthy. As is the norm these days, you get some time from work in order to spend quality time with family, and immediately befall some disease or other which has been lurking in some aircraft lavatory just waiting to jump out on some poor unsuspecting and trapped individual.
As a result, my first afternoon I was marched into the emergency care and diagnosed with bronchitis. Not as bad as I feared, it could have been worse such as swine flu, bird flu, ebola or something really nasty like airline food gastroenteritis! Hmm lucky escape. Off to grab a Peets coffee to celebrate and obtain some drugs. Much better.
Sadly for this trip it was just the four of us, no pets, they remained in Switzerland at doggy spa and kitty hotel.
We spent a relaxing day at Jill and Jeff's house (Andi's sister and brother-in-law) to get ourselves situated before we took on the drive of 3 hours from the Portland area across to central Oregon and Bend.
Bend looked like a winter wonderland and is so pretty at this time of year.
Erected and Decorated
Our tree arrived on the 23rd and was erected and decorated the same afternoon.
Below is one of Santa's little munchkins who was very excited to decorate.
On the eve of the big day Andi made Ryan's favorite, lasagna, he ate very happily! I think it looks like we had some nice vino to wash it down with too. Santa was camera shy, no surprises there. Trying to remain incognito.
On Christmas day another scenic white day was enjoyed from the living room.
Boxing day was time for a short walk and out of the house to get some much needed fresh air. A long the way, I noticed and recorded some new seasonal features that had appeared since our last visit.
Dejected and Ejected
By the 28th the tree and dried out and collapsed of malnutrition or from excessive binge drinking. I'll leave which as an exercise for the reader. Around 1am it had enough and threw itself on the floor in a fit of rage waking yours truly who only been in bed some 30 minutes.
After a standing count of 8 on three occasions, the referee called time on the fight and it was all over. A beaver dam was the next opportunity for a comeback.
A Santa munchkin gave the last rites and pouted for a day while fixing the decorations but that was that!