10:15 a.m.: Get woken up by my dog, Toffee. I think she is excited for Christmas. How do you explain complicated religious beliefs to a dog?
10:17 a.m.: Eat pancakes my parents made earlier while I get used to being awake before noon.
10:30 a.m.: Go for a drive because the roads are abandoned.
11:07 a.m.: Get home and realize that there is nothing to do.
11:15 a.m.: Resign myself to studying for the GRE.
11:17 a.m.: Notice that my desk needs rearranging. I can’t study with all this clutter around me.
11:25 a.m.: See who is online so I can try to validate my choice to waste time.
11:26 a.m.: No one is online. I’m an idiot.
11:28 a.m.: Once again try to study for the GRE. I’m going to do it this time. Seriously.
11:30 a.m.: Take an accidental nap.
1:00 p.m.: Eat a ham sandwich for lunch. Feel absolutely no guilt.
2:45 p.m.: Rooting for the Heat, but mostly LeBron, to lose.
2:46 p.m.: Realize that rooting for someone to lose is not really in the Christmas spirit. Start rooting for the Mavericks to win.
2:51 p.m.: Remember that LeBron is on my fantasy team. Become very depressed at the thought of rooting for LeBron, and by extension the Heat, for an entire year.
2:55 p.m.: A second epiphany when I remember that the fantasy season does not include the playoffs. This makes me so happy I may not write the last quarter of this column.
2:56 p.m.: It’s Christmas; give me that one joke as my present.
4:00 p.m.: The outcome of this game is clear. Somehow I’m able to find a friend who is as desperate to get out of his house as I am.
7:00 p.m.: Drop friend off so he can go to a party his parents are making him attend.
7:30 p.m.: Chinese food for dinner. Some stereotypes are true.
8:00 p.m.: Light Hanukkah candles. It is the sixth day of Hanukkah, after all.
8:05 p.m.: Open Hanukkah presents. I receive “Among the Thugs,” which is a spectacularly violent book about soccer hooligans and crowd violence. I asked for it.
9:30 p.m.: Watch random bits of the various Christmas specials.
9:45 p.m.: While watching “A Christmas Story,” my dad mentions that he has never seen or heard of it. He falls asleep watching it so his incredible streak will continue.
10:00 p.m.: Play the Xbox with my brother. This shared activity does not bring us any closer.
11:00 p.m.: Watch more basketball and SportsCenter while lurking around Facebook to see how my friends celebrated.
2:00 a.m.: Finally go to bed happy that everything will be open tomorrow.
2:01 a.m.: Remember that everything will be crowded and there is nothing to do anyway.
2:whenever a.m.: Fall asleep content that I made it another year without having tasted eggnog or knowing definitively what a Yule log is.
