Christmas 2014
Dear Friends and Family –
By now, most of you know the routine. This is the
anti-holiday letter so if you’re looking for excellent news and sweet family
stories … move along. If you want to follow the ancestral lines of the Grinch
family, well, you’re reading the right letter.
I’ll start by saying I think I have a stress fracture
because of Tommy. If you’ve seen “The Pink Panther” in which Peter Sellers’
“houseboy” constantly attacks him to keep his martial arts skills sharp, please
note that this kind of thinking is real. It’s stupid but it’s real. This is my
fault as I signed him up for a street-fighting, grappling style of martial arts
(his instructor is the real deal!) and Tommy likes to be authentic, thereby
attacking me when the house is dark. Now we both creep through the house,
neither speaking, both waiting to attack. Katie just likes to attack herself.
She does this by passing out, face first on the ground. The first time was when
she was standing in line in Austin to attend a music festival. Who passes out
on an electrical box? But when she came to, she found her peers holding cell
phones out to “snap chat” and “instagram” the moment of a leaf and dirt covered
unconscious Katie. I tried SOOO hard to find one for the Christmas letter but,
alas, nothing. As Katie answered the “how many fingers am I holding up” to a
medical person, she could hear her peers helpfully call out, “Take her pulse!” Besides
the realization that eating actual food is a good idea for someone with anemia,
Katie had yet another startling revelation: “My generation is really stupid.”
The same day that Katie scratched the cornea on her eye
after (or during) an awkward hug goodbye to a friend in college AND I had a
skin biopsy done, leaving me with a band-aid across my nose, Tommy came walking
out of school wearing only socks. When I asked where his shoes were, he merely
shrugged. He had no idea. How do you have no idea where your shoes are? I
redirect: “When did your shoes leave your person?” Answer: PE and since they
were gone, he merely walked around for the rest of the day without shoes and
did not think to tell anyone. Meantime, I got my second letter threat. Some of
you might recall many years ago when I did a story on Santa Claus that went
woefully wrong – turned out he was a pedophile stalker from another state,
relocated here so that I could do a story on him just in time to discover what
a nut bag he was so that he could then he could cyber bully me until the FBI
got involved. This time, however, it was a “fan” who disagreed with an article
and sent helpful “warnings” to me. Maybe that was why I didn’t think about the
fact that no one asked why I had a huge band aid on my face. When I mentioned
this to Katie, she said, “No offense but you’re kind of crazy so people probably
just figure you got kicked in a face by a goat or something.” I think this was
when I got the idea to sell a “Goat-A-Day” calendar. Be on the lookout for it
soon! Back to the band aid: If you live the kind of life where people don’t
think to ask why you have a band-aid on your nose because they just figure you
got kicked in the face by a goat, it’s probably time to get a goat. It just
makes sense, right?
NOEL
NOEL NOEL NOEL
For the first time ever, we took a family vacation without
the girls. They both worked for the summer so it was just me, Robb and the boy
headed to the mountains. Robb got mad at an orange because “it got juice on my
hands,” he got mad at a guy because of the way the guy walked, and he got
repeatedly mad at his phone. He became so agitated with the GPS app that, and I
swear this is true, it actually talked back to him. We were in Craig, Colorado
and he was yelling at the machine when she (voice) instructed us to turn left.
She actually said, “Turn right then!” Swear! While looking for a cabin in
Montana, he told a lodge owner that he needed one with a bathroom because he
had a “female” with him. Really? A female, Tarzan? His intense hatred of all
people who play golf, Microsoft’s BING, the Olive Garden, and overtly happy
people continues. Also, he discovered that the Pittsburgh Steelers have a
player named Merciless and now wants his last name to be Merciless but only if
he can change his first name to Completely. Still, I love him because of the
sweet things he does and says to me. Why, just last week he suggested that I
“learned to whisper in a saw mill.” Do I
speak loudly? His big thing now, however, is Great Clips. Yeah. The hair
place. Apparently, they ask for your name AND phone number when you come in and
this is very distressing to Robb. Why do
they need my number? Why do they need my name?! They now know him as Ron
Swanson. Ron has a Montana phone number. Speaking of hair - Katie decided that
her real father is Barry Gibbs from the Bee Gees and has begun downloading
pictures of him and his luscious locks. I feel like I would know if this were
true.
