Riding the holiday time warp

Column by ELLEN BOUKARI

Holidays are good and vacations are great.  But the combination can lead to unintended…and unwelcome… consequences.

Each provides an opportunity for our minds and our bodies to become rejuvenated; a time to stop watching the clock and counting the minutes.

But as with all good things, excess is bad and moderation is good.

If a glance at the calendar, or a gentle nudge from a spouse isn’t reminder enough that it’s time to head back to the grindstone, there are a few additional indicators that might tip one off that it’s time to get out of the house and back to reality before the holiday time warp takes hold for good.

The Time Slippage indicator is the gradual, but ever so real loss of time perception, and is a sure sign that vacation time should be drawing to a close.  The first day of vacation is marked by the alarm sounding at the usual hour, bright and early.  The freshly awakened vacationer is out of bed and completely dressed in 10 minutes, in time to watch the sun rise.

By day two, sleeping in for a few minutes can surely be harmless and there is certainly no damage in staying up a bit later than usual…because there is really no reason to get up so early anyway.

And by day five the new pattern is becoming firmly entrenched.  Except now, the alarm clock is nowhere to be found, and neither are the house slippers that were discarded sometime between 2 and 4 a.m. as the late, late show was moving into hour three.

Or as the DVD drones on and on playing the same nonsensical clip of theme music over and over and over again.  What, did the film end?

When did that happen?

Somewhere between midnight nap two and twilight nap three.

The sun is high in the sky and the television is blaring something about the midday news break.  The bathrobe is still stained with last night’s spaghetti sauce which now joins a drop of maple syrup from breakfast the day before.

As surreal as Time Slippage is, Houseclean Fever is just as bizarre as the persona of Mr. Clean on speed, stealthily surveying each room, armed with Formula 409 in one hand and a spray bottle of chlorine bleach and a cleaning rag in the other.  Children and pets run when this manifestation of sanitary meets insanity enters the room.  No room, no nook, no cranny is safe from this cleaning crazed homebody.  And this can happen at any hour, day or night, midnight or twilight.

That’s when the omnipresent Television Terminus kicks in.  A condition marked by bleary eyes, loss of verbal communication skills and couch potato positioning, these telltale signs of this vacation related malady results from watching endless reruns of the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, C.S.I. and The Golden Girls.

Boredom spawns Betty Crocker Cracked — If it can be baked, basted, boiled, broiled or braised, it is now crammed in the refrigerator.  The pantry is empty, save the two cans of Fancy Feast Seafood Gourmet cat food, and given one more day of mindless vacation, there’s no guarantee that won’t end up in the crockpot with the carrot that slipped behind the refrigerator’s vegetable crisper.  All the Tupperware containers, Glad disposable food savers and Cool-Whip tubs are stacked neatly in the freezer, filled with newly tried recipes resulting from the cooking frenzy that has practically depleted the entire state’s supply of milk, eggs and chocolate chips

The real hint that vacation time is no longer fulfilling its intended purpose is when one just can't slip into that mindfully relaxed state for which one is searching. There is a battle of wills raging between cleaning the cracks in the driveway, sautéing the dill pickles in Fancy Feast Seafood Gourmet and wondering if Leave it to Beaver will ever be regarded as a literary work of art.

It’s time to call it a day; buck that time warp and head back to work — and that includes dealing with the pressing issues of life, such as where in the heck is that alarm clock anyway?