Last night we celebrated and I, as usual, was the bearer of the torch of Christmas in a jaded family.  I handpainted a bunch of cards that standing together made up a "Negativity Scene," the idea stolen from a card I found at Newbury Comics by Mary Lawton.  Baby Jesus wailed, Mary muttered, the three kings kvetched.  We drank champagne and ate lots of sweets, and my metabolism, unused to such indulgences, woke me in a heart-thumping panic at 2:30 in the morning.  Flavia is chronically bored nowadays, Alex is the perfect boy.  Plays piano, practices scales, makes forts out of the living room couch pillows.  Jean-Claude cooked something delicious but unrecognizable.  My only hand-made present was for Nina: a physio-ball in one package and large board glued with hand-painted exercise instructions in another.  My mother gave me the 3rd season of West Wing!!  And the 1st and 2nd seasons of West Wing to Nina and JC, respectively, which they will exchange with my third season when they are done watching them...  !  and it turns out my mother and father have seasons 5, 6 and 7!!  Heaven.