Robb and I took a trip with just the two of us. First time
ever. So we went to Berlin, landed without our luggage and then rushed right
out to hire a former KGB agent as our tour guide, proving that we really don’t
need the children to carry on the horrible vacation tradition. The only decent
picture is the one of us on the airplane before landing. We had to run
everywhere. The guide was most animated when she showed us the former KGB
prison camp which is now a schoolyard playground. It’s where all the bad
children like to unwind …. Ahhh! Children of the German Corn!
Katie wrecked her car again but at least she wasn’t trying
to change her pants while talking on the phone in a school zone like last time.
She did get a warrant out for Robb’s arrest (unpaid tickets under his name) but
in about ten years from now we’re all going to just laugh and laugh and laugh
at that.
My parents moved from Virginia to Texas and now only live a
couple of miles away. In helping them move in, I then had to capture the stray
mother cat and her kittens, all disease ridden (common when eating rats) and my
car smelled like death for about a week. Our gym did a Spin-a-Thon to raise $$
for a Senior Food Pantry, then I came home to discover Robb made me a “meal for
a champion.” Spam and 40 year old Tang. I wish I was kidding. Robb went to
Saudi Arabia for work. He told me not to worry because he (tall, blonde, blue-eyed,
whiter than a Polish Christmas) would “blend in.” Ah. Yes. And soon, he was
communicating like a native as indicated in a recent email: “I called Jamil and
said, “Mustafa told me that you will take our laundry somewhere.” But he
doesn’t understand me very well and I don’t understand him very well. I gave
him my clothes and he took off. I’m pretty sure I’ll never see them again.”
There was a recent buzz on Facebook.
Perhaps you’ve seen it. My friend and co-worker, Dionne Zschiesche, posted: Just
so everyone knows, the Unicorn is real!! I have been in doubt for the over 10
years that I have known her. She always says she has a husband named Robb, but
no one ever sees him. But Alexandra Allred really does have a husband named Robb,
and he is for real...I saw him, met him, and actually touched him today! And,
he's quite a handsome fella!!! Lol I think I might have freaked him out...just
a little!” This set off a flurry of comments
because people who have known me over a decade still have not seen the unicorn.
He is real but, of course, as Dionne was “charging him” (according to Robb), he
was looking for the exit!
But the big news of this year, yes, even bigger than
Kerri getting engaged and me threatening my new precious son-in-law-to-be
bodily harm if I didn’t get to see footage of the proposal (it helps that he
was a kickbox student of mine and understands I have rage issues – you know,
being raised in a sawmill and all …) was that Kerri was hit by a bus. Not once,
but twice. How many people get hit TWICE by a bus?
I’m almost jealous of this because, seriously, how cool
would it be to say, “Wow, I feel like I got hit by a bus … oh, wait a minute, I
have!” The first time she got hit, it was more of a bump. The second time, the
bus driver reported that he was going about 25 MPH and Kerri flew. It
completely wrecked her bike and threw her, causing her to land on her backpack
which was so full it prevented her head from cracking the ground. One and possibly
two ribs were fractured, massive bruising appeared around her face, shoulder,
arm, torso down to her hipbone and thigh. Even her ankle was messed up. But
here’s the greatness of it all, the gratitude, the silver lining, the beauty …
Unlike her two siblings and father, Kerri rarely drives
me crazy and therefore, is not featured so prominently in the annual Christmas
letters. But this year, as she lay on the ground, doing a quick body check to
make sure her violin playing fingers were not mangled, as the driver ran around
in circles, crying, “I hit a human! I hit a human!” Kerri was elated. As a
crowd formed around her, she made a little pumping motion with her fist (though
limited due to the extreme pain) and said, “YESSSS! This is totally going to make
the Christmas letter!”
LOVE,
Robb, Alex, Kerri, Katie, and Tommy
Ho, ho, ho… boy! End of the year and you want a tax
write-off!? Please check out this amazing non-profit that educates special
needs young adults who aged out of the school system and want/need purpose!
They want to work, workout, have friends & make a difference! Please
help! www.BridgesTF.org *We are working on a documentary about this
super cool group. J
Missed a previous Christmas letter? Check out http://allredgreetings.blogspot.com/
2015 is a new year for new books!
WOO!
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