Merry Christmas from My Family to Yours

The other day my brother came and stood in my mother's kitchen with me. He looked proud and excited. He was holding a stack of books.

"What's going on here?" I asked.

"I just bought these today," he said. He spread the books out so I could see their covers. They were bartending books. He flipped one of them open to a page that showed a picture of a Fuzzy Navel. "I love these," he said. "It's all I drink now."

"Wow," I said, "that's pretty girly."

He frowned. "Whatever," he grumbled. "It doesn't matter. I just like them, okay?"

"Okay."

He tapped the ingredients list. "Anyway, I'm going to bring this book into the bar with me the next time we go. The bartenders in that bar we like in Canada don't make them right, so I'm going to show them how to do it right."

I blinked at him.

"What?" he asked.

"Adam!" I said. "Adam, you can't walk up to a bartender and tell him he is making your drink wrong and then whip out a book and say, 'See? This is how it's really done!'"

He seemed insulted. "Why not?" he asked. "What's wrong with that?"

There were so many things wrong with that I had trouble deciding which to lead with. "First," I said, "the bartender will never, ever, ever serve you again. Or he'll water down your drinks. Maybe spit in them. You can't tell a bartender he doesn't know how to make one of the simplest drinks out there. You will be laughed out of the bar."

My brother made a noise with his mouth, a noise like psssh, like I was wrong and stupid and clearly out of touch with reality. "Whatever," he said.

"Adam!" I said. "I am completely right about this!"

"Whatever," he said. "Okay? Just whatever."

There are times--times like that one--when I am convinced Adam is some sort of adopted orphan, some alien baby, something that showed up under the cloak of darkness one night and looked cute enough while he drooled on himself, while his head lolled about, and so my parents decided to keep him.

I'm now stuck in close confines with this almost-human, this strange boy, for the next forty-eight hours. I'm sure there will be stories. Until then, have a merry, merry Christmas.