Excuse me while I...

...indulge in a much needed, quasi-public panic attack.

My ability to delude myself into believing Christmas was still days and days away, still plenty of time, don't sweat it, it will all get done? Well, it abandoned me at about 8:30 last night. I suppose it had to happen sometime. I mean, I may have some mad denial skillz, but time and Santa wait for no man (or dirty book writing procrastinator). And right now, the fat man's red-velvet covered butt is about to squash me but good.

Still to do:

Wrap about 40 presents. Separate the stocking stuffers into piles.

Purchase two more presents (OMG, how could I have thought I was actually DONE?)

Buy a turkey with my IGA Turkey Bucks, plus potatoes, a loaf of good bread, veggies

Dig up my cattle prod and make my kids clean and toddler-proof the family room so my friend's half-demon hellspawn will be unable to blow up the house Christmas Day

Locate my HazMat suit and clean the upstairs bathroom

Work my last shift until the New Year

Get bank stuff in the mail to my lawyer

Bake a couple loaves of Christmas bread (optional, but if I don't, boy will my best friend be annoyed when she shows up with my bottle of homemade Irish cream and I have nothing to give her)

Swallow half a bottle of Tylenol with codeine so my head doesn't go all explody

Find SOMEPLACE in my cluttered little house to stow 60 bottles of wine

Drink 30 bottles of wine to make room

Yup. There are benefits to being a last minute kind of person, but right now I'm having a hard time remembering what they are. Still, it wouldn't be the holidays if I wasn't curled up into a ball in the corner, shivering and sweating and screaming "I want my mom!" and praying for it to just be over. I hope when the men in white coats come for me, they'll be gentle. It is the holidays, after all, and we could all use a little good will this time of year...