It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas...

Oh wait, no its not!

It's hard for me to get in a really Christmasy frame of mind when its like 90 degrees out everyday. Its like having Christmas in July. In addition, I keep getting all these work emails about meetings on December 25th. That's crazy, but I guess thats what happens when you live in a country that doesn't give a fig about Christmas. However, a few things have contributed to me getting a bit more in the mood as of late. First, my awesome Mom sent me a package that contained a bunch of Christmas decorations and wrapped presents, complete with a fully packed stocking. So while my aparment is still light years away from being Christmas tricked out, it does have a bit of holiday cheer now. Secondly, I went to Toys N Me today, the local equivalent to Toys 'R Us, in order to get some stuff for Toys 4 Tots. I compare these stores with a bit of a smirk as Toy N Me is nothing at all like Toys 'R Us, unfortunately. Luckily for my wallet, it is a million times smaller than a normal Toys 'R Us, and the selection is also quite a bit worse, unless I want to pay $200 for a Leap Frog, which I don't. However, if you know me, you know that I tend to go quite crazy in toy stores, especially when buying them for needy kids. So I walked through the store with one of the clerks following me around and I just proceeded to throw toys at her when I saw something that I liked. I must have made her happy because at one point she stopped and said "I'll give you 10% off anything in the store." It wasn't quite like Black Friday at Toys 'R Us with Mom, but its the best I can do here. And they didn't even have any dolls other than porcelain ones. What little girl gets porcelain dolls to play with (besides me, of course as I had like 30 of them...but they werent for play, I had a bunch of plastic ones for that)?

So on Saturday I'm leaving for my trip for Malaysia, Borneo and Brunei. I'm getting really excited. I started packing...I have my bikini and sunscreen. Do I need anything else? I think not. :)

Merry Christmas all!