Hello again, fellow earthlings! 

Nearly every child in school was jumping up and down on December 22nd, for the winter break was just around the corner.  Christmas, travelling, birthdays, guests – there is so much to get excited about!  Everyone has something different that they are looking forward to, but today I would like to tell you about my days of fun!  I hope you like it; speak up in the comment section if you have any feedback or… well, comments. 

For the last week of school, I was ill, and missed school for two days.  That was a shame – I would have loved to be there.  I will not dwell on that fact; let’s skip ahead to… 2:30 P.M., on December 22nd.  Children from the age of five to twelve were rushing out of the doors.  Once I had gotten on my bicycle, most kids had left, since I usually leave the property a bit later than some.  I pedalled home, and my father told me that my tennis coach was waiting for us, expecting us by 3:00.  When I got there, we played until sundown, which was at around 4:30.  The winter solstice had been on the day before, so the day was increasing in length. 

On the 23rd, we stayed home, and I worked on a music project that our music teacher assigned us.  We had to choose a musical artist or band (in my case, Jimi Hendrix), and present it in the form of a poster or digital presentation (like PowerPoint, Office Sway, or Google Slides).  I chose to type it up on a poster board, and I worked a lot for three or four days, so I would not spend every day staring at the computer screen.   

Christmas Eve followed, and we stayed home again, but we had a lovely vegetarian dinner, with zucchini patties, rice and barley, carrot and coconut salad, roasted cauliflower, and more!  After supper, we played a game of “Yahtzee”, and I played terrible (bad luck rained down on me relentlessly), but it was still quite enjoyable. 

Strangely, I found it easy to sleep; I must have been very pooped.  The next morning, I was the third to wake up; my mother was still sleeping.  When she awoke, we had breakfast, and then opened our presents.  I got a set of two pencil cases, a new tea thermos, a long-sleeved sport shirt, and (from my grandmother)… long bamboo socks.  In fact, everyone in the family got a few new pairs, and while it may seem strange, my family says that they are very comfortable and thin, suitable for the summer.  I enjoyed opening my gifts, because I love pencil cases, I drink lots of tea, I don’t really like very short socks, I play tennis nearly every day, and it gets cold in the winter! 

Two days later, my mom, my brother, his friend, and I all went to the recreation centre.  We went to the gym, where others were playing basketball.  Everyone but me was playing basketball; I was volleying a tennis ball on the wall with my racket, until the other group of people left.  When they left, I started hitting groundstrokes – forehands and backhands.  I would say we played for about two hours, and even though I was tired by the end, I could have chased the ball some more. 

By the 29th, all of my text boxes for my project on Jimi Hendrix were cut out, and were waiting to be glued.  That day, at 3:30 P.M., was when our guests, the Schlegels, came.  We played Super Smash Brothers with them for a little while, followed by a game of “Apples to Apples”.   

The 31st was… interesting.  My father was going to run roadside of the highway leading up to our local ski resort, Mount Washington, while everyone else, including myself, took a walk on a little trail.  One quarter of your steps sunk your legs knee-deep in snow.  We were hoping to find a hill for sledding, but that was unsuccessful, so we tried to make one ourselves.  You have to sled down on a downhill path repeatedly.  Sounds easy, right?  Think again; some of the snow was pretty sticky, so my sled flipped over, and I turned into a ghost – my face was (no pun intended) snow white.  As you can imagine, it was very difficult, so my mother asked a family where a decent sledding destination was located.  They told her to head to Forbidden Plateau for a nice sledding experience, which we did.  We turned around, to go back to the car, but my foot got stuck in a huge hole.  It was knee-deep, but I saw the end, and decided to put both of my feet in the space, out of curiosity.  I squirmed in, until I was waist-deep, and I can honestly say that it was comfortable, except for a branch poking me.   

It was surprisingly easy to get out of, and I raced back to the car, falling deep into the snow more frequently, since you come down a bit harder when you are running.  When we made it to the car, we started driving to Forbidden Plateau, but not before discovering that we were stuck.  Everyone, except for my mother, had to push the SUV from behind, and we made it!  We picked up my father, and started driving normally to Forbidden Plateau.   

