and speaking of christmas (i flow nicely from topic to topic don't i?), i'll be driving up to seattle this year. this isn't really one of my all-time favorite holidays though. my immediate family has never been big on the whole "put up a tree and throw a thousand gifts under it" thing so it doesn't really hold much meaning for me. maybe it's because my mom is buddhist and my dad is a lapsed christian. as for me, church just ain't my thing and i feel that giving gifts is good but not giving meaningless christmas gifts. i wrote about it here. i like to give gifts that fit. and i never seem to see them in season. oh well.