Last night, Renée and I had over lots of people for the first annual (in Albuquerque) Christmas Vacation party over at the ol’ apartment. I felt like we lived the movie.

People started showing up at the merry hour of 7pm (not that any hour is any merrier than another, mind you), and we had lots of snackies and desserts to satisfy. We decided to start the movie about 7:45pm.

Renée stuck in the movie, and pressed play on the VCR, and promptly exclaimed, “What’s all this snow?” Turns out the tape was bad. Dog-gone it! We’d have 15 seconds of clarity and then 7 seconds of snow. All through the entire movie, had we watched it. We decided to head down to our neighborhood video store and rent the silly thang…

… only to find out that their completely out. Joash and I head back to the house to reveal our shameful news.

So, we call our neighborhood-friendly grocery store because we know they have movies for rent, and they indeed say that Christmas Vacation is in. Unfortunately, no one has an Albertson’s membership, so Joash and Mattskee jump in the car and head down there to sell their souls. Problem is, though, that they’re both from out-of-state and don’t qualify for membership.

“I’ll go get it!” chimes Charis, who runs out the door and drives down there as well. In a few minutes, we get a call from her on her cell phone saying that she can’t get an application either because her home telephone is her cell phone, and she can’t provide any other number. Dawg!

Plus, they didn’t really have it anyway. Don’t you hate it when people tell you they have something, and they really don’t?

So, I get on the phone and call two other Blockbusters. Finally, we find one with the movie, except the location of the store is halfway across town. But Charis, ever so valiantly, speeds (metaphorically) over there and grabs the tape, heads back to the apartment, and we pop in the movie, and (finally) we’re set.

Despite running commentary from one of us, it was a great evening. I still think my favorite quote is from the beginning: “Let’s burn dust. Eat my rubber.” That, and I think Chevy Chase deserves an Oscar for his performance in telling off his boss. Wow.