Once we got there, there was a small hill right in front of us, so I said, “Come on!”, as I climbed it.  When I reached the top, I saw a trail leading upwards, so I walked up for a while until I saw what I thought was the end.  It was flat at the top, but then I realized… that wasn’t the peak.  Another slope was ahead, and when we climbed that one, there was no more.  I sledded down that hill twice, but your sled stops before the end of the trail; you probably only get about 1/3 of the way. 

On the third time I was coming down, someone’s legs were sticking out onto the trail, and since I had almost no time to move away, I yelled “Incoming!”, but it was too late.  My head bashed into his knee, and I can say that it is not a very nice feeling.  I think that you should not go up there if you have not gone sledding in a while, or if your sled is too short.   

After that incident, we sledded further down, where the trail is wider.  There was a small fire, and I was freezing.  You do the math; Cold Ivo + Warm Fire = Happy Ivo.  The flames were barely alive, but luckily, the person who lit it had left some spare firewood, and a stick, able to move fire-smothering charcoal out of the way.  It took about five minutes to make it rise, and it warmed me up grandly, except for my feet,    

By the end, while everyone else was sledding, I was huddled by the fire (nearly) contently.  The only downside was that the smoke was in my face (*cough, sputter*), even though my back was turned to the wind.  I am very sensitive to smoke, and that ultimately drove me down the hill.  I froze like one of those head massagers; the ones with the handle and vibration. 

I was so happy when we came home; I could not thaw outside 😜!  Everyone else, who are definitely as wintry as Niflheim jotun, seemed to be okay with staying outside for longer, but snow was buried in the bottom of my shoe, making my feet miserable.  

For supper, we had warm pizza, and cool Russian salad – potatoes, pickles, carrots, and peas, with mayonnaise dressing.  I even had a Virgin Caesar, which consists of Clamato juice, Tabasco sauce, Worcestershire sauce, lime, and rimmer (spices on the rim of the glass).  It was a non-alcoholic version of the Caesar (hence the “virgin”), in which vodka is added. 

As 2018 crawled up with ten minutes left, everybody gathered in the living room, where I discovered those little plastic kazoos.  Once our eight year old guest saw them, hell rained down on everyone’s eardrums.  We circled our couch, tweeting a twenty-minute song.  Sorry, neighbours! 

We stayed up only until 3:45 A.M., because we were going to go… 

… TUBING the next day (or later that day).  We all woke up at around 11:00 A.M., except for two guests, who slept until 12:00 P.M.  We had a very nice breakfast.  In Bulgaria, there is a tradition of eating banitsa – phyllo pastry with egg and feta cheese – with little fortunes inside, on New Year’s Eve.  We forgot, so we had it the next day. 

By the way, my fortunes predicted that I should get my vaccinations… because I was going to travel this year!  Also, my parents have to buy me at least two hats, on account of my other fortune.  Three cheers to fashion!  (Just kidding). 

We left for Mt. Washington at around 1:00 P.M., and once we got there, I saw a pleasant surprise: at the bottom of the hills, there was hay!  Once the slope evened out to flat ground, we were sliding on hay, and the fresh scent climbed into my nose. 

We were tubing from 2:00 to 4:00, and I tried going by myself, with a partner, with two, and in a large group of four.  It had been my first time tubing at Mount Washington, and we used to lug it up the hill, but there is a luxurious two-minute escalator ride here. 

When we got home, we had a nice supper, after which we had a huge game of “Apples to Apples”, in which eight people participated.  I did not win a player’s opinion until around the 35th turn, but at the end, I had four cards under my belt. 

We went to bed at around 1:00 A.M., which was unfortunate for our guests, because they had to leave at around 8:00 in the morning.  Somehow, they managed to, but not before a very fatty and caloric breakfast of scrambled eggs and bacon.   

Once we said our goodbyes, I went up to my room to “get some shuteye”, and I woke up at 1:30, thinking of the next day… in which my friends came over with their golden retriever and French bulldog puppy, both of whom are extremely adorable.  As for our friends, we played a bit of table tennis, and some Nintendo Land, for the Wii U.   

When they left, I went to sleep, but nothing special awaited us the next day, so we stayed home until January the 8th, when SCHOOL STARTED! 

Well, that was my winter break.  If you have any feedback, be sure to leave a comment.
Thank you for reading. 

Sincerely,
Ivo N.