Please Participate - Have a Holiday Howl

Harry: Boy the holidays are rough. Every year I just try to get from the day before Thanksgiving to the day after New Year's.
-- When Harry Met Sally

I'm not really looking forward to the holidays. I'm working on this - trying to adjust my attitude. But it's tough because there are so many holidays which don't conjure up positive memories for me.

I was talking with my friend Gigi about this and she began sharing one of her worst Thanksgiving Day experiences. I have to give it to her - it was horrible. (If I felt I could do it justice, I'd share it.) And as is so often the case with stories like that, I laughed. And I felt better. And I remembered/realized that the rest of the world is not necessarily sitting in a Norman Rockwell painting either.

So, I had an idea.

I'd like to host "Have a Holiday Howl" each... oh, I don't know... Wednesday? (I'll post my story each Wednesday. You can comment and share whenever.) Just from now until the end of 2009.

Basically, ripping off the concept of Tova's Totally Awkward Tuesdays (or you could say I'm tipping my hat her way, too. I guess it's all a matter of perspective.) I'll post something. Then you can share a story that qualifies as the World's Worst Holiday experience, too. Post the link to your blog post as a comment and I'll add the link to your blog to my original post. Hopefully, we'll all spread holiday howling throughout the land for the rest of this calendar year.

Important to note - You can share a story about ANY holiday. I'll probably have the most material for holidays that occur at this time of year but ANY holiday is fine with me.

Here's the first:

So Nathan's birthday is December 24. His younger brother's birthday is December 26. (Obviously, there are a few years between them, duh.) When Nathan was about 5 years old, he and the family dog, Morgan, weren't getting along. The dog bit him a few times - once in the nose; once in attack-dog mode on the forearm, dragging him around the back yard; and so on. So the parents decided to give the dog away. They neglected to tell Nathan and his brother this - until Christmas day. Christmas day, when Nathan was 5 years old, the day after his birthday and the day before his brother's birthday, his parents GAVE AWAY Morgan the family dog. The consolation, apparently, was that Santa brought Nathan a plastic Lincoln-Log-like house, in which he hid while Morgan and his new owners backed out the driveway and drove away. Happy Holidays!

Your turn! Share a story on your blog. Link back to mine. Post a link to your entry in the comments section of this post. I'll link to you below: