Star Studded Holiday Party at Sam's

Okay, maybe the whole party wasn't star studded.

Maybe one of the guests just had a star stuck in her hair. Actually, I think she flew through the big dipper on her way to my house and managed to snag a star in her blonde tresses when she dodged left suddenly in an attempt to avoid a small asteroid. I guess we'll have to call it the big seive now...

But it was definitely a cast of unique and feisty characters.

I held my annual Holiday party for all of my characters last night. Since I was hosting a mix of everyday, human types along with some angelic as well as demonic critters, the event took me weeks to prep for and was generally fraught with...shall we say...challenges.

First off, how do you set a buffet table for a guest list of this "variety"? My human characters and I needed real food...cooked, edible, and er...normal. My angelic guests mostly just drink coffee and eat dessert, having centuries ago eschewed the food pyramid and flipped the hated calorie a golden finger when they donned their wings and robes. The demons...well let's just say you don't even want to think about what they like to eat. I drew the line at live, screaming fare and mostly gave them their own table of raw meat in the next room.

Then there were the decorations.

My human characters like colorful lights, dancing Santa Claus figurines, a fat, gaily decorated Christmas tree, and maybe some mistletoe. My angelic guests don't really have a problem with these things, but they see it all as rather distracting from the true purpose of the season. For them, I put a large creche under the tree sporting Mary, Joseph, and the baby Jesus sleeping happily beneath its rustic roof. Unfortunately, anything with religious overtones makes the demons ooze oily sweat and encourages their darker side to come out and play. To make things even more difficult, apparently demons view mistletoe as the only acceptable vegetable in an otherwise pure protein diet.

So I compromised.

There wasn't much I could do about the mistletoe...but I put the tree up in a far corner of the room and handed the demons rolls of paper towels to mop their brows with. I set Astra up nearby to glare at them if they even looked like they were thinking about destroying anything. After all, what did I care if they were uncomfortable...they're demons!

Unfortunately, in the end it didn't matter because, while admiring a handmade ornament from Sasha Starshine, which was a Ding Dong on a string that had "Ding Dong-a ling" written across it in white frosting and a fresh bite on one side, Glynus the Black dragon belched from a steak tartare overload and the tree disappeared in a wash of flame. My drapes were barely saved by Emo's quick thinking and the unfortunate application of my famous citrus punch with ice cream.

Damage and decorating disasters aside, the party went well. It's always nice to see my friends getting along. In fact, string headed, monolingual Satanist Dirk Plink seemed to bond very well with my demon guests...in particular, a female I affectionately call "Wormhead". Watching the string headed Satanist drag a word at a time out of his throat in an obvious attempt to woo Ms. Wormhead, I couldn't help wondering if I wouldn't soon be attending a black magic wedding and bouncing a little string and worm headed satanist/demon on my knee.

Shuddering appropriately, I turned just in time to see yummy Prince Dialle pull Astra into a sizzling embrace that was definitely not appropriate for my G rated gathering. Clancy Rogers, draped a hand over her twelve year old son, Adam's eyes, her daughter The Princess giggled, and Thadeous Johannsen, who had been hovering protectively over Clancy and her two kids all night and glaring at the gaggle of demons in the corner, merely flicked an assessing glance over the clinched couple before going back to throwing threatening looks at the oily bad guys and caressing the gun that was barely hidden beneath his sweater.

I took a step toward the devilish duo, but before I could break it up, Astra's cranky sister, Darma tapped Astra on the shoulder and did what she does best, rained on Astra's parade. Astra and Dialle reluctantly pulled apart, but not before the demons, having seen their opportunity to misbehave, had poor Poppy Pelham, reporterette extraordinaire for the Grooster Rooster, pressed wide eyed and quivering into a corner, flicking her bra straps while she squealed in terror.

I sent Emo after the demons and he managed to subdue them without vanquishing anybody, but it was touch and go there for a while. Pretty Poppy was more than a little grateful to her handsome rescuer. In fact, Emo quickly replaced Poppy in the corner, his dark eyes flashing with panic as she plied him with aggressive thank you maneuvers.

The canine, wolf, and ferret guests of the party brought their own special holiday spirit to the gathering. With the exception of Frick and Frack, who have an inbred disdain for anything green or brown under their feet...unless it's carpet...the animals mostly enjoyed playing in the back yard and digging supra-demon sized holes in my carefully tended lawn. Plucky, Sasha Starshine's irrepressible ferret, worked the room like an accomplished street thief, gathering an impressive assortment of stuff for his makeshift nest in my downstairs bathtub. By the end of the evening his nest included some costume jewelry, a couple of scarves, assorted hair adornments, one black leather wallet (no money...I checked before returning it), a super absorbency tampon (fortunately still in the wrapper), one truly horrendous red and green striped Christmas sock with a large hole in the toe, and one pair of thong underwear bearing the strange question, "Who's Tad?" on them....hmmmm....

When I'd finally ushered the last of my guests to the door I collapsed onto my slightly charred sofa (another victim of Glynus' gas issues) and sighed wearily. Dragging a chilled and nicely topped off glass of Champaign to my lips I vowed, as I do every year, to give serious consideration to the idea of writing sweet inspirational stories in the future.

That silliness lasted about two seconds.

Then I grinned and headed for bed, busily plotting my next adventure story. Maybe I could include some Harpies in the next book. Yeah, Harpies are cool...and oh so nasty too...

Oh boy...next year's party is really gonna rock!

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Have a wonderful Holiday season everybody. I look forward to spending time with you in 2009!

Sam